title: Very Disappointed. Didn't Work

text: I was really looking forward to listening to this CD. But, unfortunately it didn't work. I tried it in both my large CD player and my portable CD player.  Nope, didn't work.  There were other items from the manufacturer that I was planning to buy, but I'm hesitant to do so. It wasn't worth the time or effort to return the CD.  Am I missing something???


title: Great!

text: Better than my old cassette, has 2 extra songs! Yes, there are a couple songs that aren't the original versions, but still ok. Jan and Dean aren't the original versions.


title: Great Value

text: A nice document of a wonderful pianist that is mostly overlooked today. The sound is good for its period, nothing that isn't perfectly listenable. Highly recomended.


title: Great Pianist

text: Currently listening to the Beethoven sonatas. The sound is perfectly listenable mid-fifties mono, no problems there for me. Nat was a French pianist who, like most French pianists of his generation, produces a crystal like tone that is very refreshing in these works if you are as tired of piano bangers as I am. Price is great. Highly reccomended.


title: Excellent. Very Satisfied.

text: The first collection of Tchaikovsky symphonies I ever owned, back in the 60's. Nice to have it again. These are very good, largely forgotten performances, the first three by legendary Hans Swarowsky. This particular set was in perfect mint condition.


title: great CD

text: exactly as shown


title: very good singer

text: I love Aya Kamiki's voice. She has strong potential to be a super star. However, her ex-company kinda messed her up. Kinda sad to see her not as well-known as she should be.


title: Great

text: I thought it would be a kpop  album but it’s just a CD. My sister loves it!


title: Simply Magnificent

text: This album is not her best. But, I feel  she has made perhaps the best personal album ever with this release. In 2004, I saw Beth open for Pat Benatar. I knew nothing of her and thought what another ho hum opening act. From the first verse of song one, I was hooked. Halfway through her set , she told the audience she was nine months sober. Then she started to sing " Leave The Light On". I was moved to tears. Needless to say within 24 hours, I purchased the first three albums and could not figure out , why she had not hit the big time. Actually, she just wasn't American Idol enough. Anyway, her pain she bore in her young life was quite evident in her bluesy voice and material. From that point her future albums alone and with Joe Bonnamassa were again pure gold. Then, this album of hope and self reflection comes along. Totally not Beth. Yet, happy endings in movies are my favorite. I sense from this material, Beth has found inner peace and as with all of her music has showed us her courage. It is an off pleasure to hear her happy. The songs are excellent and I feel Beth has overcome something to perform this. I will always love the blues toned Beth the most, but this album is special in a most personal way. Beth has found her " field of clover". Simply magnificent!


title: Excellent Hendrix Performance

text: This CD lacks the polish of a studio recording but has the raw power of a live concert.  Hendrix uses guitar licks I haven't heard anywhere else, his vocals are a little sloppy but it's exciting to hear him improvise.  The best Star Spangled Banner ever is on this CD.


title: Power pop deliciousness!

text: Jellyfish fans take note and rejoice!


title: Absolutely Essential Powerpop!

text: A great little 5 song EP that will leave you wanting more. A must have for fans of Fountains of Wayne, Owsley, Kara's Flowers, Super Deluxe, and all such similar 90's era power pop. Don't let this one pass you by!


title: Just love his greatest hits!

text: The music wonderful sound is great great value!


title: Live tom petty

text: Had to rebuild my music collection and tom petty was on top of my list!


title: Five Stars

text: fresh replacement


title: remaster as good as orignal

text: The remaster version sounds just like the original cassette tape I have from years ago!


title: Very Good

text: Very Good


title: A rare Gem

text: A rare gem.  Almost woth it  just for how sexey Areata looks on the cover.  Mine came in Album / Mini LP CD look which normally would have added to the price  especially on a limited edition.  Get while you can.


title: Very Nice

text: Very Nice audiophile quality.


title: Five Stars

text: Very Nice and a hard to find CD


This is the album that DD should have released! While I did enjoy the Astronaut album, the demos such as "Beautiful Colors" and "Salt in the Rainbow" are by far some of the best songs the band has ever recorded. Some of my favorite songs by the band happen to be demos or b-sides, so I am so glad that they end up releasing a lot of them. I also enjoyed the different versions of the songs that did appear on the Astronaut album. I highly recommend that you purchase this if you are a fan of their music.


I think It's the best Christmas album ever. Had it originally on the old 78 records, but with different cover.


title: Five Stars

text: My favorite of Garths!  Love Dixie Chicken!!


title: Great product and Super Fast Delivery

text: Great very pleased


title: Inspirational

text: Faith based music


title: The very best blue grass band in existence.

text: Excellent cd...have been a fan for 20 or more years...ed


title: Great CD

text: I first brought this CD when I went into a pawn shop to buy a money order and it was playing.  While waiting I decided I wanted that CD and purchased it on the spot.  That was 7 years ago and when I scratched it this holiday I was totally upset.  Then I thought of my Amazon and I located my favorite Christmas CD and thanks to Amazon and you, I have the replacement.  It is a wonderful CD and I "didn't even by it new!"  I most definitely will purchase from this Seller again and again.  Thanks.


title: Great CD all the classics

text: I was very happy with my purchase


title: Love it

text: Love it!!


title: Love it

text: Most gorgeous album! Love all the songs on this album, as always great artists! Red Velvet’s vocals are so smooth & blend just perfectly. Their voices are like the most delicious deserts for your ears.


title: It’s gorgeous

text: It was a gift but my friend love it and it arrived in perfect condition.


title: Great Martha Reeves cuts!

text: Two great recording's by Martha Reeves and the Vandellas -- Aretha's "If I Lose This Dream" and Sylvia Moy's "I Love the Way He Loves Me" -- make this worth the price.


title: Truly the best

text: Great collection of songs


title: Five Stars

text: They were all very good.


title: The best soundblaster midi renditions ever!

text:
If you are looking for the actual TV theme recordings, look elsewhere.

If however, you are looking for cheap soundblaster MIDI renditions of TV theme songs, this is your ticket to cheesy soundbank heaven! remember on windows 3.1 when you were amazed to hear canyon.mid belting out of your brand new SB16 ISA card with OPL3. this is what these themes sound like.

If you are looking for a joke CD to give someone, especially someone you don't like, this would be quite sufficient.


title: Love it

text: Great CD


title: Great

text: It was exactly what I wanted to replace the LP I had easy to follow and play to get exercise


title: Great Find and Seller

text: Used LP in excellent condition at a very good price.


title: BEST PURCHASE EVER

text: Came with everything and more than i was expecting. So happy with this purchase.


This set of cds were just what the Dr. ordered. They came to the house super fast and were in superb condition. They were exactly as described. Nice job.


title: gift

text: can not give a full review as this was a gift but recipient said they loved it..


title: Good

text: Good quality products


title: Priceless material!

text: A hilarious collection for anyone acquainted with Maine.  I never get tired of hearing and rebelling these stories. Deserves to be better known.


title: I love this album

text: When Maiden released all their albums on CD in 1995 with the bonus discs I managed to get nearly all of them.  I love this album.  But the bonus disc that I got had some other band on it.  It wasn't until about five or six years ago when I put the disc into my computer and Musicmatch Jukebox said the unknown band was The Offspring.  I'm not kidding.  Back in '95 I skipped through the whole disc and all the songs, 12 or 13 or so, are by The Offspring.<br />I have always wondered how many people got the same thing I have.  I still own the discs of course as Iron Maiden is one of my all time favorite bands.  Years ago I might have bought this special edition again but now with Spotify I've heard the bonus songs and there is no need to buy it again and I certainly wouldn't pay $35 for it.


title: Explosive Doowops Vol.1

text: Very satisfied


title: Finest work so far

text: AOA has gone from 7 to 5 members and has had to reinvent themselves as an artistic group. These singers have transitioned from cute young girls to talented women. new Moon is a great addition to my AOA playlist..


title: great performance. Great sax and voice as usual for ...

text: Once again, Eddie Shaw shines. Well chosen songs, great performance. Great sax and voice as usual for Eddie Shaw. Recommended highly.


title: great

text: Exceptional product, great value


title: A superb collection

text: A magnificent, wonderful celtic collection! I seldom use the radio in my vehicle but find listening to these soothing, lovely celtic songs perfectly relaxing enroute or returning from a days work. Superb value for the monies spent!


title: Wonderful compilation.

text: This is a great CD with uplifting selections.


title: Beautiful music!

text: I had seen the movie and loved it so I bought the CD which I also love. If you enjoy Indian music, this is a wonderful CD.


title: Region 2 dvd

text: Will not play with US DVD player. Region 2 dvd. Returning. Didn’t see this description anywhere except by zooming in on back of DVD image.


title: Two Stars

text: Good songs but they are NOT sung by the original artists.


title: Love the new album, Mac!

text: I love Mac Powell and enjoyed listening to him have some fun with a different genre of music although it was still pure and praised God in its own way.


title: Five Stars

text: Great discs of all of the best of his songs.


title: Five Stars

text: really good


title: Four Stars

text: ok


title: Four Stars

text: good.


title: Too many vocals, but great arrangements.

text: The orchestra is great, and the arrangements beautiful. I just wanted expecting vocals on so many of the songs, which gives it almost a juvenile sound. If they had a karaoke version of this album, I'd give it 5 stars.


title: Five Stars

text: I LOVE OLD SKOOL HIP HOP AND RAP!!! Good memories!!


title: Five Stars

text: received on time in good condition.  my grandchildren are enjoying this.  love it.


title: Love this album!

text: Loveeeee itttt!!!!

attachment_type: IMAGE


title: I'm a kid again

text: Just for kicks tonight I looked up Let's Pretend because I had part of the theme song stuck in my head.  What I never knew was Let's Pretend was an old radio show.  I did a search for "Let's Pretend" and "Uncle Ted" and there are a couple websites that have the original radio shows.  It was great.  Then to find the groovy album artwork on Amazon?  Priceless.  Feeling very nostalgic right now.


title: A different Aretha album

text: Great album! I never knew about this phase of Aretha's career until I heard some cuts on my local jazz station. Yes, over the air!


title: Five Stars

text: Love ir


Just received the CD today in the mail and the case was cracked and the CD already has scratches on it. Not very happy with the condition when it arrived...


title: Great music

text: Love John Melloncamp.  Been listening to him since he started as John Cougar


title: Worth the money

text: Good music, good songs. Sounds good.


title: Great music

text: Great rock n roll music!!! Sounds very good.  Every song is great to listen to.  Can’t go wrong buying this cd.  Arrived in good condition, even the case.


title: Fantastic bands lost works

text: This is fantastic band from Baltimore MD that faded away. I'm not sure if they are together anymore, which is sad. I lost my copy of this CD and had to purchase two of the three that I found here on Amazon, it's extremely hard to find. This is a great listen, I wish they were on Spotify, youtube or Pandora, really a great album.


title: This is the second copy I have purchased

text: Recently bought a second copy of this album as I wore the original one out (scratched) over the years.


title: Israel at his best!

text: Israel knocked it out of the park on this one. I work out and do my stretching listening to this. Is my favorite of all his albums!


title: Five Stars

text: Great product, highly recommend =)


title: Easily overlooked  but don't pass this one up

text:
I've had this disk for about two months now and I've probably listened to it once a day on average. Sometimes two or three times a day.  It is just a great listen from beginning to end that never seems to get old and seems to get better with each listening.

Nagelfar are a german black metal band - all the lyrics are in german.  Everything you could want in a diverse black metal album are here:  a mix of clean vocals, typical screeching black metal vocals, and downright sorrowful/tormented cries of anguish that only the most sufferable SOB could unleash (and the best part is it's in german so if you don't understand german like I do, it's even more outlandish sounding), swedish style melodic guitar riffs, melodic keyboard passages that are just legendary as f*ck, good drumming, occasional mellow passages.  It's all in there.

It's the diversity from track to track that really makes this album one of my favorite black metal releases hands down!  I just can't describe how much I love this CD.

It's hard to draw comparisons from other bands.  One section of the song Schwanengesang (Swansong), the guitar riff in particular, sounds like Kampfar.  Other stuff sometimes sounds like Abigor ("Opus IV" era - which is another brilliant CD while I'm at it).  Other than that these guys really just do their own thing.

If you're any kind of black metal fan pick this one up. you won't be disappointed.  The sound quality isn't the best, but it's better than the average black metal album and it's clear enough to hear everything.


title: GOOD NEWS!!!

text: Save your money.........AHC is re-releasing Trepanation!  Can't wait.  I repeat, save your money.  They are re-releasing Trepanation, as well as making a DVD and recording NEW material.  The next year is gonna belong to American Head Charge!!!


title: Five Stars

text: The live song rocks!


title: Five Stars

text: great


title: YEAH!!

text: Best Fida cd to come out in my opinion.  I really have nothing else to say about this CD.  NONO!


title: Three Stars

text: Memories!


title: Astro-

text: I saw this BBC series on PBS a few years ago and decided then, that I would love to own a copy of it for my personal library.  It was then I found out that the format was not suited to play on our American DVD player.  This was very disappointing, and I do not understand.  Why?  The whole story had to do with American effort, work and ingenuity, from Managers, Engineers, to the workers on the factory floor. Why is BBC, not releasing the DVD in the format,so American's can play them?  They did a excellent job in producing the program, but besides that, they had nothing to do with the tremendous work since 1957-1969 and beyond, with the arrival of the Shuttle. If I have to fly to England to purchase a DVD that will play their disc format, I will!


title: Some of These Classical Period Sonatas from France Are a Bit Bland; Others Are Quite Brilliant and Very Delightful to Listen to

text:
When studying violoncello (also called 'cello) in high school, I learned one of Jean-Baptiste Bréval's more famous sonatas, one of them in C major, beloved of students for many years. That sonata (which really is more along the lines of a didactic sonatina), although not identified as such on the printed music as co-edited by Leonard Rose, the celebrated American concert solo artist, pedagogue, chamber music player, and principal 'cellist of some fine U.S. orchestras (touching up, for the International Music Company, Carl Schroeder's standard old student's edition), happens to be from the composer's op. 40 set, the first of the three easy sonatas for the instrument.

That sonata is not on this fine CD of Bréval's six sonatas, op. 12, some of which, compared to the op. 40 sonatas, are quite brilliant and rather complex and thus suited to the advanced student or to the professional performer. The little sonatas, all in three movements, tend to become more virtuosic and musically fascinating as the set of six unfolds. It is annoying that neither in the listing of the op. 12 sonatas nor in the brief notes upon the wrapper's presentation folder with the CD (Centaur CRC-3194) does any identification of the tonalities (keys) of most of these six sonatas appear. That is a minor point of irritation, however, for what counts most is the playing, which is brilliant, very musical, elegant, and satisfying, as 'cellist Fedor Amosov delivers these musical gems.

Amosov claims that Bréval conceived the accompaniment to these sonatas for continuo. The solo part, incidentally, was conceived also to be played alternatively (in a treble register, of course) by a violin or flute soloist rather than necessarily by a 'cellist, but that probably was merely to provoke further sales of the sheet music in Bréval's own time. Here Amosov is accompanied, with musically discreet reticence, by Alexy Kurbatov, there being no 'cello or other bass instrument to reinforce the bass line that one hears in the pianist's left hand.

Amosov's virtuosity, charming delicacy, and flair for this delightful music in this 2011 recording are what the collector needs, so he need not wait for another CD to come along as an alternative to Centaur's disc, unless he have quibbles about a supposedly more musicologically apt realisation of the continuo accompaniment. a matter of dubious importance, since Jean-Baptiste Bréval (whose dates are 1753 to 1823. varying slightly as reported in other sources) lived well into the late classical era and the beginning of the Romantic movement in music, when such treatment of the bass was becoming redundant as continuo playing fell into disuse and, anyway, was changing in application even where it persisted. The op. 12 sonatas sound very much more akin to Boccherini or one of that composer's contemporaries of decidedly rococo or classical sonic mien than to the more questing music of Beethoven, of mature Cherubini, or of Schubert, in case one wonders how Bréval's style fits into the changing sound of the music of his time. Thankfully, Amosov's and Kurbatov's playing suits the music just fine!


title: Grandly Proportioned, Expansively Shaped Performance of Beethoven's Mighty Seventh Symphony with Pleasing Account of the Second

text:
Having just finished listening to Herbert Kegel's recording, with the Dresden Philharmonic, of Beethoven's Seventh Symphony, I was somewhat startled to realise that the Dresdner Philharmonie (know in English as the "Dresden Philharmonic Orchestra") turns out to be such an exceptionally fine orchestra! I would not have expected Dresden to have another such excellent orchestra in addition to the famous Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden (known in English simply and usually as the "Dresden Staatskapelle Orchestra") but, yes, Dresden is a city of considerable orchestral excellence, indeed. The Philharmonic of that city may not be quite on the supreme level of the Staatskappelle, one of the world's greatest orchestras of all, but it comes pretty darn close!

Of course, the Germans are so cultivated and they support the arts so magnificently, that it is not surprising that some German cities have more than one top-line orchestra. All that one has to do, by way of further example, is to think of Munich, with its civic and also radio symphony orchestras, both of them among the finest internationally. Leipzig, for its part, where Kegel formerly had directed the second-stringer Mitteldeutscher Rundfunks Sinfonieorchester (Leipzig Radio Orchestra) which does not come up to the level of the city's own Gewandhaus Orchestra of of the orchestras in Munich and Dresden, either, in that regard, The Gewandhausorchester (in English terms, the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra) is superior by a considerable margin to the Leipzig orchestra that Kegel conducted in that recording of Brahms' Second Symphony. Indeed, the Staatskapelle and Gewandhaus orchestras both are of the very top rank of orchestras internationally. However, in Dresden, the Philharmonic holds its own quite well, "thank-you-very-much".

The Dresden Philharmonic's, double bass section is really something to savour; that instrument having been the one on which I attained greatest proficiency, anyway, it should not be surprising that I tend to listen from the bottom upwards so much of the time, and what I hear in this recording is very pleasing in that regard. The basses do not have the incisive edge and attack that make the "old" (pre-Ozawa) Boston Symphony (especially under Koussevitzky and Leinsdorf) and New York Philharmonic (under Bernstein) orchestras so supremely exciting, but the Dresden dudes, indeed, fare quite well  as bass players and as together as a section, in my estimation. The entire orchestra holds up well to such close aural scrutiny.

Kegel's approach to Beethoven's Seventh Symphony in Dresden is at the antipodes of Leinsdorf;s supreme recorded performance in Boston, Kegel's being  a memorably fine performance on its own very different terms. Leinsdorf's Boston S.O. recording is electrifyingly kinetic, thrillingly the stuff of "life or death" struggle and energy. In that regard. Except in being so much better, Leinsdorf's own effort is along the lines of Toscanini's 1930s recordings of the symphony, but, thankfully, less "tightassed" and obsessive than Toscanini had been. Leinsdorf makes greater space for the Romantic elements in the work than Toscanini had done so. Toscanini is more strictly and invariably classical in expression, very powerfully so, in a somewhat rigidly unbending sort of way. Kegel, on the other hand, is more expansive in pacing and concept than either Leinsdorf or Torscanini, but Kegel does not sound at all indifferent to the genuine style and content of Beethoven's epoch-straddling music. The tempi which Kegel sets are slower than Toscnini's or Leinsdorf's. I did not measure them or make direct A-B comparisons with a metronome, but Kegel's tempi do feel, at least, to be less propulsive.

I would characterise Kegel's performance as quite measured, carefully calibrated (especially in moving from one movement to the next to emphasise contrasts between them), and, well, wise and deliberate (not the latter word in the sense of slow, but rather in that of setting forth its own interpretively particular stance). Kegel's phrasing is, unusually, more lyrical, sustained, and legato than one normally hears, although not at all weakly flabby and even a bit crude in that regard, as in Monteux' doddering manner, as with the London Symphony Orchestra, at that maestro's worst (in repertory for which Monteux in old age does not excel so memorably as he did lifelong in Russian and French music); in his prime Monteux had conducted Beethoven's symphonies and overtures superbly, but the ageing maestro did so much less reliably well in the last decade or so of his life. Anyway, Kegel's recording has a strong interpretive profile of its own, one that, in its own way, is a welcome contrast to Leinsdorf's taughtly sublime recording. As one may notice in my reviews, I tend to prefer (although not invariably) forward-pressing, high energy performances, so long, of course, as they do not become merely frenetic or superficially showy.

  There are some keenly subtle transitions that Kegel makes, if one listen attentively, not only within the symphony's movements but also between them. Kegel does not conduct the Seventh as though it were entirely of one fabric alone. For one thing, to take a clue from orchestral balances, at first he seems to under-emphasise the tympani, especially in comparison to Leinsdorf, who makes quite a feast (a welcome one) of them. However, as one movement follows another, the percussion becomes incrementally more prominent. By the last movement, the kettledrums are searing in their impact. That is a very interesting and subtle way to handle percussion. In general, Kegel seems to tighten the expressive screws noticeably from one movement to the following one as the work proceeds along its course. This has the effect of offering quite a lot of variety within the work.

All of this is far from saying that I do not continue to prefer Leinsdorf's taut approach throughout that conductor's own performance of the work, but merely that Kegel's way with Beethoven's Seventh Symphony rewards the listener amply in its own manner. I shall be coming back rather often to Kegel's recording of the Seventh, since I revel in alternative approaches, if they be valid ones, even if I have strong preferences for what I like best among recorded performances of such great music as Beethoven's mighty Seventh Symphony most assuredly is.

Kegel's Dresden recording of Beethoven's Second Symphony makes for a genial disc companion to the Seventh on this CD. The orchestra's excellent playing and ensemble work make the conductor's approach, emphasising grace and mellifluous lyricism above the work's potential for humour and energetic drive. This is not to say that Kegel ignores such aspects of the score, but rather that his approach is solidly grounded, large in gesture, lyrical, and often more dance-like, when Beethoven's rhythms encourage that, making a sun-filled, mellow feast of this delightful music.

Compared to so many other rival recorded performances of the Second, which number among them the great accounts of Sir Thomas Beecham (with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra) and of Leonard Bernstein (the recording which he made with the New York Philharmonic Orchestra being the one in mind), Kegel's recording holds its own. However, I have to admit that I do prefer the sense of adventure, thrusting energy, and of jovial humour that Bernstein brings to the fore in his great rendition rather more than Kegel opts for as an alternative to emphasising also such characteristics of this symphony. For those who prefer a more gentle and reflective approach, rather than the likes of Bernstein's, to Beethoven's Second Symphony, Kegel's excellent work with the Dresden Philharmonic, well recorded, make it a wise choice, especially since the Seventh Symphony on the same disc is so good and very much in the same interpretive mode.


title: Grand, Expansive, Probing Performance of Beethoven's Great Seventh Symphony

text:
Having just finished listening to Herbert Kegel's recording, with the Dresden Philharmonic, of Beethoven's Seventh Symphony, I was somewhat startled to realise that the Dresdner Philharmonie (know in English as the "Dresden Philharmonic Orchestra") turns out to be such an exceptionally fine orchestra! I would not have expected Dresden to have another such excellent orchestra in addition to the famous Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden (known in English simply and usually as the "Dresden Staatskapelle Orchestra") but, yes, Dresden is a city of considerable orchestral excellence, indeed. The Philharmonic of that city may not be quite on the supreme level of the Staatskappelle, one of the world's greatest orchestras of all, but it comes pretty darn close!

Of course, the Germans are so cultivated and they support the arts so magnificently, that it is not surprising that some German cities have more than one top-line orchestra. All that one has to do, by way of further example, is to think of Munich, with its civic and also radio symphony orchestras, both of them among the finest internationally. Leipzig, for its part, where Kegel formerly had directed the second-stringer Mitteldeutscher Rundfunks Sinfonieorchester (Leipzig Radio Orchestra) which does not come up to the level of the city's own Gewandhaus Orchestra of of the orchestras in Munich and Dresden, either, in that regard, The Gewandhausorchester (in English terms, the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra) is superior by a considerable margin to the Leipzig orchestra that Kegel conducted in that recording of Brahms' Second Symphony. Indeed, the Staatskapelle and Gewandhaus orchestras both are of the very top rank of orchestras internationally. However, in Dresden, the Philharmonic holds its own quite well, "thank-you-very-much".

The Dresden Philharmonic's, double bass section is really something to savour; that instrument having been the one on which I attained greatest proficiency, anyway, it should not be surprising that I tend to listen from the bottom upwards so much of the time, and what I hear in this recording is very pleasing in that regard. The basses do not have the incisive edge and attack that make the "old" (pre-Ozawa) Boston Symphony (especially under Koussevitzky and Leinsdorf) and New York Philharmonic (under Bernstein) orchestras so supremely exciting, but the Dresden dudes, indeed, fare quite well  as bass players and as together as a section, in my estimation. The entire orchestra holds up well to such close aural scrutiny.

Kegel's approach to Beethoven's Seventh Symphony in Dresden is at the antipodes of Leinsdorf;s supreme recorded performance in Boston, Kegel's being  a memorably fine performance on its own very different terms. Leinsdorf's Boston S.O. recording is electrifyingly kinetic, thrillingly the stuff of "life or death" struggle and energy. In that regard. Except in being so much better, Leinsdorf's own effort is along the lines of Toscanini's 1930s recordings of the symphony, but, thankfully, less "tightassed" and obsessive than Toscanini had been. Leinsdorf makes greater space for the Romantic elements in the work than Toscanini had done so. Toscanini is more strictly and invariably classical in expression, very powerfully so, in a somewhat rigidly unbending sort of way. Kegel, on the other hand, is more expansive in pacing and concept than either Leinsdorf or Torscanini, but Kegel does not sound at all indifferent to the genuine style and content of Beethoven's epoch-straddling music. The tempi which Kegel sets are slower than Toscnini's or Leinsdorf's. I did not measure them or make direct A-B comparisons with a metronome, but Kegel's tempi do feel, at least, to be less propulsive.

I would characterise Kegel's performance as quite measured, carefully calibrated (especially in moving from one movement to the next to emphasise contrasts between them), and, well, wise and deliberate (not the latter word in the sense of slow, but rather in that of setting forth its own interpretively particular stance). Kegel's phrasing is, unusually, more lyrical, sustained, and legato than one normally hears, although not at all weakly flabby and even a bit crude in that regard, as in Monteux' doddering manner, as with the London Symphony Orchestra, at that maestro's worst (in repertory for which Monteux in old age does not excel so memorably as he did lifelong in Russian and French music); in his prime Monteux had conducted Beethoven's symphonies and overtures superbly, but the ageing maestro did so much less reliably well in the last decade or so of his life. Anyway, Kegel's recording has a strong interpretive profile of its own, one that, in its own way, is a welcome contrast to Leinsdorf's taughtly sublime recording. As one may notice in my reviews, I tend to prefer (although not invariably) forward-pressing, high energy performances, so long, of course, as they do not become merely frenetic or superficially showy.

There are some keenly subtle transitions that Kegel makes, if one listen attentively, not only within the symphony's movements but also between them. Kegel does not conduct the Seventh as though it were entirely of one fabric alone. For one thing, to take a clue from orchestral balances, at first he seems to under-emphasise the tympani, especially in comparison to Leinsdorf, who makes quite a feast (a welcome one) of them. However, as one movement follows another, the percussion becomes incrementally more prominent. By the last movement, the kettledrums are searing in their impact. That is a very interesting and subtle way to handle percussion. In general, Kegel seems to tighten the expressive screws noticeably from one movement to the following one as the work proceeds along its course. This has the effect of offering quite a lot of variety within the work.

All of this is far from saying that I do not continue to prefer Leinsdorf's taut approach throughout that conductor's own performance of the work, but merely that Kegel's way with Beethoven's Seventh Symphony rewards the listener amply in its own manner. I shall be coming back rather often to Kegel's recording of the Seventh, since I revel in alternative approaches, if they be valid ones, even if I have strong preferences for what I like best among recorded performances of such great music as Beethoven's mighty Seventh Symphony most assuredly is.

Kegel's Dresden recording of Beethoven's Second Symphony makes for a genial disc companion to the Seventh on this CD. The orchestra's excellent playing and ensemble work make the conductor's approach, emphasising grace and mellifluous lyricism above the work's potential for humour and energetic drive. This is not to say that Kegel ignores such aspects of the score, but rather that his approach is solidly grounded, large in gesture, lyrical, and often more dance-like, when Beethoven's rhythms encourage that, making a sun-filled, mellow feast of this delightful music.

Compared to so many other rival recorded performances of the Second, which number among them the great accounts of Sir Thomas Beecham (with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra) and of Leonard Bernstein (the recording which he made with the New York Philharmonic Orchestra being the one in mind), Kegel's recording holds its own. However, I have to admit that I do prefer the sense of adventure, thrusting energy, and of jovial humour that Bernstein brings to the fore in his great rendition rather more than Kegel opts for as an alternative to emphasising also such characteristics of this symphony. For those who prefer a more gentle and reflective approach, rather than the likes of Bernstein's, to Beethoven's Second Symphony, Kegel's excellent work with the Dresden Philharmonic, well recorded, make it a wise choice, especially since the Seventh Symphony on the same disc is so good and very much in the same interpretive mode.


title: Monteux Conducts Affectionately Large, Warmly Appealing Brahms, but This Only Feebly Conveys What This Symphony Really Is about

text:
Pierre Monteux' credentials as "a bona fide Brahmsian", based on evidence of his recorded performances of Brahms' Second Symphony, would seen to have flowed then ebbed over the years. Monteux' account of the Second in 1945 for R.C.A. Victor (reissued on R.C.A. Gold Seal 09026-61891-2), conducting a San Francisco Symphony Orchestra in gloriously fine state, was a triumphant achievement, the orchestration not heard in much detail in that recording (that probably being due to Monteux' own tendency not to highlight such fine points in the complex orchestration of Brahms' and Beethoven's music), but Monteux shaped the work as a whole cogently and powerfully as he conducted it, with great fervour and drive. Among Brahms' four symphonies, the elusive Second is one that is difficult to interpret satisfactorily.  By 1959, fourteen years later. in Vienna, in Monteux' life and career, and yet later, in 1962 in London, it still is evident, indeed, that Monteux dearly loved Brahms' music, as he had averred so ardently over the years in interviews, but the results were not up to the level of the 1945 recording.

However, in 1959 at least, conducting, for studio recording, the same work in Vienna, and in 1962 doing the same in London, Monteux' much-avowed predilection for Brhams' music seems to have become something of a case of "smother-lover" adulation. Monteux' 1959 and 1962 generally consistent approach to the Second still is of the Lofty Variety  (rather than intimate sort), like Herbert Kegel or Bruno Walter in this work, but not nearly so masterfully so as Walter's 1960 account, a recording of the work that is huge, adventurous, epic, and downright heroic. Monteux with the L.S.O. rather babies the music along (like marshalling a bulky, growing St. Bernard puppy), afraid of its roughest edges, attempting to tame the work for, perhaps, Mrs. Average Housewife, as she may be plopped down upon the davenport with her head on a cushion at one end of the said sofa and her feet raised upon the arm at the other side thereof, relaxing from a rough and tiring job of scrubbing the floors, waxing, and polishing them to a splendid shine.

What that Lady of the House hears in bother the Vienna and London recordings (as I did) is a large-scale, marvellously lilting and loving way with the music, one that very much emphasises the duetting of the double basses and 'celli on the lower end with the violin sections on the distaff end above. Inner parts tend to be suppressed into a general sonic haze unless they are unusually prominent at any one moment, at which time one or more of them loom(s) up through the fog of sonically pleasant blend to seize the listener's attention. Some of the tempi are a bit on the slow side, not something particularly common for Monteux, incidentally, who even in old age was a spritely old soul.

Even concentrating to do so, it simply is impossible for the ears in such recorded performances as those of 1959 and of 1962 to peer -- as it were in visual terms for something auditory -- into the often turbulent but well balanced vortex of Brahms' orchestration and the inner texture of the music, to seize upon whatever details that I want to notice at any one time (without losing track of the main line of the music) and, especially, to hear Brahms' fascinating counter-rhythms working with, at, and against each other, in the syncopation and hemiola that tend to be present, usually subtly and ingeniously, much of the time, as ever in this composer's music. The lack of detail surely is the conductor's choice and not rather the fault of the engineer's, either, which is to say, that most of that kind of thing in Brahms' music goes to waste as Monteux himself smoothes over textures and blunts the articulation of irregular rhythms. So, although Monteux' approach is eminently competent, is definitely in control, and it is rational enough, it misses out on a lot of what makes Brahms' music so fascinating to hear and to follow closely. Monteux' performance is very disappointing in those important matters!

The London Symphony Orchestra plays smoothly and agreeably. The brass, at least, sound somewhat less disagreeably than they sometimes do on other  L.S.O. recordings. Among the strings, the double basses have a large, imposing tone, albeit without the marvellous articulation and punch of, say, the Boston Symphony Orchestra or of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, or of the best European ensembles, or, for that matter, of the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra's basses for Monteux in 1945. This is all part of the sort of the proficient but somewhat anonymous sound of the L.S.O., usually a fine enough orchestra but not one which has much of a distinctive character to its sound to set it apart from other fine orchestras of the world. As for the Vienna Philharmonic in the 1962 recorded performance, one hears a rather more distinguished orchestra (but, really, quite short of the quality of the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra in 1945) of which the brass section in Vienna, in particular, surpasses what the L.S.O. was able to accomplish.

Anyhow, for the Brahms' Second, praise for other recordings of the Second led by other conductors climaxes in enthusiasm on the part of this listener above all for the recordings of Bruno Walter (with the "Columbia Symphony Orchestra"), of Eugen Jochum (his 1951 account), radically different and contrasting in its exquisite delicacy to Walter's grandeur in the music, in Monteux' earlier 1945 R.C.A. recording, which alone of the French maestro's recordings of the work is a serious contender, even if that is not so also for his later 1959 and 1962 outings with the work from Decca/London. It is Walter and Jochum, above all, who most strongly hold my affection in this work and, along with Edward van Beinum and Antal Dorati elsewhere, in Brahms' other symphonies as well.


title: Lovely Programme of Compatible Works for Listening Together

text:
The recordings on this LP, and the cagey choice of works to feature together, are a lovely phenomenon. Perhaps best of all is the inclusion of a selection of Brahms' "Liebeslieder" watzes presented in orchestral garb, really (for these ears, at least) more agreeable fare than either the two-pianos or vocal ensemble versions of these exquisite dances.

Having the gorgeous Dvorak Nocturne and Elgar's Serenade for Strings together with those waltzes, plus some lovable Grieg, makes for one of the nicest programmes of works together on any LP or CD that I know of. The performances are among the best and warmest in spirit, too, that have been available over the years.

Hopefully, this eventually will make it to transfer on CD. Until then, folks, this is a vinyl disc to buy and to cherish, if one can find it.


title: The Late Loren Maazel Knew How to Draw Optimum Dramatic Effect from Beethoven's Opera to Thrilling Impact

text:
Many critics, and the listeners whom they influence, downgrade the worth of this supremely exciting recording of Beethoven's "Fidelio" (in the usual final version of the score). Well, they are wrong! It is true that Otto Klemperer's recording is very beautiful, and it features the incomparable Jon Vickers as Florestan among the well cast soloists, but even Klemperer's recording reeks too much of the overly-devout, oratorio-like quality of far too many performances (whether recorded in the studio or in the theatre) of this work. "Fidelio" is an OPERA (even if there is some spoken dialogue), a real music drama, NOT an oratorio or cantata!

Loren Maazel really digs into the music, driving the music forward relentlessly to thrillingly theatrical effect! There is no doubting, under Maazel's baton, that indeed this is a stage work, one as fervently dramatic as any in the standard repertoire. Bergit Nilsson's voice, singing Leonore, rings out with blazingly heroic impact; she is heard in some live recordings of "Fidelio", under other conductors' direction, interpreting her part at higher levels of histrionic intensity than in this studio recording under Maazel's direction, but most buyers will prefer Maazel's excitingly conducted recording with her in the role in stereo sound that so vividly has more sonic "presence". Her partner, tenor James McCracken, in subsequent recordings that he made seldom sounded so good as he does here; as Florestan he powerfully rises to the considerable challenge of partnering a soprano of so clarion a voice as Nilsson.

Yes, Klemperer, and some other conductors too, have shaped the score's orchestral detail more exquisitely, but nearly always in musical performance contexts that vitiate the dramatic impact which Beethoven surely intended. Maazel, on the other hand, while perhaps at times driving rough-shod over some minutiae of orchestral detail (at least compared to "Dr. Klemps"), ignites the thrilling drama that so imbues this great music. Okay, get the Klemperer recording too (which has many beauties and is sung by a superb cast of vocal soloists), but buy Maazel's recording first!


title: The First Wave of the Weavers' Recordings Bring Back Great Memories of the Late 1940s and of the 1950s!

text:
For anyone of my age (70, writing in Nov. 2013), the Weavers are a cherished and joyous remembrance of childhood and youth. Growing up in L.A. County in the 1940s through mid-1960s, the Weavers often, as I recall, made television appearances on variety shows and the like during my early years, when we had T.V. several years before it finally reached Québec or Canada, where I by now have lived most of my life. The Weavers' recordings were heard frequently on radio and sold well, too, on 78, 45, and eventually 33.3 r.p.m. discs, of which I have many in my personal collection.

Along the way, the group acquired a reputation, and at times censure from right-wing politicians, for their political and social stands. By the time that I saw the Weavers live at a Newport Folk Festival concert in the early 1960s, singing with Joan Baez, the group had become iconic among broad-minded and progressive North Americans.

The fame of the Weavers was thoroughly due them. The singers had a direct, unaffected, manner, which was even agreeably rough at times, but not bare and at times tiresome as the likes of folk and (sometimes) country soloist Burl Ives; the Weavers certainly avoided the slickness or superficiality of performers (such as the Kingston Trio) who eventually followed in their wake.

Although one thinks of the Weavers as a folk group, they sang many "old time" (and even current) pop songs as well, and their style embraced American folk, commercial pop, swing music, and even "trad jazz", evidences of all of which are on these recordings from the years which this reissue embraces; despite their versatility, the Weavers always were consistently themselves, with lively arrangements that, however styled, never sink into mere glitziness. Although the members were known for their liberal to radical political stances, the group seldom performed material with truly blatantly activist lyrics, especially during these early years.

The recordings, given their vintage, are not the last word in sonic vividness, so younger listeners, unaccustomed to the sound of late electrical "78s" and of likewise monaural recordings on 45 r.p.m. discs, should bear patiently with an honest CD reissue like this one (M.C.A.-Decca CMCAD-11465), which does not attempt to falsify their sound by a wrong-headed attempt to "update" them. This reissue is a good sampling of what made the Weavers so beloved and so justly successful.


title: Fleisher, in His Earler Studio Recording of Ravel's Concerto for Piano (Left Hand Alone), Benefits from Comissiona's Partnership

text:
Leon Fleisher made two studio recordings of Maurice Ravel's Concerto for Piano, Left Hand Alone, of which the finer performance is this one (on Vanguard's CD) which Sergiu Comissiona conducts. The other (Sony Classical SK-47-188) has Fleisher in harness with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, as that hunk of deadwood drifting in the tide, Seiji Ozawa conducts it.

The Fleisher/Commissiona recording is by far the better performance, with by turns voluptuously lovely, poetically evocative, and jazzily snazzy playing from the Baltimore ensemble under Comissiona's cunning direction. Fleisher plays better, too, with those Baltimore forces, which supply a much more atmospheric and colourful accompaniment under Sergiu Comissiona's inspired and poetic direction. Their collaboration with Fleisher Fleisher favourably with the sonic sludge that Ozawa draws, oozing gooily, from the B.S.O. (that abbreviation applying potentially to both orchestras, but being more widely recognised as standing for "Boston Symphony Orchestra" than as one indicating the Baltimore ensemble). In Saint-Saëns' famous Third Symphony, the one that includes organ, Comissiona and his men, this time of Houston, Tex., show what another "regional" orchestra (one which long has had off-and-on prominence under distringuished conductors such as Antal Dorati and Leopold Stokowsky), again in French repertory, are capable of accomplishing.

Leon Fleischer always has been an astute and highly virtuosic pianist. Fortunately, while he was lacking the use of his right hand, he continued to record piano works for left hand only as he had the opportunity, such as the other recordings on that later Ozawa-led CD from 1990 (matching the Ravel concerto with a left hand work by Sir Benjamin Britten) and 1991 (the left hand concerto by Serge Prokofiev on the same CD). This has been a boon to the record catalogues, for Fleisher's piano left-hand work has been of extraordinary quality, possibly the best in such repertory. He already had been one of the very greatest and most artistic, rigourously musical and intellectual keyboard players of the 20th century before fate made him turn to the repertory for left hand alone.

Fleisher and Comissiona simply enchant the listener on their Vanguard recording of the concerto by Ravel, whereas the 1990 recording under Ozawa's direction just lumbers along by comparison. The tempi are faster and tauter, to marvellously invigourating effect, on the 1982 Vanguard recording, whereas the 1990 performance, trudging and plodding along like a musical pachyderm, never really quite gets fully into gear. By comparison with Vanguard's Fleisher/Comissiona recording, the sound of both the orchestra and piano on Sony's recording pairing Fleisher with Ozawa seems like an insufficiently detailed blur, downright blowzy for the orchestra; as for the piano or, perhaps, the way that the instrument was recorded, there is a distinct difference between the clarity and tonally varied timbre of the piano that Fleisher used for the Vanguard recording, an instrument so completely suited to this quintessentially French music, and the rich but excessively rotund, monochromatic sound of the instrument which the soloist plays on the Sony recording, one that probably is better suited to some German and English music than it is to French or Slavic repertory.

The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, for Vanguard, covers itself in glory as Sergiu Comissiona so skillfully leads it to such delectable effect. The orchestral sound there is clear, replete with seasoning as well as juice, and gloriously colourful. Compare Baltimore's exquisite results to what the Boston Symphony Orchestra delivers under Ozawa's baton. Before Ozawa had succeeded, as he desired and intended, to destroy the special character of that ensemble, considered widely as the best French orchestra in the world (even if, ironically, it was not not in a country of "La Francophonie"), that great Bostonian musical institution excelled in French and Russian repertoire, as Sergei Koussevitzky, Pierre Monteux, Charles Munch, and Erich Leinsdorf at the helm of the Boston Symphony Orchestra so brilliantly documented, nearly always in the exceedingly good sound (for their respective dates) as R.C.A.'s recording studios captured it. In "blanding down" the B.S.O.'s musical character, resulting in it becoming "just another" generic-sounding musical formation of the kind.

While the Boston orchestra has suffered a dismally downward trajectory under Ozawa, the orchestra in Baltimore has been making a remarkable upward ascent, as one can hear for oneself in all of the works by Ravel included on Vanguard's treasurable disc, and the orchestra in Houston holds its own nicely, too. The Baltimore orchestra, for its part, under Comissiona never sounded better in its recorded history and that orchestra, in fact, is a first rank choice to accompany such a great artist as Leon Fleisher in Ravel's music. Enjoy the results of their collaboration in Ravel's concerto on Vanguard's CD!


title: Wonderfully Enlivening Recorded Performances of Sousa's Sprightly, Melodious Marches

text:
This recording (of which MTL is the Vancouver-based label and distributor, and MTLCD-1089 the release number), took me very much by surprise. I expected only an inexpensive but decent CD of assorted marches by John Philip Sousa, a composer whose marches, dances, and operettas I adore and thrive on listening to. What I got is one of the finest and liveliest recordings of these famous marches that ever I have heard! The bandsmen's musicianship is quite good, although not entirely exceptional in every regard, but it is the incredible rhythmic verve of these performances, so gloriously strong in the "bounce factor", as it were, that astonishes me most. There is no feeling whatsoever of a professional band merely going through the paces competently, but without much heart, as even many of the best British, Canadian, or American armed forces bands so often tend to limit themselves to doing, whether live or on so many recordings. This, on the contrary, is sheer joybells! Now and then a cymbal crash could have been more exuberantly prominent, but there is really very little to criticise. I cannot urge anyone enough who loves this music to get this CD; it really is extraordinary.

The editions of the marches are nothing unusual, being those commonly heard live or on recordings. It is just that they sound so utterly magnificent and joyous here. I have no clear idea who the performers really are; the name "Capital Regimen Band" (the second word of which is likely to be a misspelling of "regiment" with a "t" at the end) seems to be only what the record company or its distributor devised for marketing, although there are real-life bands with similar names. The disc is a Canadian product, so perhaps the band is Canadian, but that is not certain. On the other hand, even the cover photo well might be of a Canadian band; the red and white colours of a flag, insufficiently unfurled to identify with certainty, appear to be possibly those of the Canadian Ensign or even of the nation's Maple Leaf (or perhaps, to the contrary, of a provincial flag or only of some regiment's banner, maybe even of something else entirely). If this name, Capital Regimen(t) Band, is a real one, perhaps this is a band based in Ottawa or one of the provincial capital cities, but that is only a guess; after all, the photo may not be of the musicians who actually perform.

Wherever this quite professional-sounding band is in Canada or elsewhere, or if it really might turn out to be a studio ensemble or a particularly fine collegial/university aggregation from just about anywhere, this disc is a "must" for band collectors, especially as available at so cheap a price.


title: Great Haydn, Great Jochum!

text:
These recordings of Haydn's masterly late symphonies are among the best ever put to disc. When I tend to say that the greatest Haydn symphonic interpreters are Sir Thomas Beecham, Leonard Bernstein, Hermann Scherchen, and Bruno Walter, I never mean to demean Eugen Jochum, who really belongs in that company; one just tries to keep such lists short, and in doing so it is easy to slight some conductors of equal stature. Jochum's recordings of Haydn's "London Symphonies" are essential to a serious collector's personal collection as well as to the libraries of musical institutions.

Jochum's approach, like those of Beecham, Bernstein, and Walter (the last-named of whom made too regrettably few Haydn recordings), is decidedly large and symphonic in scope. Votaries of the "H.I.P." (i.e., of so-called "historically informed performances"), of course, will shun them (though they at least may tolerate Scherchen's approach in some of the works), but who cares about the opinions of such nitwits? I certainly do not! Jochum has a very good orchestra at his disposition, one fine enough to realise his intentions to the full. What more could one ask?


title: Great Brahms, Great Spaulding!

text:
Albert Spaulding (the preferred spelling of his family name, so far as I am aware) always has been one of my great favourites among solo violinists. He certainly is a towering figure in the history of string playing in the UniTIGHTASStates of AmeriKKKakapeepee. Spaulding had a particularly great affinity for the music of Johannes Brahms and I am fortunate to have a large portion of Spaulding`s Remington LP and 45 r.p.m. recordings, which include some very fine and probing Brahms. I also possess quite a few of his Edison Diamond Discs from the acoustical era, as well as some of his electrically recorded 78 r.p.m. discs.

Spaulding was a musician of great sensibility and secure technic, always interesting interpretively. The music of Johannes Brahms requires all of these assets to make its maximum impact (admittedly the violin sonatas and the violin concerto more so than music as light as the composer`s Hungarian dances as recorded originally on Remington LP and 45 r.p.m. vinyl or vinylite discs), as all of this repertory does when Spaulding plays it. Nobody really contested his great musicianship, but somehow Spaulding never quite attained the fame of certain other concert violin soloists active in the years of his own career. However, one never can have too much of such playing as his!


title: Lyricism of Butterworth's Orchestral Music Tops the Merely Formalistic Charms of Parry's & Bridge's Suites for String Orchestra

text:
This recording, also issued in the U.S. by the well-known Musical Heritage Society (5153293 being the issue number on the M.H.S. disc's surface, 515329-X on the box's recto and verso paper inserts), presents some very agreeable and eminently approachable English music of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Alas, while the music is accessible and mostly pleasantly melodious, it is of variable quality. In short, Parry's and Bridge's works seem like "small change" in the company that they keep on this CD with Butterworth's truly exquisite folk-tinted pastoral music, gorgeous tone poems (though not termed that) that they are. To be fair, this is due to the choice of Parry's and Bridge's music being from among their more derivative and pallidly academic-sounding works in order to share disc space with some of the very best strains of Butterworth's most memorable music.

Sir Hubert Parry's "Lady Radnor's Suite" is a clever example of "Baroque pastiche", imitating 18th century dances in orchestral garb that reminds one of the warmly robust textures of Sir Hamilton Harty's performing editions of suites of excerpts from G.F. Handel's "Water Music" and "Royal Fireworks Music". As such intentionally derivative music goes, Parry's suite probably shows more genuine understanding and absorbtion of Baroque dance suite style and meolodic-harmonic content (apart from in the obviously differently motivated "Slow Minuet" movement) than most such efforts. On the other hand, it does not offer much besides such feigned manner in a work which, indeed, is what the French might term an "exercice de style"; one thinks of the best of similar works which add something more to the mix, e.g. Grieg's "Holberg Suite", with its sweetly nostalgic veneer over the borrowed dance rhythms and styles of more or less the same past epoch of musical history. If the listener relishes this sort of thing, Parry's work may impress him for stature more than it does this listener.

Frank Bridge probably is known better to most music lovers as the teacher of his only composition student, Sir Benjamin Britten, whom he greatly influenced. Some of Bridge's music, especially after his post-1920 turn to a more compositionally "advanced" style, is of arresting and striking originality. His "Suite for Strings" (i.e., for string orchestra) is from his earlier period; it also sounds more redolent of Bridge's connexion to the academic aspect of his musical career, than with music which might spring from more urgent inspiration. Despite the work's expert construction and quality, this bland and pallid work, despite its renown, to these ears seem to suffer from a sort of "musical tired blood, as it were, and from a sense thus conveyed of musical purposelessness, apart from  demonstrating compositional virtuosity. Bridge's music certainly is not boring, or arcane, or difficult "to understand" (in the sense that music can be said to require such comprehension), it simply is that after hearing all the hustle and bustle, with the moments of more hushed lyricism along the way, the work can leave one, after having finished listening to it, with little by which to remember all the tone-spinning. The overall effect of this music, despite all of the composer's skill that it embodies, is synthetic and somewhat "cobbled together", rather than genuinely inspired.  Other listeners, however, may disagree with such an assessment.  ("Chacun à son goût", as the French say.)  Bridge's writing for string instruments is exceptionally expert, perhaps reason enough to hear the work occasionally or to study its score for what it reveals, so notably, of the sheer craftsmanship of musical creation.

What makes this compact disc worthy of the buyer's interest, as indicated enthusiastically at the onset of this review (apart, of course, from the truly superb performances of both the lesser and the best of its music) are George Butterworth's exquisitely melodious and aromatically orchestrated masterpieces in the "English pastoral style" ("A Shropshire Lad, the first and second "English Idylls", and another idyll titled "The Banks of Green Willow"), often highly folk music imbued, so well known from British works in the same and essentially related idioms by Ralph Vaughan Williams, Arnold Bax, Frederick Delius, Gerald Finzi, Herbert Howells, as well, to some extent, by Gustave Holst and that expatriate (to Canada), Healey Willan, among many others. At its least imaginative and slavishly imitative of folk music linked works, one can almost conjure up in the music of some others among the lesser British and Nordic "pastoralists" visions of milkmaids sitting at their stools all for the apparent sake of tiresomely tallying up the number of "strokes per teat per bucket" of milk extracted from the placid animals. That kind of literalist stuff, of course, is far from what springs from the poetic imaginations of composers like Ralph Vaughan Williams, George Butterworth, John Ireland, Ernest John Moeran, or the other composers just singled out for mention! Although prevailingly tranquil, Butterworth's melodic inspiration is unfailing, his orchestration marvellously fragrant and evocative, while the insistent but delightfully unpredictable inner motion of the music at even very slow tempi keeps the music from lagging or growing sluggish.

Butterworth's works on this recording are gorgeous stuff, superbly played and conducted (with, of course, additional instruments and their players added to the ranks of the English String Orchestra to play the mixed instrumentation of Butterworth's scoring of his works included), and thus are more worthy of William Boughton's expert direction than is the music of the works by Parry and Bridge unequally harnassed to Butterworth's music. While this critic has a fairly good array of LP recordings by conductors of preceding generations who have been associated with music of the "British pastoralists", e.g. Sir John Barbirolli (above all!), Sir Thomas Beecham, Sir Adrian Boult, Sir Eugene Goosens, and Sir André Previn, there is less in that personal collection of recordings directed by later baton-wielding exponents of the British pastoralists' music such as those led by Vernon Handley, William Boughton, or Richard Hickox (dropping British peerage terms of address again for the moment), among others. The calibre of these currently active conductors is quite extraordinary. However, those treasured LPs from a receding era are. inaccessibly. in this critic's basement at the moment, so it would be unfair to make comparisons with such earlier performances too exclusively from memory.

There is no doubting, though, that William Boughton is a very expert and sensitive proponent of music by the British pastoralists on this and on some other CDs auditioned previous to this one. Certainly, these 1986 and 1987 recordings are highly commendable. Especially if the collector does not own already the legendary recordings which Sir John Barbirolli, most notably, made of some of these British pastoralist works by Butterworth and by other likeminded composers (i.e., those of George Butterworth, not music of the later and unrelated Arthur Butterworth, a composer whom Barbirolli also championed), Boughton's fine-sounding recordings on this CD will more than suffice.


title: An Appealing Programme of Butterworth's Superbly Lyrical Effusions and of More Mundane Works by Hubert Parry and Frank Bridge


title: Sebastian Fichtl Always Pleases on His Chosen Instrument, the Zither

text:
This and any other recording by Sebastian Fichtl are worth hearing and cherishing.  Fichtl was not so famous either as Anton Karas (of "The Third Man" movie music fame) or as Ruth Welcome.  The much more more famous, virtuosic, and more frequently recorded Ruth Welcome did not have the natural refinement that sets Sebastian Fichtl above her.  His playing is not so impressive technically, but his lovely tone and tasteful arrangements for, and playing of, the zither make his recordings even more desirable than those of the fascinating Ruth Welcome.

Sebastian Fichtl is a winner! Seek out his own Internet site for more recordings of this amiable and musicianly zitherist.


title: One of the Best Club Songs Ever Made!

text: This song will get any party going, it is definitely one of the best dance songs ever made!  I wish it was still available to buy!  :(


title: Mummies CD

text: Love listening to them and shipment was very fast.  Choices of their CDs were great too.  Will order more CDs of theirs at a later date.


title: One of my favorite albums. Got it from way back when it ...

text:
One of my favorite albums.  Got it from way back when it came out, it was an advance copy for record stores.  Had no idea it was Mike Henderson - so very cool.

Great blues rock, excellent musicianship.  Give it a shot.


title: If you like different kinds of metal metal buy this

text: This is a fantastic album. I liked it the first time I heard it and that hardly ever happens.


title: Modern NWOBHM band comin' atcha here!

text: I don't have any of their three albums yet, but I've been listening to their YouTube videos to get a sense of their sound and here's the vibe I'm getting with them. Rising Steel, out of France, is like a slightly heavier Megadeth'ed version of the classic British NWOBHM band Saxon.  That may sound like a mouthful, but hear me out.  They have a duel guitar attack that has a tone like classic Megadeth along with a solid, but not over powering bass line.  The vocals are like a Rob Halfordized version of Biff Byford of Saxon.  Meaning that they are a slightly cleaner version of Biff's vocals, and more powerful as well because this vocalist is still quite young.  But the overall sound is still that NWOBHM but with a modern edge.  I'm really digging it, and will probably buy their catalog.


title: That's Carbondale...not Carbindale.

text:
As a Carbondale area resident (40 miles to the east), this misspelling needs to be corrected.

In any case, as a college student at SIU-Carbondale from '93-'96, I can only assume that this album probably contains the local hit of "Cold Beer", with the ingenius lyrics of "Jump up if you like cold beer!"  Obviously a party favorite that could also be envisioned as a sports stadium loudspeaker favorite.


title: which version of Bluebird is on this album ?

text: I used to have a 19 minute version, well it seemed like it was and was much longer on another greatest  hits of the Springfield, any one know where that gem of guitar interplay ended up ? The version on Again is the short version, which is good but not as incredible  as that longer version,, any advice BF fans?????


title: a nice window into the past

text: Some are live some are lip synched but all make you smile... Really nice selection of artists and  acceptable video for its age.... I would have called the DVD , its what was happening baby, and it was a heck of a lot of talent and fun!


title: start over again

text: I love this cd, although I thought it was the one with the DVD, The cheaper one isn't it's just a CD. Its okay a great song and another  so basically it's a single... Good stuff from an amazing band.


title: Great band but an over priced EP

text: Great band but an over priced EP ! Three songs on it , why no American company sign's them is a mystery, they are so talented.


title: Dark, brooding and amazing music.

text: I remember watching this Mickey Rourke movie back in the late 80's, it's not a bad film, but what really struck and actually stayed with me for many years me was Bill Conti's beautiful music. Back then it was very difficult, and very expensive, trying to find this soundtracks in Mexico City, and it took me close to 30 years, but by pure chance I found it here in Amazon 3 years ago and has become one of my favorites since then. Enjoy it!!


title: You May Know Daphnis and Chloe - But Have You Met Sheherazade?

text:
Ravel is one of my handful of favorite composers. The other five may change a bit, depending on mood,  but Ravel always has a place at the table (even if he does smoke those nasty Galoises).

I enjoy 'Daphnis,' and have sung in the chorus of the piece. This performance and recording are very fine.

But it's 'Sheherezade' that stops me in my tracks - this performance, every time. Jean-Claude Casadesus conducts, Nadine Denize (she was not well-known in the US, but she was a French national treasure) give a performance full of the Far-Eastern mystery, the exotic perfumes and scenery of poet Tristan Klingsor. The poetry is much more successful with Ravel than without - and happily, we have our choice.

It is a glorious and under-performed work.

Conductor and soprano give what I feel, based on years of study, is the best recorded performance now available. I have heard no better, even from the much-admired singer/actor Maria Ewing, whose performance at The Ravinia Festival set me on a course of musical study which changed my life.


title: Favorite!

text: I bought two copies to give as gifts as I have loved this CD for years! Delivered so quickly!!


title: Awesome punk rock album

text: Awesome punk rock album. One of my first punk rock discoveries back in the early 90's. I can't believe the CD is worth that much now. Glad I still have mine.


title: Three Stars

text: I would love to be able to see what's on this album!!!


title: Looks Good, Arrived on Time!

text: It is a gift so hasn't been opened yet, but great packaging and it arrived either on time or early.


title: Horrible Sound - CD

text: I never owned the original vinyl, but like the songs so bought the CD.  WOW --- have to turn the bass way down and the treble 3/4 to full to even stand it.  Must have been re-mastered through 2-1/2" speakers from a mid-sixties transistor radio!  I could have a better job!


title: Beautiful

text: This is such a great great CD never get tired of listening to it. Love this CD I tell others about it.


title: You will love it

text: Wonderful music


title: Five Stars

text: great music.


title: Great gift for Tom Petty fan

text: Husband loves it!  Great song selections!


title: Billy Joel

text: Billy Joel


title: Five Stars

text: Awesome


title: Elvis is King.

text: Very good CD, not one bad song in the bunch, brought back a lot of memories of my childhood. Highly recommend.


title: Timeless Mega Crasher

text: Yes I know it was released over 12 years ago but after listening to the new volumes you'll come to find out these are even better. It has a raw sound unique to the older volumes at turbo speed which I love. Yes it's a TURBO MEGA CRASHER!!!


title: Fede_08_09

text: One of the best of the early series. The album was laid down in 1998 and shows how far ahead the German's were in electronica/dance scene. Holds up strong to some of DJ Deans newest compilations not to mention other wanna-be DJ's. ITS A TIMELESS MEGA CRASHER.


title: CD

text: Love this CD


title: Absolutely wonderful album

text: Jean Chaumont is a remarkable talent, and this album provides a thoroughly enjoyable variety of pieces with diverse moods. Well done!


title: Five Stars

text: Great album! Speedy shipping


title: Love this CD and my two babies do too

text: This is a WONDERFUL addition to your classical music collection. Very gentle, beautiful selections of music, and easy to calm the family during "down time."


title: Five Stars

text: Great addition to my patriotic song collection.


title: Neat CD

text: Saw the movie, bought a CD.  Like it.


title: Finally got to check this out

text: Have had the first album for over forty years, glad I found the second album and got it finally. Just as good if not better than the original!


title: Love it!

text: If you like Marshall Tucker you’ll like this.


title: Five Stars

text: My Husband Loved It!


title: It is missing songs!

text: The one song that titles the album is missing! :(


title: musicianship is really great

text: I have had a copy of this cd for years. I've played it so much that it's about worn out. Nice to have my own "original". The arrangements are great and the playing is first rate. Very good recording and this cd represents a new approach to old songs mostly done in a church environment. "What A Friend" done as a samba? They actually pull it off and it sounds great and gets your whole body jumping. The sequel to this however was not as good in my opinion. It got into a little heavier jazz and was made up of unfamiliar songs. The artistry was there but in a different manner.


title: Five Stars

text: My son and I enjoy this CD with our drum.


title: The very best live album of all time!

text: I bought this back in 1971 when I was 17 and have pretty much owned the various permutations over the years. My two-CD set is skipping, so I just ordered this again. I don’t need to go into details. I have lived this for 50 years. My headline for this review is no exaggeration. It truly is the best album of all time! Hopefully two two discs I just ordered will last me the rest of my life. I need to make sure my wife has No Way Out and Trouble No More at my funeral. RIP ABB!


title: Great Album

text: Wonderful tracks


title: CD worth it

text: Love the music and had no problem with the CD


title: Yugioh

text: Great product and service


title: Five Stars

text: Some old classics from the 70s and a mixture of jazz rock pop.


title: Five Stars

text: Very much enjoyed this.


title: CD Case Broken

text: The cd is damaged with a crack from side to side.  That was disappointing.  The CD plays fine.


title: Not enough of Messiah to enjoy

text: The description is the whole Messiah and I only got part 2!<br />How do I get Part 1?


title: Nice disc.

text: Good recording.Nice sounds.


title: I HOPE THEY COME OUT WITH NEW RECORDS IN THE NEAR FUTURE

text: I REALLY LIKE THIS RECORD I GAVE IT A CLEANING AND I PLAYED THE FIRST SIDE AND IT DIDN'T SKIP.


title: I HOPE THEY COME OUT WITH NEW 45'S IN THE NEAR FUTURE

text: I REALLY LIKE THIS 45 I REMEMBER THAT I SAW HIM ON SOLID GOLD IN 1985 DOING HIS SONG "YOUR SECRET'S SAFE WITH ME" AND I AM ALSO GOING TO PUT IT IN THE JUKEBOX.


text: I REALLY LIKE THIS 45 I REMEMBER THAT I SAW HIM SING THE SONG "HEY BABY" ON THE ARSENIO HALL SHOW WHEN I WAS LIVING ON JONES ST. AND I AM ALSO GOING TO PIT IT IN THE JUKEBOX.


text: I REMEMBER THAT I SAW THE MUSIC VIDEO FOR IT ON YOUTUBE AND I AM GOING TO PUT IT IN THE JUKEBOX


text: I REALLY LIKE THIS RECORD I SAW THE MUSIC VIDEO ON YOUTUBE AND I AM ALSO GOING TO PUT IT IN THE JUKEBOX


text: I PLAYED THE FIRST SIDE AND IT DIDN'T SKIP AND I HAVE ALSO SEEM THE MUSIC VIDEO ON YOUTUBE


text: I HAVE GAVE THE RECORD A FEW CLEANING AND I PLAYED THE FIRST SIDE AND I TOOK IT OUT OF THE JUKEBOX AND PUT SOMETHING ELSE IN


title: I HOPE THEY COME OUT WITH NEW 45S IN THE NEAR FUTURE

text: I PLAYED THE FIRST SIDE AND IT DIDN'T SKIP AND I AM GOING TO MAKE A TITLESTRIP WITH THAT RECORD


text: I PLAYED THE FIRST SIDE AND IT DIDN'T SKIP AND I AM ALSO GOING TO MAKE A TITLESTRIP WITH THAT RECORD


text: I REALLY LIKE THIS RECORD AND I HAVE SEEN THE MUSIC VIDEO OF THE SONG ON YOUTUBE AND I ALSO GAVE IT A LITTLE CLEANING AND I PUT IT IN THE JUKEBOX


title: Great music.

text: Old favorites from a unique musician


title: Can barely hear the singing

text: Voice is barely audible.  Guess I got spoiled by the quality recordings out there and did not research this CD enough.  The instrumentals came through quite well.  Can not recommend.


title: Filled in my collection

text: On time and as expected


title: Five Stars

text: nice!


title: One of Tsuji's best albums, featuring a re-arrangement of her signature song...

text:
Everyone seems to possess a list of artists that they consider tragically unappreciated. Listening to the sometimes substandard quality of popular music, which today focuses more on attitude, photogenic faces and bodies and marketability, won't help quell such grievances. One can hear the agonizing cries of the afflicted as they gnash their teeth, rend their flesh and howl "how can this shallow crap sell millions while [insert unappreciated artist here] remains painfully obscure? Why must life grind me to powder?!?" Life does contain many mysteries, but music, as a purely aesthetic experience, dwells mostly in the realms of opinion and personal taste. Today's predominant and furiously competitive winner take all music industry also limits the number of those who "reach the top" since scaling such heights requires large budgets, gratuitously manipulative saturation marketing and an omnipresence and ubiquity akin to a living god. Given such stifling requirements, only an infinitesimal fraction of artists ever really "make it." So spins the loaf.

Some may subsume Japanese singer-songwriter and ukulele connoisseur Tsuji Ayano under the category "unfairly marginalized." Her now long career demonstrates songwriting mastery and enough experimentation to almost qualify her as eclectic. Her fourth full-length album from 2003, "Renren Fuuka," provides a great example. Not only does it contain a re-worked version of her signature song, but also a potpourri of styles and moods. Ukulele appropriately saturates nearly every song and every song shows a growing artistic maturity. Knowledge of the Japanese language isn't required to enjoy the album, though the lyrics definitely add an extra dimension to the unforgettable music.

The album opens with the gorgeously haunting "Sakura no Ki no Shita de" or, roughly, "under the cherry tree blossoms." A waft of wavering synthesized strings glides over the delicate vocal melody. The song also gradually intensifies as guitar accompanies the first sparsely arranged verse, piano the second and the strings and additional instruments thereafter. "Arisatari na Romance," one of Tsuji's most uplifting songs follows, complete with a catchy "la la" refrain and a bouncy danceable rhythm. "Ameoto," or "the sound of rain," one of Tsuji's best songs, feels frustrated and self-questioning, as though exploring a tentative distant question. The strings provide perfect emphasis to the chorus, not to mention their excellent instrumental interlude. Other songs feature wind counter melodies, sparse arrangements where ukuele dominates, lush fully layered productions and even jazz. No duds mar this set.

Those who find this album after seeing "The Cat Returns" may want to look closer. This album does not contain the "acoustic" version of Tsuji's most famous song, "Kaze ni Naru," as featured in the Studio Ghibli film, but a faster and fully re-arranged version with lush strings, electric guitar and percussion. It's still excellent, but those wanting the film version should look to "Koi Suru Megane," an EP released the year before "Renren Fuuka," the CD single from the film or the 2009 "Tsuji Gift" compilation. "Tsuji Best" from 2006 contains the fully arranged version. Very complicated.

Tsuji never found absolute stardom even in Japan, but she did attain a respectable level of success with "Kaze ni Naru," two other film songs and numerous songs featured in commercials. She apparently sold enough albums to maintain her major label contract through some fifteen albums, EPs and compilations. For more than a decade she released something every year, but her output has groaned to a near halt recently. "Oh! Shigoto Special," a mash-up of mostly new songs, appeared in 2012 and, according to generasia.com, she released two digital singles in 2013, but nothing since. Her all-Japanese blog shows her playing music festivals, hosting what looks like ukulele seminars and hanging out with friends in envy-inducing restaurants. Time will tell whether she has ceased producing new music, but even if she produces nothing else her litany of albums remains a testament to her songwriting skills and talents. Nonetheless, her fans will probably keep bemoaning her relative, and to them unjustified, obscurity.


title: Tsuji's first independent release... before glasses...

text:
Japanese songwriter Tsuji Ayano said she built her career around the ukulele because of her small hands. Their tiny size apparently didn't allow her to hold and play a guitar properly (did she try smaller sized guitars?). So she downsized all the way to the one of the smallest stringed instruments of all. Her trademark quickly became this dainty instrument melded with her melodious and often cute vocals. In her earlier music videos and concerts she often presented an almost catatonically stoic persona, rarely cracking a smile or displaying any hint of physical emotion as she strummed her poignant songs of heartbreak, longing and loss. This exuded an aura of disaffectedness, as though keeping everything in her presence at a great distance. Or did this help her deal with nervousness? In any case, it provided a stark contrast to her very emotional music.

Ayano eventually signed to a major label in Japan, but prior to this she recorded a short and somewhat roughly produced independent album called "Uraraka." Containing just six songs, Ayano, her ukulele, a guitarist (supposedly not her due to the previously mentioned hand size issue) and backing vocals (perhaps Ayano overdubbed), it lacks some of the polish of her major label releases, but it still packs plenty of charm. Ayano fans will instantly realize that her writing, performing and lyrical styles all begin with this small album. She still sounds this way overall, but her songwriting has since developed exponentially. On this, her earliest available recording, her voice hasn't quite developed its full strength, some of the playing sounds a little shaky and it doesn't really sound professionally produced. Still, it probably helped her land a recording contract, so it goes way beyond tinny AM radio fidelity and rolls of sea shore tape hiss.

Many of the songs appeared on her later major label releases. "Kuloobaa" ("Clover"), easily the most recognizable to long time Ayano fans, begins the album with a guitar introduction. Ukulele soon arrives along with Ayano's vocals. The final song, a beautiful ballad (which also sounds accompanied by guitar), appeared, along with "Clover," on her first full-length album two years later. Snippets of tape-recorded ambient sounds fill some of the gaps between songs. Ayano's voice stands out clearly in these interludes. In one, she strums and sings a few bars of a song that surfaced on a later album. Another features a distant prolonged buzz, similar to a subway or train signal and a jumbled mass of voices. These episodes do provide some variety between the sparsely arranged songs. The CD booklet features photos of a very young Ayano without her now trademark glasses. It almost doesn't look like her. The back cover shows skinny lower legs terminating in sandal-covered feet with toes playfully touching.

Ayano never found extreme success, even in her native Japan, but she apparently found enough for someone to re-release this 1998 independent album. The CD lists "Living, Dining and Kitchen Records" ("LD&K") as the label, not her current label Speedstar. LD&K's website gives the appearance of a smaller label and Ayano's "Uraraka" doesn't seem to appear anywhere. So perhaps it now resides in "out of print" status? Ayano continues to record, though her output has slowed considerably in the past few years. Mostly known for her theme song to the Studio Ghibli anime, "The Cat Returns," her Japanese blog shows her giving ukulele workshops, playing music festivals and hanging out with friends (and eating some incredible looking food). "Uraraka" offers a fascinating glimpse of Ayano's beginnings and also demonstrates how far she has come since those early glassless days.


title: A decade of ukulele strumming and kawaii vocals...

text:
In 2009, Japanese singer, songwriter and ukulele strummer Tsuji Ayano celebrated her tenth year in the music business. Though her first recording actually appeared in 1998, the raw and independently produced "Uraraka," she didn't sign to Victor Entertainment until the following year. A string of albums followed, one per year, that built on her ukulele-based and melodically smooth pop, not JPOP, style. Multiple albums filled with original material, a few EPs, two albums of cover songs (complete with the punning title "Cover Girl") and a "Best" compilation filled the decade. Most people know her work via the "acoustic version" of "Kaze Ni Naru," which played over the credits of the 2002 Studio Ghibli anime, "The Cat Returns." A more fully orchestrated version appeared the following year on "Renren Huka," her fifth album, depending on how one counts. She never gained outright stardom or maniacal JPOP-type fame, which she probably never wanted, but she must have sold enough albums to keep going. More film songs, collaborations and commercial jingles sprouted from her success with "Cat Returns" and then she released a ten year retrospective called "Tsuji Gift," though this gift does require payment.

Seeing that "Tsuji Best" had appeared only 3 years prior to "Tsuji Gift," the two compilations do contain some overlap, but they nonetheless diverge enough that fans will probably want both. "Tsuji Gift" does cover material released since her "Best" collection, such as her "Sgt. Frog" theme song collaboration with The Beat Crusaders, an entirely new song which opens the album, material from 2007's "Sweet, Sweet Happy Birthday" and many unreleased tracks. It also includes the "acoustic version" of "Kaze Ni Naru," an alternate take of her early song "Koloba," a cover of the Carpenter's "(They Long To Be) Close To You" sung in English, a rare live duet, her bouncy collaboration with 6-feat, and a beautiful song called "Calling" that apparently won a song contest for a Japanese telecommunications company. Ayano herself selected the songs and they represent her entire career up to that point as well as demonstrate her  versatility. Heartbreakingly gorgeous songs billowing with strings sit beside harder distorted numbers like "Shiny Day." Though, in general, Ayano leans heavily towards the mellower, musically prettier side of the spectrum. The final track contains numerous short episodic melodies that may have appeared in commercials. Ukulele saturates nearly every track, undergirding Ayano's soft, cute and often relaxing vocals.

Anyone seeking a survey of Ayano's career, including her best known songs, would probably find everything they need in "Tsuji Best" and "Tsuji Gift." Her momentum has slowed since "Tsuji Gift." Only one full album in 2010 and a shorter album in 2012 have emerged since her ten year anniversary. Nonetheless, a new song has appeared on download sites in 2014, so the end has apparently not yet arrived. Her Japanese language blog chronicles her doings and she seems to have become quite the popular ukulele teacher in Japan as voluminous pictures of classrooms filled with ukulele-wielding students suggest. Whether she returns to her previously ambitious release schedule seems questionable, but everyone needs a break after a full exhausting decade of touring, writing and recording. Even if she doesn't return, "Tsuji Gift" provides a lasting chronicle of some of her best work.


title: One of Tsuji Ayano's best albums sadly neglected, as usual, in the United States...

text:
Those living on this side of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch who have heard of Tsuji Ayano probably know her from one of two sources. First, her biggest hit, the acoustic version of "Kaze Ni Naru," appeared in the 2002 Studio Ghibli film, not directed by Hayao Miyazaki, "The Cat Returns." This remains her best known song to the present day, her "Space Oddity," though she has since provided songs for additional movies, including one of the "Sgt. Frog" installments. Second, National Public Radio produced a short piece on Ayano in 2006 called "Playing A Delicate Instrument" (still available online) contrasting her style with the more typical frenetic JPOP. It reflects on Ayano's arguably unfortunate uniqueness in a culture often dominated by musical conformity. Quoting the Japanese proverb "the nail that sticks out gets hammered down," it seems to doom Ayano to playing eternally in coffee shops or parks and to "go her own way." Though a bit harsh, especially since Ayano did obtain a major label recording contract in Japan, this prediction has somewhat come true in the intervening years. Sadly, her work has pretty much vanished from the United States.

Those who continued to track Ayano following 2006 were lucky enough to hear one of her best albums, 2007's "Sweet, Sweet Happy Birthday." In retrospect, this album may represent her artistic peak and the culmination of all that came before. The enrapturing title track explodes into a hypnotic chorus that surrounds the listener in sheets of harmony that will never leave the psyche. Even more overlooked, the opening track, "Mermaid," doubtlessly ranks amongst Ayano's best work. A very simple theme builds into a poignant symphonic climax that terminates into shocking silence with a single note. An almost perplexing drum track that seems completely incompatible undergirds the crescendo beautifully. Another great song, "Fly High," appeared on a prior EP, but it nonetheless fits perfectly into this mix. One of the most gorgeous songs, "Sayonara Aishiteru," also came out before this album as a CD single. Ayano hasn't really created a sonic landscape like this before or since. The song has an underwater bubbling aura complete with a fascinatingly indistinct and murky feedback-driven solo. A video, now sadly difficult to find, featured Ayano at a distance, strumming her ukulele and rotating slowly as sealife frolicked around her. This song feels like a breakthrough on multiple levels. Though the rest of the album doesn't quite reach these heights, it still showcases brilliant compositions and performances. Ukulele pervades every song. A few even feature Ayano alone with her signature Hawaiian instrument. A solid collection that Ayano fans should not overlook.

Tsuji Ayano released an album a year from 1998 until 2010, though two were "greatest hits" compilations. Then a year passed before her most recent release, "Oh! Shigoto Special." In 2013, nothing. What about 2014? Judging from her all-Japanese website she still tours Japan, plays parks, malls, theaters and even seems to conduct ukulele workshops. Nonetheless, a link from this website also includes a link to a new single released in May of this year available in iTunes. The preview reveals a definitely previously unreleased happy string and horn laden arrangement. So perhaps a new Ayano project finally brews? No one can blame Ayano for slowing down a bit after over a decade of constant releases. Unfortunately, she seems destined to remain somewhat obscure in Japan and almost non-existent in the United States. Though the world can surprise, a breakthrough in the English-centric music world seems next to impossible. Still, a Japanese musician even receiving a mention in the American press, though some eight years ago now, remains a rare distinction. A lingering question fills the air: has Tsuji Ayano reached her peak? Will she continue to deliver intriguing and innovative music? Even if she doesn't, her work will stand as a highly enjoyable and unique testament to human creativity. But if she does, let's hope she does it soon.


title: Perfect

text: Everything was perfect, and as pictured!


title: Worth every penny

text: [[VIDEOID:292a3b96ee5a0eec1bfb8f649fc80702]] Amazing, absolutely as pictured. Great quality songs and album design! I even got 3 photo cards!


title: Four Stars

text: Thanks


title: Vince is absolutely amazing.

text:
I had the whole collection but lost 2 of the discs.
Had to get them back.
Vince is absolutely amazing.


title: The wife loves it.

text: Got this CD for my wife for Christmas (she's a big JD fan), she's been listening to it ever since.


title: I loved My dog Skip

text: This is the best of the best. There should be more movies like this. There should be more music like this. It lets you remember the dogs that have past through your life time.


title: Bought it for 1 song believe it or not :P

text: I watched this movie called " Soldiers Girl " based on a true story. Starring Lee Pace as a Transgender Woman. She dances to this song in the movie  # 1 Crush and I had to have this song :)


title: Lee Junho is my fave

text: Lovely presentation for the couple of songs on this ultra mini album, but hes the best there is and i love it.


title: Four Stars

text: ok


title: Excellent Meditation

text: Ms. Naparstek's health related CDs are really the best ones on the market. She has a lovely voice and the suggestions are helpful


title: Five Stars

text: Such a great, gritty, jangly rock and roll album.


title: Five Stars

text: some of the most soothing Mozart I have ever listen to.


title: Good selections

text: Disclaimer: I am a huge Sparks fan.  This is a good selection of their stuff.


title: Five Stars

text: This is an awesome album and listening to it again took me back to some wonderful memories!


title: Great Group

text: CD is as good as hearing them in person.


title: Five Stars

text: Great !


title: A must have for music enthusiasts.

text: This is a great groovin album.


title: A real touch of class

text: Outstanding.. most enjoyable. A welcome edition to our home entertainment system. Several purchases of other Taylor Davis albums.


title: Good quality DVD.

text: Good suspenseful story.


title: Roy Lee Centers

text: At that time in his life and was one of the Best , and still is . Someone needs to release Vol. 2


title: Five Stars

text: Good quality sound.  Listen to it all the time!


title: my Irish part

text: I learned some new things ... very interesting ... raised by my Irish grandmother, found it all fascinating!


title: A rarer album from an amazing band

text: Maybe one of my favorite unknown albums, Hey Hey Hey is the original release of Dream Big by Ryan Shupe with the addition of She's Bad For Me and a hidden track.  They removed both as they felt those songs did not fit the rest of the album on the rerelease of the album.  I love the removed track and it is worth owning solely for it to me.  Beautiful banjo work combines with modern bluegrass to make a fun, up-lifting, and remarkable album.


title: Inspiring

text: This is an inspiring message. Though not my favorite Jesse Duplantis CD, it is a good one. The CD arrived in good time and in good condition.


title: The GVB at its inception

text: This is back when it all got started.  Some of the names in the quartet may even surprise you, as there have been many different singers that sang in the GVB over the years.  Many also enjoyed stellar solo careers.  There is not a song on this whole album that will disappoint.  From 1981, the songs and the messages are just as relevant today as when they were recorded.


title: The start to a great set

text: The songs on this album are all from 1927 & 1928.  It is volume 1 of 20.  Having been born long after the 20s, all these songs and sounds were new to me especially where country music is concerned.  The Carter Family and Jimmy Rodgers are the only artists on this album that I had heard of previously, but I got to learn of some "new" artists and to appreciate the sound of Country & Western music from back in the 20s.


title: A fun listen

text: My only reason for purchasing this album is I remember my father owning it and playing it when I was a kid.  It brought back some good memories to hear it again and it's an enjoyable album to listen to.


title: Don't be fooled

text: So I should have read the label more carefully.  I'm a big fan of the Zac Brown Band but this album contains only 3 songs by that group.  To be honest I don't even recognize the names of some of the other singers or groups with tracks on this CD so make sure to do your homework, which I didn't, before you plop down the money.  Even the 3 songs by Zac Brown were nothing to write home about.  A compilation album that should never have been put together in my opinion.  I've already given my copy to Good Will.  It may be there a long time...


title: This is remastered

text: I thought this cd was remastered poorly. the song La Grange was live and the sound was sub-par! That is one of my all-time favorite tunes. So I would recommend to buy the cd that was not remastered


title: All excellent quality original recordings.

text: Time-Life's recordings are the best. Original and great quality recordings. Another sweet addition to my collection.