: Everyone deserves music :
I went to the Barnes & Noble yesterday and picked up a couple CDs that I had in my collection prior to my house burning down. I've only replaced a few from my once-prodigious collection (including Yes' 90125, Cole Porter's soundtrack to the movie De-Lovely and Rimsky-Korsakov's Scheherazade) but I still have a ton of music that was rescued from my destroyed iMac's hard drive (thanks to my tech guy at work). However, much of that music is popular music, and bad pop music at that. These days I find myself missing the subtlety of classical music, something I can't have absent in my life for very long.
So yesterday I bought a double-disc set that included Essential Opera and Essential Opera 2 in a single case, and The Mozart Collection. The opera collection is pretty complete to my taste, with the exception of having only one aria from Verdi's La Traviata, one of my favorites. The second disc, however, has an interesting story on how I discovered it, as it is probably one of the most fascinating Mozart discs on the shelves.
The Mozart disc is an American Gramaphone recording, the label responsible for the popular "Fresh Aire" series by composer Chip Davis leading the group Mannheim Steamroller. I first discovered Fresh Aire when I was a freshman in high school, when I was sitting the back of my drum captain's BMW and he was showing off his car stereo using the first track of Fresh Aire III. Davis is a drummer, so his music naturally features the drums, which appealed to high school percussionists like us. From hearing that first track pounded into my body by this guy's supercharged car stereo, I was hooked.
I eventually collected Fresh Aire I-V, some on CD, some on vinyl, before exploring the rest of AG's catalog. Like the now-defunct Sheffield Lab label and Reference Recordings, and to a lesser extent, Windham Hill, AG at one time specialized in producing high quality analog recordings pressed on 180-gram virgin audiophile vinyl. The music may have been a little snarky at times, but it always sounded great, and the Mozart album is no exception. The liner notes on the CD tell the incredible story about how producer Davis and English composer and conductor John Rutter were planning the recording of Fresh Aire VI in London and had an extra day in the schedule. Only a month away, it seemed an insurmountable challenge to plan a major recording project in such a short time frame, but seredipity prevailed in countless ways to make their impossible dream a reality.
Now, back to the music....
So yesterday I bought a double-disc set that included Essential Opera and Essential Opera 2 in a single case, and The Mozart Collection. The opera collection is pretty complete to my taste, with the exception of having only one aria from Verdi's La Traviata, one of my favorites. The second disc, however, has an interesting story on how I discovered it, as it is probably one of the most fascinating Mozart discs on the shelves.
The Mozart disc is an American Gramaphone recording, the label responsible for the popular "Fresh Aire" series by composer Chip Davis leading the group Mannheim Steamroller. I first discovered Fresh Aire when I was a freshman in high school, when I was sitting the back of my drum captain's BMW and he was showing off his car stereo using the first track of Fresh Aire III. Davis is a drummer, so his music naturally features the drums, which appealed to high school percussionists like us. From hearing that first track pounded into my body by this guy's supercharged car stereo, I was hooked.
I eventually collected Fresh Aire I-V, some on CD, some on vinyl, before exploring the rest of AG's catalog. Like the now-defunct Sheffield Lab label and Reference Recordings, and to a lesser extent, Windham Hill, AG at one time specialized in producing high quality analog recordings pressed on 180-gram virgin audiophile vinyl. The music may have been a little snarky at times, but it always sounded great, and the Mozart album is no exception. The liner notes on the CD tell the incredible story about how producer Davis and English composer and conductor John Rutter were planning the recording of Fresh Aire VI in London and had an extra day in the schedule. Only a month away, it seemed an insurmountable challenge to plan a major recording project in such a short time frame, but seredipity prevailed in countless ways to make their impossible dream a reality.
Now, back to the music....
