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Album Review: BRAZZ (Rachel Beausoleil)
BRAZZMATAZZ This release may be subtitled Where Bossa Nova Meets Jazz, but I call Brazz “delectable.” The first stunner is that this Portuguese-sounding angel with perfect diction, as if singing from a beachside café in Rio de Janeiro, is actually Ottawa-based French-Canadian vocalist Rachel Beausoleil, who released this collection of Brazilian popular music last September….
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Album: DREAMS OF A NEW DAY — SONGS BY BLACK COMPOSERS (Will Liverman)
DREAMS OF A NEW DAY Cedille Records, marking its 31st season as Chicago’s independent classical record label, has announced its new release: Coinciding with February Black History Month, operatic baritone Will Liverman’s recital album, with pianist Paul Sánchez, highlights Black composers across generations, from early 20th-century pioneers Henry Burleigh, Margaret Bonds, and Thomas Kerr to…
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Music Album: MAHLER’S TENTH SYMPHONY (Minnesota Orchestra)
MINNESOTA ORCHESTRA RELEASES RECORDING OF MAHLER’S TENTH SYMPHONY BIS Records and the Minnesota Orchestra release seventh disc in Mahler symphonies recording project Minnesota Orchestra’s newest album in the ongoing Gustav Mahler symphonies recording series is Mahler’s Tenth Symphony, recorded at Orchestra Hall in June 2019 by Swedish label BIS Records. The album will be released worldwide…
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DVD Review: EALING STUDIOS COMEDY COLLECTION (Blu-Ray in HD from Film Movement Classics)
FOUR VEDDY BRITISH COMEDIES There was a bright, shining moment in the history of British film and it wore the banner: Ealing. The Ealing studios have been in operation since 1902, making them the oldest, still operating studios in the world. Their most recent productions include the popular series Beecham House, and the remake of Murder on…
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Review: RIDING THE RAILS (American Experience)
RAILING AGAINST DEPRESSION Being a lover of railroads, especially railroad travel, I still remember this absorbing documentary from PBS’s American Experience. Back in 1998, I learned of the teenagers who rode the rails during The Depression, and it left an indelible mark on me. That aching search. The adventure. Strangely, it has been hard to…
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Album Review: THE QUEEN OF BAROQUE (Cecilia Bartoli)
YES, QUEEN OK, it may be a tag line, but I promise you that Cecilia Bartoli IS the “Queen of Baroque.” And this sentiment coming from someone who can take only so many malismas. Her strength and passion are awesome, her diction stunning, her emotion undeniable, and her range seemingly endless. Her first compilation album…
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Album Review: THINK OF SPRING (M. Ward)
JUST TRY GETTING ALONG WITHOUT THIS ALBUM Ah, songs. You know, with melody and lyrics and accessible sentiment. Prolific songwriter M. Ward brings us his new album Think of Spring, a collection of songs originally recorded by Billie Holiday – a muse to Ward and many others. But don’t expect literal translations like the way…
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Album Review: BEAUTIFUL SOUVENIRS (Bidi Dworkin)
BIDI DWORKIN’S NEW ALBUM IS A BEAUTIFUL SOUVENIR IN ITSELF So, you probably know that Stage and Cinema receives hundreds of albums a month to review, and many more since COVID kept CDs from arriving in our snail-mailbox. We have decided therefore to review only those that knock our socks off on the first hearing….
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Music Review: 2AM CHRISTMAS EVE (White Owl Red)
ALL ABOUT 2AM CHRISTMAS EVE Sometimes with new Christmas music, I feel stuck between the old-fashioned, the gloopy and the irritating (anything that sounds like Disney Radio). We’ll always have the greats (Ella, Frank, Bing, Bette, Babs) singing the greats (the most popular Christmas music was written by Jewish men), but as with so much…
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Album Review: REAL ME (Brit Taylor)
IT DOESN’T GET MORE REAL THAN THIS It’s not often that an album comes out that is instantly likeable. And Brit Taylor’s just-released debut album, Real Me, is also drenched in honesty, soulfulness and non-saccharine sweetness. And she goes deeper than just country; her ten songs are flavored with blues and rock. And she writes…
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Album Review: DAVID KOREVAAR: (Luigi Perrachio’s Nine Little Poems and 25 Preludi)
CAPRICIOUS CHROMATICS FROM KOREVAAR CATAPULT TO CLOUD NINE What a find this new album is — and the composer had better be a household name after this. The prolific David Korevaar’s world premiere recording of piano music by Italian impressionist composer Luigi Perrachio (1883-1966) is now available. The two works on the album, recorded for…
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Album Review: SOUL OF THE SPANISH GUITAR (Pablo Sáinz-Villegas)
THE SOUL OF A NATION So, at first I thought “another Andrés Segovia for Brunch-like album”? Not that that’s a bad thing, but Pablo Sáinz-Villegas truly surprised me. He makes his guitar sing like an orchestra. Even the plucks go from a tinkle to a pounding. When supreme virtuosity is coupled with lightness of touch,…
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Album Review: DRUNK TANK PINK (shame)
PUNK FOR ALL For those who know the band shame, then you know the UK members spent their entire adult life touring as riotous post-punkers (they’re first album 2018’s Songs Of Praise is a hoot). But what of those who like their punk adventurous, but without the feeling that an overripe drunk is distorting the…
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Album Review: ON THE ROCK (Ofra Harnoy)
ON THE ROCK SOLID North America’s only known Viking settlement is also the place on our continent where the sun first rises. I’ve heard about the Canadian Province Newfoundland and Labrador mostly from cruise and land package ads. It is sold as having a reputation for people who are warm, welcoming, fun loving and “funny…
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CD Review: LULLABIES (Dave Brubeck on Verve)
THANKS FOR THE LULLABIES…AND THE MEMORIES Not long before the great Mr. Dave Brubeck drifted off to eternal sleep one day before his 92nd birthday, he had left for us a final album of soft jazzy lullabies to guide us into peace. Awesome! We teared up at not just the loveliness of the tunes, but…
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Album Review: JONI MITCHELL ARCHIVES VOL. 1: THE EARLY YEARS (1963-1967)
A BRAND NEW TREASURE TROVE OF JONI Today is quite a special day. Not only did a new President get elected, but it is also Joni Mitchell’s Birthday. How lucky is today? Joni turned 77 on November 7. The slot machine of life also comes up 777 for you. This is one of the greatest…
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Film/Blu-ray: THE VAMPIRE BAT (1933, directed by Frank Strayer, restored by the UCLA Film & Television Archive)
PRE-CODE BATTINESS Restored by the UCLA Film & Television Archive from a 35mm composite acetate fine grain master and a 35mm nitrate print, here’s your chance to see the American Pre-Code horror film The Vampire Bat (1933). Director Frank R. Strayer spins a thrilling tale from Hugo nominated screenwriter Edward T. Lowe (House of Frankenstein,…
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Film Review: DARK CIRCLE (Newly Restored; directed by Judy Irving, Christopher Beaver & Ruth Landy)
WHAT GOES AROUND… It’s been 75 years this month since the start of the Atomic Age, with the U.S. nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki killing hundreds of thousands of civilians, but its trail of destruction has never ended. Dark Circle covers both the period’s beginnings and its aftermath, providing a scientific primer on the…
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Album Review: LOVECRAFT COUNTRY (Official Soundtrack for the HBO Series)
A NEW COUNTRY Lovecraft Country premiered on August 16, 2020, on HBO and consists of ten episodes. Based on Matt Ruff’s novel of the same name, Lovecraft Country follows Atticus Freeman (Jonathan Majors) as he meets up with his friend Letitia (Jurnee Smollett) and his uncle George (Courtney B. Vance) to embark on a road trip across…
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Album Review: ELLA FITZGERALD: THE LOST BERLIN TAPES (Verve)
SHE’S BACK! Ella Fitzgerald’s feathery swinging touch is instantly recognizable: her acumen, heart, and technical finesse ’” that subtlety in deftness and taste ’” combined with her jazzy roots in bebop and novelty, and her skill in using her voice as if it were an instrument, made her the foremost jazz singer in the history…
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