The Go! Team: Thunder, Lightning, Strike

CML call number: CD/ROCK/Go!
Tony Ware wrote in the Boston Phoenix, 3/17/06: "[T]he Go! Team, a Brighton-based British sextet … emerged in 2004. … The original Go! Team featured Ian Parton, who cobbled together the group's cut-and-paste Thunder, Lightning, Strike (Sony) from nicked LP samples and his own multi-instrumental additions. Parton then solicited collaborators, a 50/50 male-female mix of instrument swappers willing to perform high kicks. … [Guitarist/drummer Sam Dook says,] '… I think as long as a song can be reduced to a melody that gets in your head, you can put chaos all around that.' Indeed, the multinational, co-ed Team's amalgam encompasses sassy electro-soul, windswept country, smeared guitar sneers, block-party hip-hop, piano ballads, and brassy double-dutch chants. … [A] Go! Team song is built around buoyant, almost vertigo-inducing loops. … The result is a band who are on the absolute cutting edge of cut-and-paste pomo pop with songs full of nostalgic bits that bring comfort and familiarity to the mix. … Parton has created what amount to mash-ups before DJs even get a chance to chop up his material."

Jonathan Lemalu: Love Blows as the Wind Blows

CML call number: CD/CLASSICAL/Lemalu
Performers: Jonathan Lemalu; Malcolm Martineau, piano; Belcea Quartet.
Contents: Songs by English and American composers: Roger Quilter, Samuel Barber, Benjamin Britten, Richard Rodney Bennett, John Ireland, George Butterworth, Gerald Finzi, William Bolcom.
Russell Platt wrote in the New Yorker: "Much of the music featured in 'Love Blows as the Wind Blows,' a new album from the young New Zealand bass-baritone Jonathan Lemalu (on EMI), shows that a certain Handelian decorum still held sway over British vocal music in the early twentieth century. Songs by Quilter and Finzi have an undeniable charm, but the most vibrant pieces are by composers in the American orbit -- such as Barber's 'Dover Beach,' which Lemalu (accompanied by the Belcea Quartet) performs with an impressively robust lyricism" ("Classical Notes: The King's English," 3/20/06, p. 42).
In Dover Beach, Samuel Barber set the famous poem by Matthew Arnold, which concludes: "Ah, love, let us be true / to one another! for the world … hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light. … "

Prince: 3121

CML call number: CD/ROCK/Prince
Jon Pareles wrote in the New York Times: "It's a friendly, happy, concise album, clocking in under 54 minutes and just about always putting the funk in the foreground. But within the grooves, Prince enjoys some sly musical games. It's not what he says, but what he plays, that gives the songs their snap. … Working alone in the studio, Prince becomes the opposite of his onstage self. Instead of working in real time with live instruments, he goes for a dizzying mix of the handmade and the surreal. … [T]he murky P-Funk vamp of the song '3121' carries dissonant distorted guitars and voices that have been sped up and slowed down. … He's still a seducer, but one with boundaries. In 'Lolita,' he's tempted by a young girl, yet insists, 'you'll never make a cheater out of me"; then he starts a call and response, asking, 'What you wanna do?' She responds, teasingly, 'Whatever you want,' but when he says, 'Then come on, let's dance,' she says, with disdain and disbelief, 'Dance?' Still, Prince understands what made him a star, and he's not giving it up. 'I'm hot and I don't care who knows it,' he declares … then immediately gets pragmatic: 'I got a job to do.'"

Mozart: Piano Concertos 17 & 20

CML call number: CD/CLASSICAL/Mozart
Anthony Tommasini wrote in the New York Times: "The Polish-Hungarian pianist Piotr Anderszewski … continues to follow his own path on an engrossing new Virgin Classics recording … with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra. He is both soloist and conductor. The Concerto No. 20 in D minor … is a grimly dramatic work. Yet there is a great elegance. … Mr. Anderszewski's cagey and entrancing performance captures the work's elusiveness. The first movement is rhythmically free and boldly expressive, yet in a subtle and soft-spoken way. Some passagework creeps along stealthily, almost in a whisper. In the development section, when the soloist and orchestra engage in dialogue, Mr. Anderszewski makes the piano's statements seem deceptively timid, as if the soloist is trying to sneak in strategic rebuttals to the bossy orchestra. Yet when a forceful passage in the piano comes along, the impact in context is overwhelming. Like most other pianists, Mr. Anderszewski opts for the intensely dramatic cadenza Beethoven wrote for the first movement. Yet he plays it with such impetuosity that you would think he was improvising it on the spot."

Elvis Costello: The Juliet Letters

CML call number: CD/POPULAR/Costello
Today's New York Times reports on a forthcoming book about the letters that people write to Shakespeare's fictional character Juliet Capulet, addressed to "Juliet, Verona" or dropped off at the house where the historical model for Juliet might have lived. The article doesn't mention it, but The Juliet Letters was inspired by the same situation. It's a song cycle jointly composed and recorded by Mr. Costello and the Brodsky String Quartet, and worth a listen.

Barry Manilow: The Greatest Songs of the Fifties

CML call number: CD/POPULAR/Manilow
Artist website: http://www.manilow.com/
Contents: Moments to Remember, It's All in the Game, Unchained Melody, Venus, It's Not for Me to Say, Love Is a Many Splendored Thing, Rags to Riches, Sincerely/Teach Me Tonight (duet with Phyllis McGuire), Are You Lonesome Tonight?, Young at Heart, All I Have to Do Is Dream, What a Diff'rence a Day Made, Beyond the Sea.
Mr. Manilow writes in the liner notes: "When [music executive Clive Davis] suggested this idea to me, I slapped my forehead and said, 'Why hasn't anyone thought of this idea?' … Being given the opportunity to co-produce, co-arrange and sing these rarely sung golden standards is a privilege. I hope they affect a new generation of listeners as deeply as they did those of us who were there."
Other Manilow works in our collection: Even Now (1986) and Ultimate Manilow (2002), both in the CD/POPULAR section; A Christmas Gift of Love (2002; CD/HOLIDAY); and a memoir, Sweet Life: Adventures on the Way to Paradise (1987; call number 784.54/Manilow).

Donald Fagen: Morph the Cat

CML call number: CD/ROCK/Fagen
Fred Kaplan wrote in the New York Times: "Mr. Fagen, best known as the vocalizing half of the rock band Steely Dan, … wrote 'Morph the Cat' in the wake of Sept. 11, and it's an album about fellow New Yorkers dealing with the aftershocks -- tales of love and dread in a time of terror. … 'Morph the Cat' has the familiar Steely Dan sound: the dense chords, jazz vamps, laser backbeat, skylark guitar riffs and sly lyrics -- polished narratives of insouciant irony and cryptic allusions -- sung by Mr. Fagen in a nasal troubadour's wail. But this time, he's staring at the darkness with open apprehension. … Cut loose from Dan, Mr. Fagen writes songs that are 'more personal,' he said, 'and, as it turns out, more autobiographical.' … 'Morph the Cat' begins with the title song, which sounds like an R. Crumb cartoon theme about a cat named Morph who flies above Manhattan and seeps into apartments, spreading good cheer. But when the tune is reprised at the end of the album, after the songs about severed heads and so forth, Morph (as in Morpheus, god of dreams?) seems more menacing. 'Yeah, the cat is narcotizing the citizens,' Mr. Fagen said. …"

Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker: Town Hall, New York City, June 22, 1945

CML call number: CD/JAZZ/Gillespie
Label website: http://www.uptownjazz.net/
Producer Robert Sunenblick writes in the liner notes: "Record shows are marvelous places for lovers of vinyl. … It was at one of these record shows that I met the 'picker.' A 'picker' is a dealer who is constantly searching for the next rarity, looking to quickly recycle his finds into cash. Within weeks of one of these shows, I received a telephone call from this particular 'picker' who related, 'I just found an acetate of Charlie Parker. I can play it for you over the phone. Do you want it?' … I recognized Symphony Sid and when I heard him say, 'We'd like to start off with Dizzy Gillespie and his quintet featuring Charlie Parker,' I knew this acetate had to come from an unissued New York concert, since, to my knowledge, there were no live Dizzy-Bird recordings except on the West Coast, but Symphony Sid certainly was not the announcer out in Los Angeles. … The New Jazz Foundation presented two Town Hall concerts featuring Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker, both in 1945. … The presence of Max Roach and Don Byas date this concert to June 22, 1945."

Gorillaz: Demon Days

CML call number: CD/ROCK/Gorillaz
Sasha Frere-Jones wrote in the New Yorker: "In 2000, [British musician Damon] Albarn … formed a new band, Gorillaz, officially consisting of four cartoon characters … an ingenious conceit, enabling Albarn to orchestrate a comeback without showing his face. Albarn, who writes the band's songs and plays almost all the instruments, could now make music with whomever he pleased. … [W]hat makes Gorillaz universally appealing is Albarn's music, a blend of low-key hip-hop and mellifluous pop, ornamented by an assortment of African and Asian instruments. … 'Demon Days' … has lingered in the Top Forty of the U.S. charts for six months. … [Albarn co-produced 'Demon Days' with hip-hop artist] Brian Burton, a.k.a. Danger Mouse. Albarn also enlisted guest artists … De La Soul and the singers Neneh Cherry and Shaun Ryder. … Albarn is a mercurial synthesist who weaves together bits of rock, pop, and reggae without condescending to any of them. … 'Feel Good Inc.,' a tightly wound hip-hop song, is memorable for Albarn's forlorn hoots and for what sounds like a guitar theme from a sixties spy movie." -- "Damon's Day", 11/28/05

My Morning Jacket: Z

CML call number: CD/ROCK/My
Artist website: http://www.mymorningjacket.com/
As Rolling Stone wrote: "This Louisville, Kentucky, band's idea of interstellar overdrive comes with the distorted snort of Lynyrd Skynyrd-style guitars and the whiff of bluegrass wet with morning dew. The most high-flying thing about My Morning Jacket is still guitarist-songwriter Jim James' glassy, near-falsetto singing. But on the group's second major-label album, James nails his flights of fancy and worry with an invigorating attention to earthy modernism: pop-song structure ('What a Wonderful Man'), hip-hop-inflected beats, reggae-train rhythms ('Wordless Chorus,' 'Off the Record'). The result: electric Dixie soul bright with star shine, climaxing in 'Dondante' with a shrieking-guitar meltdown that sounds like the '68 Pink Floyd rocketing through 'Free Bird'" ("The Top 50 Records of 2005", 12/29/05-1/12/06).
Visit the NPR website to hear My Morning Jacket's "experimental country-rock" in concert.
Besides excellent music, this CD boasts an outstanding cover illustration by Kathleen Lolley.

John McNeil: East Coast Cool

CML call number: CD/JAZZ/McNeil
Ben Ratliff wrote: "[A] band with trumpet, baritone saxophone, bass and drums … has to orient itself either toward or away from Gerry Mulligan's original pianoless quartet, which he formed with Chet Baker in Los Angeles in 1952. The trumpeter John McNeil … uses his new album to imagine a possibility: What if a band with the same instruments as the Mulligan-Baker group played themes with boiled down, contrapuntal lines, in honor of the ones Mulligan wrote, but engaged the bass and drums much more? … Because the musicians with Mr. McNeil … are Allan Chase on baritone saxophone, John Hebert on bass and Matt Wilson on drums, the music can remind you as much of Ornette Coleman's early-60's quartet … as Gerry Mulligan's early-50's one. Mr. McNeil wants to unlock the neat, airy, compressed feeling of the Mulligan quartet. … [T]he wonder of the record is its breezy transparency. Mr. Wilson has a light, bouncing touch … Mr. McNeil sprawls through long, Don Cherry-style improvisations … using a clear, dry, clarion upper register. And Mr. Chase … plays with balance and authority" (New York Times, 1/9/06).

Violetta: Arias and Duets from Verdi's La traviata

CML call number: CD/OPERA/Verdi
Performers: Anna Netrebko, Rolando Villazón, Thomas Hampson, Vienna Philharmonic and Vienna Opera Chorus conducted by Carlo Rizzi.
Includes a bonus DVD with excerpts from the modern-dress La traviata presented at the 2005 Salzburg Festival, a Mozart music video, and a photo gallery depicting Ms. Netrebko.
"The famous Parisian courtesan, Marie Duplessis … was transformed in Verdi's opera into Violetta, who leaves the gay, social life of Paris to live in the country with young Alfredo Germont, until his father, unbeknown to his son, persuades her that she is ruining his and his sister's lives. Alfredo only learns the true reason for her desertion in time to be reunited with her just before she dies of consumption. … The music depicts her with great tenderness, her bright and taxing coloratura part when she is shown in the fashionable world … contrasting movingly with the simpler, elegiac melodies of the later scenes. … La traviata is undoubtedly one of Verdi's supreme achievements." -- Peter Southwell-Sanders, Verdi: His Life and Times (780.92/Verdi), pp. 80-83.

Belle and Sebastian: The Life Pursuit

CML call number: CD/ROCK/Belle
Artist website: http://www.belleandsebastian.com/
Kelefa Sanneh wrote in the New York Times, 2/2/06: "For many years, the Scottish indie band Belle and Sebastian has been a quiet, wee group adored by a loud, not-so-wee cult of fans. … Loving Belle and Sebastian meant loving Stuart Murdoch's murmured tales of disappointment and transcendence. … 'The Life Pursuit' … includes some of the best songs in the band's catalog. … The album includes what is, by some measures, the band's most popular song yet: 'Funny Little Frog,' the first single, which entered the British charts at No. 13. Over a swinging bass line and some bright keyboards, Mr. Murdoch evokes a love unrequited and quite possibly unacknowledged. … 'White Collar Boy' … tells a lurid story of crime and seduction and punishment. But there's a familiar whistleable melody under those greasy guitars. … [T]he album's best song, 'Dress Up in You,' is classic, old-fashioned Belle and Sebastian. It tells a quiet, petulant little story about two women, a 'star' and a 'loser,' rivals who can't quite bring themselves to hate each other. …"

Britten: Song Cycles

CML call number: CD/CLASSICAL/Britten
Contents: Les Illuminations; Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings; Nocturne.
Performers: Ian Bostridge, tenor; Berlin Philharmonic conducted by Simon Rattle.
Anthony Tommasini wrote: "[I]f there are three greater works for voice and orchestra from the mid-20th century I don't know what they are. … [Bostridge's] performances … represent boldly reconsidered and bracingly fresh takes. … Bostridge, in his way, sings the ethereal passages in these scores with boyish lightness and shapes the phrases with cool elegance. Then, when the music heats up and turns sensual, he exudes a husky, almost adolescent virility. … Sir Simon and the Berlin players treat these works like audacious contemporary scores. … In the great Serenade, a cycle of settings of poems by Tennyson, Blake, Keats and others, the performance captures the Mahlerian mysticism of the music … and the phantasmagorical strangeness of the 'Dirge.' The horn player, Radek Baborak, conveys the feeling Britten seemingly intended: the instrument becomes a pensive, all-knowing and wordless commentator" (New York Times, 1/22/06).

Ray Davies: Other People's Lives

CML call number: CD/ROCK/Davies
Artist website: http://www.raydavies.info/
David Carr wrote in the New York Times: "Mr. Davies … former leader of the Kinks, the seminal rock band … is noncommittal on whether the Kinks might play again … [He] came to America and to New Orleans in 2003 because, having mastered the tidy horrors of the English middle class, he wanted to explore American musical roots and temporarily adopt a new frame of reference. He succeeded, perhaps too well, getting shot in the leg … after confronting a robber. … The music is annealed by his time here. There are enough arch lyrical winks and slashed rhythm guitars to please the Kinks traditionalists, but also touches--horns, among them--that reflect his sojourn in New Orleans" ("Ray Davies Gets His Tocqueville Moment," 2/19/06).
From the liner notes: "I joined The Kinks before I was a completely formed adult; now I am a single artist; the jump from childhood to adulthood has suddenly occurred and I still don't know who I am." Be that as it may, he still knows what he is doing and it's good to hear his voice again.

Stravinsky: Petrushka; Rachmaninoff: Symphonic Dances

CML call number: CD/CLASSICAL/Stravinsky
Performers: Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra; Mariss Jansons, chief conductor.
James R. Oestreich wrote in the New York Times: "Stravinsky's 'Petrouchka' (1911), a ballet that brings puppets to life, is all elbows, angles and discontinuities. It looks resolutely ahead. … Rachmaninoff's 'Symphonic Dances' (1940) … looks just as resolutely and yearningly backward, wallowing in waltz rhythms, flowing melody, rich harmony and nostalgia. Yet it, too, has its sarcasms, and Mr. Jansons indulges them, just as surely as he revels in the odd lyrical bits in 'Petrouchka.' … [T]he orchestra seems to retain the splendid form of its many years under Bernard Haitink. … The woodwinds, in particular, have long been among its glories, and they bring real flair to the vivid characterizations in 'Petrouchka.' The recordings document the early days of Mr. Janson's tenure, drawing on concert performances in October and December 2004 and February 2005. The sound, bright and wide-ranging, does justice as much to the exquisite pianissimos Mr. Jansons achieves as to the robust climaxes" ("Classical Recordings," 2/12/06).

The Lion King / Original Motion Picture Soundtrack

CML call number: CD/SOUNDTRACKS/Lion
Contents: Circle of Life, I Just Can't Wait to Be King, Be Prepared, Hakuna Matata, Can You Feel The Love Tonight (songs by Elton John and Tim Rice); This Land, … To Die For, Under the Stars, King of Pride Rock (instrumental music cues by Hans Zimmer).
From the Disney animated film, later revived as a Broadway musical.
Painless listening even if you haven't seen the movie. Incorporates amusing dialogue spoken by Rowan Atkinson ("Blackadder") as Zazu the hornbill, and Jeremy Irons ("Brideshead Revisited") as the evil lion Scar. Other celebrities involved include Whoopi Goldberg and Cheech Marin as villainous hyenas and Nathan Lane as Timon the meerkat, apparently a kind of Falstaff figure in relation to the lion prince Simba. Matthew Broderick voiced the adult Simba's dialogue in the film, but the character's singing voice as heard here is that of Joseph Williams.
Released in 1994, new to our collection. Our thanks to the anonymous donor!

John Ciambriello Jr.: When Time Stands Still

CML call number: CD/ROCK/Ciambriello
Artist website: http://www.garageband.com/artist/johnboy
Contents: The Me Within, Through Your Eyes, When Time Stands Still, I See You, Now I'm Alive (all written by Ciambriello); Be Thou My Vision (attributed to Dallan Forgaill); plus 8 bonus songs in MP3 format (About Life, Finding Love, He Said, In His Hands, Kneeling Down, Magnificent, Pour, Take Me); plus lyrics, chords, and 2 rather endearing video clips.
Ciambriello is a New Haven area musician. He states on his website: "I've been writing songs now for about 8 years. My focus is to meet people where they are in life and show them that there is a hope in Jesus Christ. …"
That said, it's clear from this disc that he is a gifted guitarist, writer, and singer. The subjects that concern him might remind you of that song on the radio "I Can Only Imagine" by MercyMe, but to this listener's ears, his work is much more interesting and more musical.
Our thanks to the anonymous donor of this disc!

Rosanne Cash: Black Cadillac

CML call number: CD/COUNTRY/Cash
Artist website: http://www.rosannecash.com/index2.html
Alan Light wrote in the New York Times: "Relationships between parents and children, between the past and the future, between public and private lives are among the threads running through Ms. Cash's new album. … Its 12 songs were written between the spring of 2003 and the spring of 2005, a period in which Ms. Cash, now 50, lost three parents: her mother, Vivian Liberto Cash Distin; her stepmother, June Carter Cash; and, in between, her father, Johnny Cash. With her characteristic sense of craft and precision, Ms. Cash explores a kaleidoscopic range of experiences related to loss and mortality on 'Black Cadillac,' reaching from when her parents first met through her responses to their passing, her anger, her regrets. … [S]he described the album as 'a map--a geographical map, a spiritual map, an emotional map.' … 'Black Cadillac' flows effortlessly from intimate acoustic moments to bluegrass-inflected songs like 'House on the Lake,' mirroring the scope and ambition of the lyrics" ("Rosanne Cash Walks a Line of Her Own," 1/22/06).

Liszt: Orchestral Works

CML call number: CD/CLASSICAL/Liszt
Performers: Herbert von Karajan conducting the Berlin Philharmonic.
Contents (on two CDs): Mephisto Waltz; Les Préludes; Hungarian Rhapsodies nos. 2, 4, and 5; Fantasia on Hungarian Folk Melodies; Mazeppa; Tasso.
A roundup of recordings made in 1961, 1972, and 1976. The set leads off with the Mephisto Waltz [No. 1], which "tells a Faust story. The hero and his supernatural guide Mephistopheles listen to the dance music at a country inn. When Mephisto himself takes up the fiddle the dance becomes wild and feverish, and at the end, as a nightingale sings, Faust and the innkeeper's daughter vanish into the darkness outside" (from the liner notes by Christopher Headington). Next in sequence is Les Préludes, inspired by a poem of Lamartine. "In his preface to the music Liszt asked: 'What is our life but a series of preludes to that unknown song of which death sounds the first solemn note?' … Melodious and rousing by turns, Les Préludes … deserves its great and lasting popularity."
Released in 1986, new to our collection. Our thanks to the anonymous donor!

Shostakovich: Film Music from "The Gadfly" & "Pirogov"

CML call number: CD/CLASSICAL/Shostakovich
Performers: José Serebrier conducting the Belgian Radio Symphony Orchestra.
According to Maestro Serebrier's notes: "Shostakovich wrote more music for films than for any other medium, and yet this substantial output (over 30 scores) remains unknown. Except for a couple of fragments from The Gadfly that have become very popular (one even used as the theme of a TV series [i.e., 'Reilly']), the rest of his film music is surrounded by mystery. … The Gadfly was based on a novel by the late 19th century writer E. L. Voynich. It takes place in 1840 in Austrian-occupied Italy. The subject appealed to the Soviets of 1955: the Italian national struggle and the conflicts between state and church. The 'Gadfly' is a revolutionary leader, so called because his 'sting' had become legend. The illegitimate son of a cardinal, he is finally captured and shot by a firing squad. … Pirogov (1947) was a film based on the life of Nikolai Ivanovich Pirogov, a Russian doctor who became famous for the defense of Sevastopol during the Crimean War."
Released in 1987, new to our collection. Our thanks to the anonymous donor!

Peter Cetera: Live

CML call number: CD/POPULAR/Cetera
Artist website: http://www.petercetera.com/
Fan club website: http://www.peterceterafanclub.com/
Contents: Baby What A Big Surprise; Glory of Love; If You Leave Me Now; After All; Restless Heart; Hard to Say I'm Sorry; Even a Fool Can See; Remember the Feeling; Next Time I Fall; You're the Inspiration.
According to the liner notes, on this disc, "Peter Cetera is backed by his 'unplugged' band and members of the Salt Lake Symphony Orchestra," performing in Salt Lake City, October 2003. He sounds good, and much the same as he used to. The album is recorded in 5.1 Surround Sound.
According to Jason Ankeny, as quoted at VH1.com: "While best known as the longtime frontman for Chicago, singer Peter Cetera also enjoyed success as a solo performer. Born September 13, 1944 in the Windy City, Cetera was in a band called the Exceptions when in late 1967 he was recruited by another aspiring group, then called Chicago Transit Authority, to play bass. …"

Heather Headley: In My Mind

CML call number: CD/R&B/Headley
Artist website: http://www.heatherheadley.com/
Jon Pareles wrote in the New York Times: "Drama is drama, in a Broadway show or a radio-ready ballad, and Heather Headley has the voice for both. She started her recording career after winning a Tony Award for the title role of 'Aida,' yet only an occasional perfectly enunciated consonant separates her from other R&B singers. On her second album, 'In My Mind,' Ms. Headley doesn't try to reinvent her genre. She just follows the leaders: Mariah Carey for dewy ballads, Beyoncé for brittle upbeat tunes and Mary J. Blige for slow-building melodramas. … Yet the formulas work in 'Rain,' a dancehall come-on she shares with [dancehall reggae artist] Shaggy, and even better in smoldering songs that narrate troubled romances: 'In My Mind,' about wishing she had her ex back; 'I Didn't Mean To,' where she gets caught cheating; and 'Losing You,' in which she exults over the breakup that let her find a better man. Those songs owe their styles to Ms. Carey, Ms. Blige and Beyoncé, respectively, but Ms. Headley is a fast learner" ("New CD's," 1/30/06).

Altre Follie, 1500-1750

CML call number: CD/CLASSICAL/Savall
Performers: Hespèrion XXI, directed by Jordi Savall.
James R. Oestreich wrote in the New York Times, 12/4/05: "The follia, whose name connotes folly, even madness, seems to have begun as an ancient Portuguese country dance. Then, in refined arrangements, it pervaded courtly settings all over Europe and reached as far as Latin America. [Altre Follie] begins with that geographical stretch--a spirited improvisation on 'Folias Criollas,' an anonymous work from Peru--before picking up chronologically. Various settings from the 16th century and into the 17th establish the pacing and harmonic structure. Later in the 18th century, the tune . . . began to attach itself to a more or less standard bass line, as here in infectious works by Andrea Falconiero and John Playford. The disc moves into the high Baroque with Corelli's virtuoso showpiece and Juan Cabanilles's 'Diferencias de Folias' for harpsichord, also from 1700. It concludes, inevitably, with Vivaldi's variations for two violins . . . wonderful entertainment in the hands of Manfredo Kraemer and Mauro Lopes."