This gritty vocalist gained early experience as a member of the Shadettes, a mid-60s beat group based in Dunfermline, Scotland. By 1968, the act had evolved into Nazareth, which grew from provincial origins into a leading international attraction…

Joseph Lee "Big Joe" Williams (October 16, 1903 – December 17, 1982) was an American Delta blues guitarist, singer and songwriter, notable for the distinctive sound of his nine-string guitar. Performing over four decades, he recorded the songs "Baby Please Don't Go", "Crawlin' King Snake" and "Peach Orchard Mama", among many others, for various record labels, including Bluebird, Delmark, Okeh, Prestige and Vocalion. He was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame on October 4, 1992.

"Comin' Home Baby" is a song originally written as an instrumental by Ben Tucker and first recorded by the Dave Bailey Quintet in 1961, and shortly thereafter by Herbie Mann.

Alice Sara Ott's new recital combines Edvard Grieg's Opus 16 with a dozen of the more famous of his "Lyrical Pieces". His at first glance somewhat strange title "Wonderland", of course, alludes to Lewis Carroll's famous children's book "Alice in Wonderland", which appeared in 1865, the same decade in which Grieg wrote the first of his "album sheets" and his unabated popular piano concerto.

Gloria Lynne (born Gloria Wilson; November 23, 1929 – October 15, 2013), also known as Gloria Alleyne, was an American jazz vocalist with a recording career spanning from 1958 to 2007.

Madman Across the Water is the fourth studio album by British singer/songwriter Elton John. The title song was set to be released on John's previous album Tumbleweed Connection. However, it was set aside and would eventually be re-recorded and serve as the title track of this album. The SACD version of the album contained a longer version of "Razor Face" which extended the song-ending jam to 6:42 instead of the early fade on the original album.

Honky Château is the fifth studio album by British singer/songwriter Elton John, released in 1972. In 2003, the album was ranked number 357 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time. It was certified gold in July 1972 and platinum in October 1995 by the RIAA. Honky Chateau became the first of a string of albums by Elton John to hit #1 in the Billboard Charts in the US. In Canada, the album peaked at #3 on the RPM 100 Top Albums Chart, reaching this position on 29 July 1972, dropping two places to #5, then returning to #3 for a further twelve consecutive weeks before falling to #9 on 4 November of the same year.

Pure is Robben Ford’s brand-new instrumental studio album – the first one since Tiger Walk from 1997. With nine unique tracks the album features a “pure” Robben Ford - this guitar virtuoso who has a tremendous music vocabulary of jazz, blues and rock. Pure is to be congratulated as an album which seamlessly blends a soulful west coast vibe with bluesy hard rock. On top, Pure features exceptional guest musicians such as Nate Smith, Toss Panos, Shannon Forest and more.

This album features the complete works for flute (to date) by Franco-Ukranian composer Dimitri Tchesnokov (b.1982), with the exception of his flute trio Tableaux feìeìriques. This programme is supplemented by some of Tchesnokov’s piano solos in a comparable style. The pieces presented here offer a contrast to the composer’s religious/mystical music (3 Chants sacreìs, Requiem, Ave Verum) and his historic/realistic works (Symphonie archaïque, Château de Grandval, Symphonie Ukrainienne).

If there is one student of Johann Sebastian Bach whom posterity has definitely not forgotten, it is Johann Gottlieb Goldberg. However, he owes this destiny to his position as harpsichordist to Count Keyserling: during the latter’s bouts of insomnia, it was Goldberg’s task to play for him the famous variations that he had commissioned from the Leipzig Kantor. This has probably long obscured the fact that Goldberg was also an excellent composer.

The Italian pianist Filippo Gorini took advantage of the world health crisis to immerse himself in The Art of Fugue, Johann Sebastian Bach’s unfinished mystical masterpiece: ‘The view that it should be seen solely as a theoretical marvel is misguided: as the counterpoints and canons evolve in formal complexity, so does their emotional tension, until the heartbreaking mystery of the unfinished Fuga XIV’, says the young pianist, winner of a Borletti-Buitoni Trust prize in 2020, whose first two albums for Alpha have been very well received (Diapason d’Or, 5 Stars in BBC Music Magazine etc.).

This programme marks the eagerly awaited return of Véronique Gens to Baroque music and Lully, in which she made a name for herself at the start of her career. It presents airs from Atys, Persée, Alceste, Proserpine, Le Triomphe de l’Amour and other works by Louis XIV’s famous composer, but also several by Marc-Antoine Charpentier (Médée), Henry Desmarets and Pascal Collasse.

This is a collection of some of the best jazz compositions with female vocals.

Before the first sound from the loudspeaker, a certain skepticism: Do the countertenors now also want to kill the mezzo-sopranos in the Belcanto compartment? Will all trouser roles soon be filled with real, albeit falsetting guys? The future will tell us whether this will happen.

Nature, the cosmos and humanity are the inspirations for Joji Hirota’s latest solo album, Prayer’s Tale. Single-handedly playing 40 different Japanese and Asian instruments, combined with vocals, he weaves sounds of nature, emotions and colours of the universe into a beautiful soundscape.