This album comprises nine solo and chamber compositions written over a span of more than fifty years. Although none of these pieces uses any Asian instruments, most of them contain some kind of Asian cultural references. All of them were composed for the performers who have recorded them. __ David Loeb

This is an album largely consisting of solo violin works by Paganini, but also with two Paganini works for violin and piano. Argentine violinist Tomas Cotik, who has made a number of recordings for Centaur, is the ideal performer for these works.

The piano duos presented here, all drawn from the mid-20th century, have their inspiration in dance or ballet: but thankfully, that red flag for program music - is it a hopeless prisoner of a storyline or visual narrative? - shows no sign of rising. All three works stand majestically on their own: Rachmaninoff's autumnal self-eulogy, The Symphonic Dances, Barber's Souvenirs, a whimsical collage of the Gilded Era ballroom, and Piazzolla's Tango for Two Pianos (arr. P. Ziegler). And, in the case of Piazzolla, we witness the tango, as it moves from the cafe to the concert hall, shedding the strictures of dance itself.

Jose Elizondo is a multifaceted Mexican composer. He studied at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and at Harvard University. In the field of technology, Jose works full-time as an engineer in a company that specializes in speech recognition technology systems. As a composer, Jose writes chamber and orchestral music in a style that is lyrical and expressive, often drawing inspiration from Latin American folk music.

Night Surrendering to Dawn features an engaging and eclectic program of works for flute and piano by 21st century composers Valerie Coleman, Christian Ellenwood, Amanda Harberg, and Samuel Zyman. As we move through unprecedented and challenging times, we hope that the pieces on this program serve to remind us that light and hope will return after the dark.

Why Preludes & Fugues? Everyone loves a fugue! But the prelude is important too. It should set up the fugue in dramatic fashion. Although my fugues have expositions, episodes and stretto sections, they diverge from the strict forms of the Baroque period. A pure 3 or 4 voice fugue is modeled on 4-part choral writing where each voice is maintained withing it's limited range. In the classical era - Mozart, Beethoven and Brahms all wrote 'fugue-like' pieces known as 'fugati'. These pieces often started out formally but soon broke out of their strict voice leading with runs, arpeggios and block chords. Fugue writing continued into the 20th century, but losing the tonal centers and discernable key changes weakened the strength and logic of the form. Tonal fugue writing calls for independent, melodious, horizontal lines, while also expressing logical chord progressions vertically. It's tricky! Why write piano music in this style these days? Actually, they were all composed in the late 1970's during my student days at Boston University. I was having a great time, and my teacher, David del Tredici was writing fully tonal music himself. Bottom line: if you have one life to live, you should write the kind of music you like!

This album features two of the greatest Clarinet Trios, those of Beethoven and Brahms. These are beautiful performances of truly great works.

Samuel Lord Kalcheim composes in a variety of styles, old and new, and is dedicated to writing music both emotionally and intellectually satisfying, balancing tender lyricism with tight, complex formal architecture. Building on an expertise in 18th and 19th c. styles and forms, Samuel writes expressive new music for today's sensibilities.

Music, for all of us, is intimately connected to our lives and the sounds we love and grew up with, and that we discovered on our journeys through our world. We all remember the music we heard as children, and certainly we remember the songs that bound us together with our friends as teens. As we grow older, we are exposed to music from all over the world that we experience through visits, shows, and media. -Craig Madden Morris

This album comprises seven solo, chamber, and orchestral pieces composed over almost forty years. It does not include any compositions for Japanese instruments or for early instruments which are well-represented in other albums by David Loeb. All of the pieces were written specifically for the performers who have played them here.

This album features the late piano works of Johannes Brahms, beautifully played by pianist Daniel Shapiro.

Jeffrey Chappell performs three great pianos sonatas from the 20th Century, by Alberto Ginastera, Charles T. Griffes, and Samuel Barber

Chinese pianist Nariga Nogi, in live recordings of piano works by Haydn, Liszt, Debussy, and Chopin.

This repertoire spans almost eighty years of classical composers' excursions into blues, folk, hip-hop, jazz, musical theater, samba, tango, techno and other genres. Each piece goes beyond mere stylistic imitation, cultivating an authentic expressivity within a transcribed musical language rooted in the Americas. ___Alexander Crosett

This is a great modern jazz album, with all original compositions by Jorge Variego