Weltbekannte populäre Melodien aus allen Bereichen der Musik. Der Bläser findet unvergessene Standards und Classics, Pop-Songs, Filmmusik und Evergreens.
Tucson's musical savant Howe Gelb has released an album of mostly instrumental keyboard music, Ogle Some Piano. It's a curious disc, even by Gelb's eccentric standards – nineteen tracks of piano meanderings in a variety of styles: jazz, rock, pop, tin pan alley and experimental avant-garde weirdness. And the titles seem a parody of art-rock pretentiousness: "Spangle Bib of Radiant Value," "Hammered and Hampered, We Then Took the Deeds Down by the Dozen," and "Someday They Will Have a Name for What Ails You as Opposed to Being Saddled with Speck Elation" are representative. The best tracks include Joey Burns on double bass and John Convertino on drums, making these tracks more or less Giant Sand pieces. There are also contributions from the usual suspects, including Nick Luca and Craig Schumacher of Wave Lab studios in Tucson, and the late great Rainer Ptacek as well.
The Concerto for Prepared Piano and Orchestra is one of Cage's most delicate works. The orchestra is treated as a group of soloists throughout, and for the most part operate with a small set of pitches and timbres, but is extended by a large array of percussion instruments played by four players. The piano, played by the superb contemporary piano interpreter Stephen Drury, weaves between the orchestral sonorities, rarely taking extended solos, as the piece becomes progressively more sparse until it tapers into silence at the end.