2 Disc Set. On a captivating night in April 1964, Stuttgart, Germany, became the epicentre of jazz innovation as Charles Mingus graced the stage with an ensemble of legendary talent. Known for his explosive creativity and magnetic presence, Mingus was not just a bassist; he was a revolutionary composer whose work shattered the conventional boundaries of jazz, crafting intricate narratives that spoke to the soul. As the lights dimmed, the audience was treated to a stellar lineup featuring the virtuosic Eric Dolphy on alto saxophone, flute, and bass clarinet. Dolphy's adventurous spirit wove seamlessly with Mingus's compositions, blending whimsy and urgency in a way that only he could. The powerful tenor saxophone of Clifford Jordan added depth, while Jaki Byard's piano work-rich and soulful-infused each piece with harmonic complexity. Holding it all together was the dynamic drumming of Dannie Richmond, Mingus's trusted collaborator, whose rhythmic inventiveness made every beat feel alive.
Eddy Clearwater's slashing guitar attack hails directly from the same 1950's West Side school that spawned Magic Sam, Luther Allison and Freddy King. Clearwater displays a highly admirable versatility throughout this set.
Mean Case Of The Blues
$15.99
CD
Rounder Records
Jan 01, 1997
116619584
Awakening / Kate Chopin (abridged) [2 CDs]
Naxos AudioBooks
Available as
CD
$19.98
Oct 22, 1996
Chopin, K.: Awakening (The) (Abridged)
Awakening / Kate Chopin (abridged) [2 CDs]
$19.98
CD
Naxos AudioBooks
Oct 22, 1996
NA210812
John Williams and "The President's Own", Vol. 3
Naxos
Available as
CD
$19.99
$15.99
Jul 04, 2026
Legendary composer for stage and screen John Williams has admired the United States Marine Band, the "President's Own," since childhood - and in recent decades, the maestro and ensemble's mutual admiration has deepened amidst a series of collaborations marking the group's major anniversaries. The culmination of this twenty-year relationship was Williams' return to conduct the band's 225th anniversary gala concert in July 2023, along with the release of this 2026 album, John Williams and 'The President's Own,' Vol. 3. Completing a trilogy of albums issued by Naxos of America, this live recording brings the outstanding virtuosity, good cheer, and moving musicianship of that 2023 Kennedy Center concert to the world.
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John Williams and "The President's Own", Vol. 3
$19.99
$15.99
CD
Naxos
Jul 04, 2026
8559968
The Secret Letter
Signum Classics
Available as
CD
$19.99
Aug 14, 2026
For so many, coming out is framed as a kind of reckoning-a threshold one must cross, as if queerness begins in secrecy and only later earns the right to be spoken aloud. That narrative suggests burden before freedom, fear before love. But why should love require courage simply to exist? Such is the world we've inherited. For centuries, desire that fell outside society's narrow definitions was forced underground, met with shame, exile, or silence. In that silence, letters became a refuge: fragile but fearless vessels for truths that could not be safely expressed aloud. The Secret Letter re-imagines a program of the same name performed by Cantus in the spring of 2025, weaving music together with excerpts from letters by Marcus Aurelius, Oscar Wilde, Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, and others. These interludes offer fleeting access to private moments of longing, devotion, and vulnerability, while the surrounding music expands and amplifies their emotional terrain, carrying forward their tension, tenderness, restraint, and release. Letters are remarkable things. They are both private and exposed, meant for a single reader yet capable of outliving both the writer and recipient. Passed between trembling hands, they hold confessions, desires, and love stories told in ink rather than whispers. The Secret Letter bears witness and celebrates queer love that has always existed-persistent, imaginative, and worthy of song-and that even in secrecy, has found ways to speak, to sing, and to survive.
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The Secret Letter
$19.99
CD
Signum Classics
Aug 14, 2026
SIGCD1024
Legends and Narratives
Centaur Records
Available as
CD
$15.99
Aug 14, 2026
Paul Smith had previously recorded two albums of my solo guitar music, so with more than enough new pieces ready, a third album seemed destined. He also kindly introduced me to Ekaterina Skliar, who has joined him for two works, playing mandolin and domra. This latter instrument comes from Russia. It has three strings tuned in fourths, and it's sound resembles both the balalaika and the mandolin. David Loeb
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Legends and Narratives
$15.99
CD
Centaur Records
Aug 14, 2026
CRC4191
Sur
PENTATONE
Available as
CD
$17.99
Aug 14, 2026
Mezzo-soprano Daniela Mack presents a deeply personal exploration with Sur, an album shaped by memory, identity, and the enduring pull of home. Inspired by a vivid childhood recollection - listening from the back seat of her father's car - Mack traces her first encounter with the electrifying sound world of Astor Piazzolla. His music, brimming with colour, grit, and intensity, left an indelible mark, one that continues to resonate in her artistry today. Known for her versatility across the operatic spectrum, Mack finds in Piazzolla's reimagined tango a natural meeting point between classical discipline and expressive freedom, bringing to these songs both technical finesse and emotional immediacy. As an Argentine artist living abroad, Mack reconnects with the spirit of Buenos Aires through music that invites vivid storytelling. Each piece unfolds as an intimate vignette, enriched by arrangements of her collaborator JP, whose work honours Piazzolla's legacy while adding a distinctive, personal voice - including his tender Dulce suenos. Together, they create a sound world that is at once nostalgic and immediate, rooted in tradition yet alive with reinvention - an invitation to experience music that, in it's depth and universality, speaks to all. This album marks Daniela Mack's debut on PENTATONE.
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Sur
$17.99
CD
PENTATONE
Aug 14, 2026
PTC5187591
Auber: Overtures, Vol. 9
Naxos
Available as
CD
$19.99
Aug 14, 2026
Daniel-Francois-Esprit Auber was one of the most successful opera composers of the 19th century. His overtures were favourites of the light Classical repertoire with gracious melodies and dance rhythms that were hugely influential on the genre of Romantic comic opera, especially in Germany. The unexpected complexities of Le Domino noir result in Auber's most subtle and refined overture, while the often vivacious and joyful music in Gustave III, ou Le Bal masque corresponds to the expectations of the grand-opera tradition. All of these contrast with a closing Marche funebre composed to accompany the interment of Napoleon's ashes in the church of Les Invalides.
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Auber: Overtures, Vol. 9
$19.99
CD
Naxos
Aug 14, 2026
8574723
Itinerant
Centaur Records
Available as
CD
$15.99
Aug 14, 2026
The end of life is a defining aspect of all itinerant journeys. Death serves as a poignant throughline for the album, as each piece chronicles a magnificent, nostalgic, surreal, or horrific journey, leading to death in some way. The interrelationship between humankind and nature-or gross manipulation of it in the case of Poison Mushroom-creates an expressive arc and subtheme.
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Itinerant
$15.99
CD
Centaur Records
Aug 14, 2026
CRC4126
Anthony Hedges: Complete Piano Music, Vol. 1
Divine Art
Available as
CD
$18.99
Aug 14, 2026
On 14 August 2026, Divine Art is delighted to present The Complete Piano Music of Anthony Hedges (1931-2019) Vol 1, the first of three albums from British pianist Adam Davies presenting the entirety of this prolific composer's concert music for piano. This first volume documents a thirty-year maturation showcasing the full breadth and diversity of Hedges' creative output, starting with the earliest of the published piano pieces, the Five Preludes of 1959, fresh with youthful energy and verve, and ending with the bright and evocative Five Aphorisms of 1990. Between these sit two weighty centrepieces marking important stylistic departures: Four Short Pieces, his gritty foray into serialism, and the bold intensity of the First Sonata. Interspersed with these are delightful miniatures written for budding pianists, reflecting the composer's pianistic skill and facility in writing for younger musicians. This music is colourful, rich in it's allusions, and expertly crafted. Many of these works are being recorded for the first time. Adam Davies first encountered the music of Anthony Hedges in his youth and saw the composer himself in performance, as he grew up in Beverley, East Yorkshire, also by then Hedges' home. He rediscovered the composer during COVID after finding his own long-neglected score of Ten Bagatelles Op.156, gifted from his boyhood singing teacher, and was reminded of the quality and accessibility of the writing. Such was his enjoyment of these pieces, and his surprise at the relative lack of recordings of Hedges' music, that he resolved to record the complete piano music. Anthony Hedges' daughter Fiona provided the scores and private recordings of many of these works by the composer himself: 'Listening to these works proved to be a liberating experience he played like a composer: perhaps not with note-perfect Polish, but with crystal-clear imagination, purpose, character, and expression permeating every note and phrase.I have tried to convey something of his essence in these recordings, which I hope will serve to bring wider attention to this richly deserving repertoire.' The album is financially supported by the Ida Carroll Trust. Composer, pianist, conductor, teacher and critic Anthony Hedges was born in the town of Bicester and educated at Oxford, where his broad musical activity included singing in the Oxford Bach Choir under the batons of such luminaries as Vaughan Williams and Constant Lambert. During his National Service (1955-57), he worked as pianist and arranger for the Royal Signals Band. He taught at the Royal Scottish Conservatoire in Glasgow and later at Hull University, where he became a Reader and earned his Honorary Doctorate, also during that time meeting poet Philip Larkin and setting his words to music. As well as a weekly column for the Glasgow Herald, he contributed reviews and interviews for the Guardian, the Scotsman, and other publications. His expansive output covers all genres, including popular and frequently broadcasted lighter works for brass band and orchestra. Pianist Adam Davies was born in Manchester and raised in Beverley, East Yorkshire, where he had the opportunity to hear Anthony Hedges at the piano several times. Davies was educated at the Royal Northern College of Music, where his teachers were John Gough and Dr. Murray McLachlan. Adam performs throughout the UK as a recital and concerto soloist and teaches at Chetham's School of Music, Manchester. In 2019, he commissioned and gave the world premiere of Tom Harrold's Crux, and he has performed as duo partner with Kathryn Stott.
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Anthony Hedges: Complete Piano Music, Vol. 1
$18.99
CD
Divine Art
Aug 14, 2026
DDX21139
Farrenc: Complete Piano Works, Vol. 5
Grand Piano
Available as
CD
$19.99
Aug 14, 2026
Louise Farrenc won the admiration of her contemporaries as one of the most respected pianists, composers and pedagogues in 19th-century Paris. She was acclaimed as a performer of Beethoven's music, and her graceful Melodie in A flat major was included in an 1846 anthology of works by an array of composers inspired by the music of Beethoven. Farrenc's Impromptu in B minor appeared in another publication, Vogt's Musical Album of Autographs, alongside compositions by 62 other musicians including Berlioz, Gounod and Liszt. The Fugues were never published in Farrenc's lifetime and are heard here in a world premiere recording. '[Stratigou] has a full mastery of Farrenc's romantic style and a technique to match' (American Record Guide on Volume 3, GP942).
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Farrenc: Complete Piano Works, Vol. 5
$19.99
CD
Grand Piano
Aug 14, 2026
GP966
Marx: Chamber Music, Vol. 1
Naxos
Available as
CD
$19.99
Aug 14, 2026
This first volume of Joseph Marx's chamber music charts a period of 30 years from the cello works of 1913-14 to the Violin Sonata No. 2, written in 1944, shortly before he ceased all composition. The Pastorale is characteristically subtle with impressionistic devices harnessed to ever-changing variations. The Suite in F major, for which the Pastorale was originally intended, balances a rural idyll with more sombre elements, informed by a noble Classical design. Violin Sonata No. 2, subtitled Fruhlingssonate ('Spring Sonata'), consciously re-uses material from earlier works to form a lyrical dance-like work irradiated by ingenious harmonic twists.
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Marx: Chamber Music, Vol. 1
$19.99
CD
Naxos
Aug 14, 2026
8579181
Viola Concertos
Dacapo Classical
Available as
CD
$15.99
Aug 28, 2026
Viola Concertos presents three 21st-century Danish concertos, written for Rafaell Altino by Karsten Fundal, Christian Winther Christensen and Soren Nils Eichberg. In these works, the viola moves from intimate lyricism to dazzling virtuosity, weaving it's way through both tender dialogues and dramatic exchanges with the orchestra. Altino's masterly playing brings out each composer's distinctive voice and reveals new facets of the viola, revealing the instrument's full expressive range, shifting between neo-Romantic hero, indifferent loner and shadowy foil.
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Viola Concertos
$15.99
CD
Dacapo Classical
Aug 28, 2026
8224775
Smetana: Piano Works
Naxos
Available as
CD
$19.99
Aug 14, 2026
Regarded as the father of Czech music Bedrich Smetana was a pioneer in developing a national style that culminated in his popular symphonic cycle Ma vlast. Composed after he had become deaf the Czech Dances are Smetana's last major piano works. Sparkling with distinctive character and inventiveness Book 1 elevates the humble polka to the level Chopin achieved with his mazurkas, while Book 2 was inspired by the old Moravian and Bohemian dances played to Smetana by his neighbour, a local amateur violinist. Coloured with Lisztian harmonic richness, the Piano Sonata in G minor combines Romantic expressiveness with puckish good humour.
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Smetana: Piano Works
$19.99
CD
Naxos
Aug 14, 2026
8574718
Catalog of Dreams
Challenge Records
Available as
CD
$16.99
Aug 28, 2026
For the past six years, flutist Alex Hamburger and pianist Jose Luiz Martins have been the heartbeat of each others' musical worlds. Now, with their debut record as a duo, the husband and wife create a shared world, offering listeners a highly personal, textural immersion into the sonic catalog of their journey. The two musical prodigies were originally on divergent paths when they first met in 2018 during coincidental time abroad in Basel, Switzerland. Hamburger, originally from the Washington, D.C. metro area, was living previously in New York City, while Martins was studying for a masters in Basel after leaving his hometown of Sao Paulo, Brazil. Their first shared notes snapped their lives together, ushering in an instant connection and understanding, both about the music that influenced them and the music they wished to put in the world. Together, the partners found a deeply rooted shared commitment to using space, listening, and empathetic reaction to dive into the unknown and return with beauty and compassion. Now living together in Hyattsville, Md., Hamburger and Martins recorded Catalog of Dreams in 2025 as a response to the diverse range of musical traditions that shaped them, both as individuals and as a pair. Six of the album's eight songs are unique reinterpretations of traditional and modern classics from composers such as Herb Ellis, Wayne Shorter, and Thundercat. The duo then flexes the intimate dynamics and texture of piano, voice, flute, and electronic keyboards to reinterpret the compositions into vehicles for new dreams and possibilities. Of course, the most noticeable influence on the album is that of Brazilian music, which native Paulistano Martins brought to the record (and the relationship) from the very beginning. Three tunes make this connection explicit: Gilberto Gil's classic 'Ladeira da Preguica' (made famous by Elis Regina), Airto Moreira's eternally groovy 'Tombo in 7/4,' and the modern Brazilian heavyweight Luisa Lacerda's 'Poente,' a familial celebration that features lyrics by her father Andre Lacerda. However, Catalog of Dreams is steeped in Brasiliana beyond these three tunes, with traces of groove, melody, and harmonic complexity saturating the duo's playing and arrangements throughout. The record's two original compositions, both composed by Hamburger with production assistance from Martins, achieve this with a tender nuance. By taking these Brazilian influences back into her own roots of great lyrical musical traditions (the Great American Songbook, Black American Music, and folk), Hamburger finds a way to explore themes of loss, trauma, injustice and the human experience with nuance and care. Although both Hamburger and Martins are prolific on their own, each with their own critically acclaimed body of work as bandleaders, this is their first full length album with just the two of them. With this debut of eight songs in just under thirty minutes, the partners draw us into their journey, into their catalog, and into their dreams.
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Catalog of Dreams
$16.99
CD
Challenge Records
Aug 28, 2026
CR 73639
Aftermath
Dacapo Classical
Available as
Vinyl
$32.99
Aug 28, 2026
Composer Niels Ronsholdt's (b. 1978) solo project Aftermath journeys the American highway, observing cities and landscapes in decay, and reflecting on a fractured modern society. The classic road -trip dream of freedom fades into bewildered loneliness and remorse, yet fragile hopes of spring and new generations glimmer. This exclusive vinyl edition includes a free mp3 download of the full album (14 tracks in total).
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Aftermath
$32.99
Vinyl
Dacapo Classical
Aug 28, 2026
DAC-LP015
From manuscript to invention - A dialogue between romantic h
Challenge Classics
Available as
CD
$16.99
Aug 28, 2026
From Manuscript to Invention is a deeply imaginative musical journey that bridges past and present, reviving forgotten Romantic voices while transforming them through contemporary creativity. At it's heart stands Emilie Mayer - one of the most prolific yet historically overlooked female composers of the 19th century - whose remarkable career defied the conventions of her time. Alongside the music of Ferdinand Ries, a close associate of Beethoven, the album brings rare manuscript sources to life. Several works are presented here in world premiere recordings, offering listeners a first encounter with music long hidden from the repertoire. By returning to Mayer's original Duet in F Major and Ries's Cello Sonata, the performers reveal a rich sound world shaped by expressive freedom, historical performance practice, and the intimate, improvisatory spirit of 19th-century salon culture. At the same time, the album becomes an act of creation in it's own right: newly composed works inspired by these historical materials unfold alongside them, blurring the line between interpretation and invention. Through this dialogue, the performers not only reawaken the art of musical spontaneity - ornamentation, rubato, and improvisation - but also restore Mayer's voice to it's rightful place within the Romantic canon. The result is an evocative exploration of continuity and renewal, where rediscovery becomes both an act of justice and a catalyst for new artistic expression.
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From manuscript to invention - A dialogue between romantic h
$16.99
CD
Challenge Classics
Aug 28, 2026
CC 720069
Legends - Rebellion
Sono Luminus
Available as
CD
$16.99
Aug 14, 2026
LEGENDS: Rebellion is the next installment in a series of recordings celebrating women as storytellers and bearers of cultural memory. Featuring world-premiere recordings, Grammy-nominated, long-time collaborative duo soprano Laura Strickling and pianist Joy Schreier return to add to the evolving legend of modern art song in an album exploring rebellion in many forms: political, emotional, erotic, maternal, and spiritual. From Afghan women's landay poetry composed in defiance of oppression, to mythic heroines reclaiming their own narratives, to an unflinching portrayal of new motherhood and a powerful meditation on love as resistance. Pushing against conventional expectations of what art song 'should' be, this album offers a kaleidoscopic array of harmonic and rhythmic languages alongside compelling, deeply human texts; a program that fascinates, challenges, informs, and delights - inviting both devoted listeners of art song and those less familiar with the genre into a richly expressive sonic world celebrating contemporary song as a space for courage, vulnerability, witness, and transformation.
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Legends - Rebellion
$16.99
CD
Sono Luminus
Aug 14, 2026
DSL-92291
Here I Am - Choral Music of Jocelyn Hagen
Reference Recordings
Available as
CD
$16.99
Aug 28, 2026
True Concord's newest album, HERE I AM, features two world-premiere recordings of works by Jocelyn Hagen. The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci has been performed more than 50 times around the world since 2019, incorporating visuals, sound, light and movement. Here I Am was inspired by conductor Eric Holtan's suggestion that Hagen should write a piece celebrating the women's suffrage movement and the centennial of the 19th Amendment in 2020. This piece is performed with live-concert projections of portraits of 47 inspiring women from across the world and across time, whose words form the libretto. HERE I AM was recorded in outstanding fidelity by engineer John Polito and produced by GRAMMY-award winner Peter Rutenberg of Los Angeles. Recorded May 28-31, 2024.
![Awakening / Kate Chopin (abridged) [2 CDs]](//arkivmusic.com/cdn/shop/files/181840.jpg?v=1785526068&width=800)
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![Awakening / Kate Chopin (abridged) [2 CDs]](http://arkivmusic.com/cdn/shop/files/181840.jpg?v=1785526068&width=1200)
![Awakening / Kate Chopin (abridged) [2 CDs]](http://arkivmusic.com/cdn/shop/files/181840.jpg?v=1785526068&width=800)
