Music and Media Focus

Album:The Fairy Garden
Artist: David Arkenstone
Website: http://www.davidarkenstone.com/

After a number of musical journeys into diverse musical terrain such as Game of Thrones-inspired Dark Ambient music and the contemporary groove-based Chill genre on his recent Songs From The Aqua Lounge album, veteran recording artist and sonic explorer David Arkenstone, has revisited a style that fans around the world will find familiar. According to David: “I was channeling my musical self from 25 years ago. The Fairy Garden is a nod to my early releases.” The music has all the enchanting characteristics that many people associate with David Arkenstone, including lush orchestration, atmospheric synthesizers, airy flutes, heavenly harps, dramatic percussion, and more. There is a cinematic quality to the music and I could easily see it as a soundtrack to a Lord of the Rings type movie. In a word… magical.

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Album: Dancing on the Wind
Artist: Shoshana Michel
Website: http://shoshanamusic.com/

Although Dancing on the Wind is only pianist Shoshana Michel’s second album, and her first as a composer of original material, she is already being recognized for her talents and is making a name for herself in the solo piano category. Her debut album, Soul Whispers, received critical acclaim as well as extensive radio airplay and was nominated for 2015 Album of the Year by solopiano.com. Shoshana is both a Whisperings Artist (solopianoradio.com) and Enlightened Piano Artist (enlightenedpiano.com). Not bad for a first recording in a highly populated field of talented artists. Dancing on the Wind is being promoted by RS Promotions, which is run by well known new age flutist Sherry Finzer.

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Album: Eternity
Artist: Anaya Music
Website: www.anayamusic.com

While I have enjoyed Anaya’s previous keyboard-based albums, her new release, Eternity, in collaboration with a live symphony orchestra, brings out the richness and dimension of her stirring compositions, taking the music to another level all together. Anaya’s desire to elevate the human spirit is deeply felt in every note of this inspired recording.

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Album: Late Night with Headphones Vol. 1
Artist: Trevor Gordon Hall
Website: www.trevorgordonhall.com

Guitarist Trevor Gordon Hall is not an artist who will be accused of being in a creative rut or mining the same musical territory over and over. On the contrary, he is constantly exploring new directions to bring fresh and innovative energy to his artistry. His previous release, Mind Heart Fingers, which I had the pleasure of writing about, featured a unique instrument he helped to design called a kalimbatar, which combines an acoustic guitar with a kalimba, or African thumb piano. However, on his new album, Late Night With Headphones Vol 1, Trevor has charted a decidedly different course for his music.

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Album: Jeff Oster Live!
Artist: Jeff Oster
Website: www.jeffosterlive.com

Live concert recordings are not as common in the Contemporary Instrumental genre as they are in some others, which makes Jeff Oster Live! something special. Although in reality, everything Jeff Oster does is pretty special. Writing about this album and performance is something I feel particularly qualified to do since I was fortunate enough to actually be at the concert in the San Francisco Bay area where the album was recorded. It was quite an event and I quickly did a write up about it the next day on Facebook. Here’s what I wrote:

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Album: Life Sometimes
Artist: Sarah Dukes
Websites: http://www.sarahdukesmusic.com/
www.facebook.com/sarahdukesmusic

With the release of her sophomore album, Life Sometimes, pianist/composer Sarah Dukes is beginning to find her place in the music world. While she is relatively new in this field, her accomplishments have already been impressive. Sarah has been hand picked by Whisperings-Solo Piano Radio as one of their exclusively featured solo piano artists, and was granted the Akademia Music Award for best pop ballad in 2015 for her song “No More.” This new album was honored with a Silver Medal for Outstanding Achievement In Music in the New Age Solo Piano and Album categories in the Global Music Awards. Continue reading →

Album: Circles of 8
Artist: Holland Philips
Website: www.musicbyholland.com

Its been exactly a year since I wrote about Holland Phillips wonderful previous album Daydream Alley, so I was happy to receive his latest recording with the interesting title Circles of 8. Since I covered so much of Holland’s musical background in my feature article on Daydream Alley, I’ll refer readers who may be interested to that rather than recount it all here. But suffice it to say that Holland is a well-trained and experienced musician whose history includes classical, progressive rock, electronic, new age music, and more.

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Album: Rise
Artist: Sukha
Website: http://www.sukhatheband.com/

The devotional chanting of mantras is a spiritual practice that has been around for thousands of years. For those who may not be familiar, a mantra is defined as: “a word or sound repeated to aid concentration in meditation, a Vedic hymn, a statement or slogan repeated frequently.” Throughout the centuries, the form of mantra chanting has probably changed very little, that is until more recently, where contemporary spiritual seekers are finding new and innovative ways to present this ancient practice. Among these sonic explorers is a group called Sukha who takes a bold direction in their blend of sacred singing with rock music.

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