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Artist:
Various Artists
List Price: $18.97 |
Our Price: $12.68 |
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Artist:
Various Artists
List Price: $16.98 |
Our Price: $10.73 |
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Artist:
Various Artists
List Price: $16.98 |
Our Price: $10.69 |
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Artist:
Various Artists
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Adiemus
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Angelo Badalamenti
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David A. Stewart
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David Byrne
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Deep Forest
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Enigma
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Ennio Morricone
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Enya
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Eight Others
New Age music, ambient electronica, and spiritualized hip-hop received their first major, K-Tel-like treatment in 1996 when Virgin Records assembled Pure Moods. The "As Seen on TV" compilation quickly became a hot seller, and it would be nice to think that its popularity has as much to do with the music as the marketing. To be sure, Pure Moods offers genre hits aplenty: from Enya's "Orinoco Flow" to "Sadness" from Enigma; from a dance mix of the "X-Files Theme" to edits of vintage electronica from Mike Oldfield (Tubular Bells) and Jean Michele Jarre (Oxygene). Beyond other selections of beat-enhanced chants and a few other popular themes ("The Mission," "Twin Peaks"), the album, refreshingly, also includes a few selections noteworthy only for their originality and quality. A three-track section near end of the 70-minute disk features affecting soft African chants from Geoffrey Oryema, followed by "My Wife with Champagne Shoulders," a dollop of regal, faintly ethereal romanticism from master film scorer Mark Isham, then a robust piano workout, "The Promise" from Michael Nyman (The Piano). With so many elements of interest on its 17 tracks, the albu...
List Price: $17.98 |
Our Price: $9.94 |
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Artist:
Various Artists
Since the Windham Hill imprint's Winter Solstice series was born in 1985, the concept has gone through some changes, bottoming out with 1999's abysmally kitschy Winter Solstice on Ice. With this Silver Anniversary Edition, Dawn Atkinson, who produced the first Winter Solstice disc, has gone back to her original concept of nontraditional seasonal music and novel arrangements of Christmas classics. She's also brought in some old standbys, soliciting works from Paul McCandless, Barbara Higbie, Will Ackerman, Philip Aaberg, and Liz Story. Much of this new Winter Solstice turns on classical themes. Ex-Kronos Quartet cellist Joan Jeanrenaud teams with guitarist Steve Erquiaga on an airy Handel piece, and McCandless adapts Orlando Gibbons's "The Silver Swan." Others explore traditional carols, including Erquiaga's double-guitar filigree on "Greensleeves." As with past titles in this series, the best compositions are usually the originals. Keyboardist Tim Story, a Winter Solstice stalwart, unfolds another gorgeously melodic ambient chamber piece called "What Comes December." Tracy Silverman and Thea Suits turn in a wistful duet for electric...
List Price: $9.98 |
Our Price: $6.25 |
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Artist:
Various Artists
List Price: $9.98 |
Our Price: $4.50 |
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Artist:
Various Artists
The Winter Solstice series from Windham Hill is an appealing souvenir from the label's early days, when guitarist Will Ackerman still served as its chief guiding light and fount of original thought. For years Ackerman shunned the overt commercial trappings of traditional Christmas recordings and instead offered odes to a broader season that, like his artists' music, is compatible with periods of sustained, hushed contemplation. Winter Solstice II, released in 1988, mixes original and traditional compositions (none that specifically brings Christmas to mind) and is adorned with classical overtones from front to back, conveying the high-minded earthiness associated with the label's then all-acoustic format. A few pieces on the 50-minute disc clock in at under than two minutes, and a couple others are duds, yet several selections make this quiet disc a worthy listen: a handsome interpretation of Bach ("Prelude to Cello Suite No. 1") on harp-guitar by Michael Hedges, plus gorgeous, yearning piano solos by Philip Aaberg ("The Gift") and Michael Manring. Better known as a bassist, Manring's reworking of one of his own works, "Sung to Sleep," may be the disc's highlight. Ack...
List Price: $9.98 |
Our Price: $7.46 |
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Artist:
Various
List Price: $17.98 |
Our Price: $4.12 |
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Artist:
Steve Erquiaga
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Oystein Sevag
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Paul McCandless
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Michael Manring
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Nightnoise
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Will Ackerman
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Barbra Higbie
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Mike Marshall
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Modern Mandolin Quartet
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Various Windham Hill Artists
In 1993, Windham Hill Records released its fourth album of seasonal music recorded by the label's artists and unavailable in any other collection. Only a few of the tracks on A Winter's Solstice IV lend credence to the label's unfair stereotype as the home for new age background music. Many of the musicians come from such respected jazz bands as Oregon and the Freddie Hubbard Quartet, and from such respected folk bands as the David Grisman Quartet. Several tackle such classical pieces as Bach's "Sheep May Safely Graze" (the Modern Mandolin Quartet), Purcell's "Trumpet Tune" (solo guitarist Alex de Grassi) and Vivaldi's "Four Seasons" (the Turtle Island String Quartet). From Liz Story's "Carol of the Bells" to Nightnoise's "Wexford Carol," this is rigorous instrumental music for the most part, no matter how quiet and pretty it may seem at first listen. --Geoffrey Himes
List Price: $9.98 |
Our Price: $4.88 |
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Artist:
Various Artists
List Price: $6.98 |
Our Price: $2.40 |
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