The Danish Radio Big Band joined in with Curtis Stigers to celebrate the iconic legendary Frank Sinatra concerts that took place at The Sands Hotel in Las Vegas. This concert recording presents the most beloved evergreens from the American songbook classics of the 1950s and 1960s. 50 years ago, magic was made on the stage of the Sands Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, when the timeless Frank Sinatra met the robust swing of the Count Basie Orchestra. Sinatra at the Sands has remained a beloved classic ever since, the perfect marriage of old-school pop and big band jazz. Singer, songwriter and saxophonist Curtis Stigers brings those worlds together in his own music since the last three decades, which makes him the perfect candidate to reinterpret Sinatra's cherished repertoire for modern ears. He captures the rare alchemy of hipness, elegance, playfulness and feeling that made Sinatra's renditions of these songs immortal while adding his own unique twist.

The Danish Radio Big Band joined in with Curtis Stigers to celebrate the iconic legendary Frank Sinatra concerts that took place at The Sands Hotel in Las Vegas. This concert recording presents the most beloved evergreens from the American songbook classics of the 1950s and 1960s. 50 years ago, magic was made on the stage of the Sands Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, when the timeless Frank Sinatra met the robust swing of the Count Basie Orchestra. Sinatra at the Sands has remained a beloved classic ever since, the perfect marriage of old-school pop and big band jazz. Singer, songwriter and saxophonist Curtis Stigers brings those worlds together in his own music since the last three decades, which makes him the perfect candidate to reinterpret Sinatra's cherished repertoire for modern ears. He captures the rare alchemy of hipness, elegance, playfulness and feeling that made Sinatra's renditions of these songs immortal while adding his own unique twist.

Vinyl LP pressing of this classic jazz album. American hard bop trombonist Curtis Fuller recorded The Opener for Blue Note records in 1957. This was his first album for the label. Alfred Lion of Blue Note Records first heard Fuller playing with Miles Davis in the late 1950s, and featured him as a sideman on record dates led by Sonny Clark and John Coltrane; Fuller's work on the latter's Blue Train album is probably his best-known recorded performance. Featuring Hank Mobley on the tenor sax, Bobby Timmons on piano, Paul Chambers on bass, and Art Taylor on drums, The Opener reissue is part of an overall Blue Note 75th anniversary vinyl initiative spearheaded by Blue Note Records President, Don Was.

On Curtis Stigers's 2022 release, this multi platinum artist takes a look back with new versions of his international hits "I Wonder Why," "Never Saw A Miracle," and "You're All That Matters To Me," as well as "This Life," the theme song to the TV show Sons Of Anarchy, and (What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace Love and Understanding" from The Bodyguard soundtrack. Stigers revisits these classics and more, in his signature laid back, jazzy, bluesy style. Exclusive to the gatefold double LP is the bonus track, Bob Dylan's "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right." Track-listing: 1. (What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love And Understanding 2. You're All That Matters To Me 3. I Don't Wanna Talk About It Now 4. I Wonder Why 5. This Life 6. Keep Me From The Cold 7. Summertime 8. Don't Go Far 9. Tonight Will Be Fine 10. Swingin' Down At 10th And Main 11. Never Saw A Miracle 12. Don't Think Twice, It's All Right

On Curtis Stigers's 2022 release, this multi platinum artist takes a look back with new versions of his international hits "I Wonder Why," "Never Saw A Miracle," and "You're All That Matters To Me," as well as "This Life," the theme song to the TV show Sons Of Anarchy, and (What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace Love and Understanding" from The Bodyguard soundtrack. Stigers revisits these classics and more, in his signature laid back, jazzy, bluesy style. Track-listing: 1. (What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love And Understanding 2. You're All That Matters To Me 3. I Don't Wanna Talk About It Now 4. I Wonder Why 5. This Life 6. Keep Me From The Cold 7. Summertime 8. Don't Go Far 9. Tonight Will Be Fine 10. Swingin' Down At 10th And Main 11. Never Saw A Miracle

Japanese remastered pressing. Ultra-Vybe. 2021.

Japanese Remastered SHM-CD pressing. Universal. 2024.

SONGS FROM MY KITCHEN VOLUME 1

Japanese resissue, part of the Timeless 50th Anniversary (1975-2025) campaign. Ultra-Vybe. 2025.

From the "Jazz Masterpieces Best & More" series once released by EMI, 30 carefully selected works are being reissued on SHM-CD. None of the titles overlap with "Jazz Department Store" or "Everything Jazz"! - Universal. 2025.

Japanese resissue, part of the Timeless 50th Anniversary (1975-2025) campaign. Ultra-Vybe. 2025.

NEW TROMBONE

Now Playing - Curtis Mayfield - vinyl LP - Rhino Records

Curtis Mayfield / Now Playing (SYEOR24) [Grape Vinyl] / The Curtis Mayfield "Now Playing" vinyl includes 10 seminal tracks from across the artists' catalog, including smash singles "Move On Up" and "Superfly".Compiled on a 1LP grape color vinyl, it's priced for the savvy record shopper in mind and drops just in time to kick off Rhino's Black History Month releases. - Curtis Mayfield was an American soul, rhythm and blues and funk singer, songwriter, and record producer. He is highly regarded as a pioneer of funk and of politically conscious African-American Music. He was also a multi-instrumentalist who played the guitar, bass, piano, saxophone, and drums.

Principal cast: Laura Cherici (Soprano - Martesia) ,Mary-Ellen Nesi (Mezzo Soprano - Antiope), Zachary Stains (Tenor - Ercole), Randall Scotting (Counertenor - Teseo), Marina Bartoli (Soprano - Ippolita), Filippo Mineccia (Countertenor - Telemone), Luca Dordolo (Tenor - Alceste).

John Pascoe, director, set & costume designer.
Sara Erde, choreographer.

NTSC All Region
Sound: LPCM 2.0; Dolby Digital 5.1
Color
Aspect Ratio: 16:9
Duration: 136 mins.
Subtitled in Italian, English, German & French

Singers of great renown were called upon for the first performance of Ercole sul Termodonte by Antonio Vivaldi in Rome, “in the hall of Signor Federico Capranica”, on 27th January 1723. An exclusively male singing cast, as was the custom on Roman stages, to tell the tale of the battle between Hercules, accompanied by the heroes Theseus, Telamon and Alceste, and the Amazons led by Antiope. The story, which is based on the ninth of the legendary labours of Hercules, and which concludes with the traditional happy ending here decreed by Diana, who proclaims the nuptial unions of Hippolyte, Antiope’s sister, (with Theseus, prince of Athens) and of Martesia, Antiope’s daughter (with Telamon, king of Ithaca), was arranged by the “regular canon of La Carità of Venice” Don Giacomo Francesco Bussani, on a libretto that had already been performed in 1678 at the San Salvatore theatre in Venice. The opera was successful, winning appreciation and at the same time astonishment , through its introduction of many passages written in a new “manner”, with an exciting, incisive rhythmic gait. This style so excited the Romans that from then on they demanded it almost exclusively in melodramas.

After the success of 1723, however, Ercole did not circulate widely and at a certain point the score was thought to have been lost. It has only recently been reassembled thanks to the precious rediscovery of some thirty arias and two duets in various archives, and has been reconstructed in its recitative passages. Arias and recitatives are indeed the traditional dramatic pillars supporting the dénouement of the story. The recitatives are generally “secco”, recreated along Vivaldian principles of expressivity and flexibility to accentuate the quality of the individual verses and respecting the general tone of the discourse. The orchestra, however, is present, punctually and in elaborate manner, not only in the more dramatic moments but also in the bucolic, descriptive arias, and stands in the service of the voice to accentuate onomatopoeic effects and to offer clearer depictions of the characters and the feelings that drive them. Now in his twenty-second opera score, Vivaldi brings into play all the technical means at his disposal to render the story comprehensible and to present the state of mind of the individual characters. The main desire of the “red priest” was to proceed smoothly, following the expressive substance of the verses, using shifting melodic invention to set the various scenic moments against a ceaseless search for lively collaboration between voices and instruments and a skilled use of harmonies and of a fanciful search for colors. The final “product”, based though it was on the structures of Neapolitan opera, thus emerges as something unique and personal.

NOTE: Contains nudity

Classical Music

The Anglo Mexican Foundation celebrates it's 75th anniversary with this programme of three of it's recent commissions - from Mexican composers Alejandro Basulto and Arturo M�rquez - joining the first recording of M�rquez's harp concerto M�scaras, in an album that interleaves nocturnal warmth with an infectious spirit of dancing energy. Alejandro Basulto is a Mexican award-winning composer and orchestral conductor. His music is characterized by a profound Latin-American identity, a vibrant integration of contemporary popular culture, a continuous exploration of diverse techniques and the use of new narrative approaches. Arturo Marquez was born deep in the Sonoran desert in the colonial town of Alamos, Mexico. He currently works at the National University of Mexico, Superior School of Music and the National Center of Research, Documentation and Information of Mexican Music.

British-violinist Tamsin Waley-Cohen – described by the late Ruggiero Ricci following a masterclass as the “most exceptionally gifted young violinist I have ever encountered” – adds to her prodigious reputation with a new disc of timeless works for strings by Ralph Vaughan Williams and Edward Elgar. Joined again by the Orchestra of the Swan under David Curtis, the centerpiece of the program is a performance of Vaughan Williams’ enchanting The Lark Ascending. Of her previous disc: “Waley-Cohen makes the utmost of [the D minor Concerto’s] innocent, songful lyricism...” The Observer

Celebrated international pianist Peter Donohoe continues his series of Shostakovich releases on Signum Classics, following his recent release of the 24 Preludes and Fugues, Op. 87 (SIGCD396). For this new recording he is accompanied for the concertos by the Orchestra of the Swan under their artistic director David Curtis. In the years since his unprecedented success as Silver Medal winner of the 1982 7th International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow, Peter Donohoe has built an extraordinary world-wide career, encompassing a huge repertoire and over forty years’ experience as a pianist, as well as continually exploring many other avenues in music-making. He is acclaimed as one of the foremost pianists of our time, for his musicianship, stylistic versatility and commanding technique.

Classical Music

Classical Music

Recorded at Teatro Comunale, Ferrara, January 2008

Motezuma is Vivaldi’s only opera set in the New World. The manuscripts for this rarely performed and rarely heard opera were only rediscovered in 2002 and currently only one CD version exists recorded by Alan Curtis and Il Complesso Barocco.

Of the CD recording, BBC Music Magazine wrote: “The instrumentalists of Il Complesso Barocco are on excellent form as indeed is Vivaldi himself in a rewarding score”.

Alan Curtis, one of the leading experts of Baroque music, returns again with the same orchestra, renowned Baroque specialist Vito Priante and another expert cast for the World Premiere Recording on DVD.

Region Code: 0 (All)
Sound format: 16:9
Picture format: LPCM 2.0
Running Time: 153 min. + extras
Booklet notes: Ita / Eng / Fre / Ger
Subtitles: Fre, Eng, Ger, Spa, Ita

Vinyl LP pressing of this collection from the soul/R&B legend.

Demofoonte dates from the early ‘Milan years’ of Christoph Willibald Gluck (1714–1787), long before the radical ‘reform operas’ for which he is most famous and his break with opera seria and the librettos of Pietro Metastasio. Gluck arrived in the northern Italian city in 1737 and was mentored there by composer Giovanni Battista Sammartini. Though Sammartini primarily composed symphonies and music for the church, Milan boasted a vibrant opera scene, and Gluck soon formed an association with one of the city's up-and-coming opera houses, the Teatro Regio Ducal. His first opera, Artaserse, on a libretto by Metastasio, premiered there on 26 December 1741 and opened the Milanese Carnival of 1742. Gluck went on to compose an opera for each of the next four Carnivals at Milan, Demofoonte being the second of these and his third opera overall, premiering on 6 January 1743. In celebration of Gluck’s 300th birthday, the early music scholar and harpsichordist Alan Curtis (1934–2015), founder of Il Complesso Barocco and leader of the period music ensemble for nearly four decades, prepared Demofoonte for performance. All of the arias had been preserved, but nearly all of the secco recitatives were lost. Curtis composed new recitatives in Gluck's style, using Gluck’s earliest fully extant opera, Ipermestra, written less than two years after Demofoonte, as a model. This modern revival was given its first performance on 23 November 2014 in Vienna and was recorded with the same excellent cast of singers the week before, in Northern Italy.

Classical Music