2008 five CD release. Carrying on from previous releases Dance Anthems and Club Classics, 100 Hits Dance Mix has 100 massive dance classics from the biggest producers and artists around. With tracks from Armand Van Helden, The Prodigy, Artful Dodger, Goldie, Grace, Bob Sinclar, Orbital, Utah Saints and Fatboy Slim and many more. 100 Hits.

Bill Champlin served as lead singer, primary songwriter, keyboard player, rhythm guitarist, and occasional saxophonist in the Bay Area band the Sons of Champlin from 1965 to 1977, shepherding the middle-level San Francisco rock group through seven modestly selling albums. In August 1977, he quit the band that bore his name and moved to Los Angeles, where he became a busy session singer. Not surprisingly, that soon led to his own solo recording contract and his debut album, Single. To anyone expecting acid rock from a veteran hippie musician, however, Champlin announces his change of direction on the album cover, an elaborately staged photograph of him admiring himself in a three-sided mirror, dressed in a tuxedo, his hair and beard fashionably trimmed, as a cadre of tailors tries to tempt him with more colorful fabrics and outfits.

Russ Ballard's first solo album is, surprisingly, a bit rootsier than one would've expected coming from an ex-Argent member, trying for a good, pounding beat on most of its length, interspersed with some anthemic-style numbers. There aren't too many interesting or diverting hooks on this album's worth of originals, and at his best Ballard is a decent if unexceptional hard rock singer here. The record as a whole is as much a somewhat bland extension of Ballard's mid-'60s work with the Roulettes, as it is a distillation of the core Argent sound, with the strongest songs being the material on the original LP's side one.

120 years after its premiere at Leipzig (under the baton of Arthur Nikisch), Philippe Herreweghe provides an opportunity to rediscover the Seventh Symphony played on period instruments. This work was the first to bring Bruckner success beyond the borders of Austria, and was never subsequently revised. By dedicating his score to Ludwig II of Bavaria, the composer was also relishing a calculated insult to the Viennese press, still resolutely hostile to his music…

Symphonies & Concertos in HM Gold series is the second entry among a pair of excellent C.P.E. Bach discs by the Akademie für Alte Musik, Berlin, recorded in the late '90s. To be fair, of the two this is probably the lesser release, although that's not by a margin of very much; one wishes Raphael Alpermann's harpsichord was a little louder in the Concerto in C major H. 654/Wq. 20, but that's about the only inequity between this and the other disc. This concerto appears along with the "first" cello concerto and three additional symphonies; Akademie für Alte Musik, Berlin, handles all of these works with an unbridled, no-holds-barred exposition of this Bach's sense of aggression and otherness, yet with crisp, precise playing that remains exceptional in its energy and drive.

"From Out of the Blue" is an album by the Philadelphia soul group Blue Magic, released in 1989. It was regarded as a comeback album. The album was produced by Vincent Bell and Alvin Moody. It was released via OBR Records, a Def Jam subsidiary that concentrated on R&B and soul. The songs "Romeo and Juliet" and "It's Like Magic" were top 40 hits on the Hot R&B Singles chart. "Romeo and Juliet" peaked at #89 on the UK Singles Chart.

Whitesnake's grip on the U.S. record-buying public may have lessened considerably by the late '90s, but in other parts of the world (especially Japan), David Coverdale and company still reigned supreme. Keeping in step with the unplugged craze of the decade, Coverdale and longtime guitarist Adrian Vandenberg united for such a performance in the land of the rising sun, resulting in the release of 1998's Starkers in Tokyo. Anyone wondering if Coverdale can still cut it vocally all these years later will be pleasantly surprised – the bloke can still sing splendidly, as the duo perform selections from throughout the singer's career.

The same year that Blues Creation gave us their amazing second album DEMON & ELEVEN CHILDREN, they recorded this collaboration with Carmen Maki. While it's not as consistently great as the aforemntioned album, it is a damn good seventies hard rock record…

For this release, Raimund Nolte and the Batzdorfer Hofkapelle have tackled a repertoire which makes extensive demands on the singer. In the two cantatas Nell’africane selve and Cuopre tal volta il cielo there are breathtaking leaps and bizarre changes of register.

Sarah Vaughan was approximately three decades into her career when she stepped onto the stage at the Monterey Jazz Festival in September 1971 and still at the top of her game. Her voice swoops, sways and swings; it's a veritable roller coaster of pitch, tone and tempo, and Vaughan is in complete control of her instrument at all times. The voice is weightier than it was during her early days, but having recently taken a few years off from recording it was primed and ready for the remarkable push Vaughan was prepared to give it. Backed by the very capable trio of Bill Mays on piano (Vaughan introduces him as Willie Mays), Bob Magnusson on bass and Jimmy Cobb on drums, Vaughan wastes no time showing why she always appears on the short list of jazz's greatest singers…

Continuing to go her own way on Gospel Plow, Elizabeth Cook is another artist who's too rock for country and too country for rock, although in the music business climate of 2012 she may be too country for country, too. As you might expect from the title of this mini-album, Gospel Plow is a record of sacred music, although it's marked by Cook's own inimitable mix of styles and features at least one track that will surprise almost any country fan, not matter how alt. The songs are mostly familiar, although the arrangements are anything but…

Live and Let Die is the soundtrack to the eighth James Bond film of the same name. It was scored by George Martin. The title song was written by Paul and Linda McCartney and performed by Paul McCartney and Wings. It was the first Bond film score not to involve John Barry. The digitally remastered CD re-release, 2003, as well as adding eight additional tracks also extended several of the original ones, such as Bond Meets Solitaire.

Sacros ("The Sacred") was a Chilean rock band inspired by the spiritual passion and veneration for the great gods of South America, such as Quetzalcoatl, the Plumed Serpent, god of the ancient Mayas and Viracocha, Lord of Tiahuanaku in the Andes mountains. Sacros identified with these gods from around the planet, with the energy of love and devotion for creativity. Sacros recorded this 1973 debut (their only record) on the state label IRT, and the production was destroyed by the military. Only a very few copies survived the destruction. The music goes in the same direction as Los Jaivas, Los Blops and El Congreso (all from Chile) and Lula Cortez from Brazil. It has great 12-string Rickenbacker sounds, effects, compelling vocals and rhythms with an experimental touch…

Sir Roger Norrington was chief conductor of the former Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra (today the SWR Symphonieorchester) for thirteen years. During that time he caused an international stir with what came to be known as ‘The Stuttgart Sound’, a synthesis of historically-informed performance practice with the technical capabilities of a modern orchestra. Whether in Mozart, Haydn, Bruckner or Brahms, Norrington sought to capture the performance experience of the time, adjusting the orchestra’s size and seating plan to create an authentic sound without vibrato. In these reissued recordings of Bruckner symphonies, Norrington and the SWR present the human face of a composer whose image in the public mind has sometimes been reduced to that of someone in a quasi-religious retreat. Bruckner’s symphonies, however, were distinctly secular works written with the Musikverein Vienna in mind. They describe journeys, nature and birdsong; there is dance music, humour, unexpected drama and pauses. In his entirely individual style, albeit with subtle influences of Beethoven, Schubert, Mendelssohn and Wagner, Bruckner conjures memories of his youth, from playing violin at village weddings to the sounds of the St Florian organ loft.

Engelbert Humperdinck (1854–1921) was a student at the Conservatory in Cologne from the spring of 1872; it was at this time that he got to know the Siegburg district judge and arbitrator Johannes Degen (1826–1902), an excellent singer and violinist, who gave regular chamber concerts in Siegburg at which he played in his own string quartet. Humperdinck, whose talent he had astutely spotted, was the pianist and composer he had been looking for. For his part, the young music student saw his admission to Degen’s chamber-music circle as an opportunity for regular performance; in return, he wrote whatever Degen requested. Humperdinck’s tally of 13 chamber compositions represents a relatively small part of his oeuvre (beside his six operas and about 80 Lieder, along with stage music and choral works).