Magda

Jill Scott "Live in Paris”

Behold the record of one of the best live concerts I’ve ever heard. Behold one of the best-played and best-sung albums I’ve ever heard. Behold one of the most personal albums I’ve ever heard. Jill Scott is an extraordinary personality, an unmatched musicality, an ingenious voice, a music that makes the soul alive. She’s an artist who, performing Soul, puts the meaning of the word Soul to practice. The concert is both dynamic and melancholic. It surprises with new arrangements of big hits (“Golden,” “He Loves Me”) which have accompanied MMI’s shared moments more than once. It is for this reason that it is worthwhile - as a source of inspiration and great energy. And thanks to Scott’s voice and personality, we can encounter an artist that is true, sincere and happy with her life.

Erik Truffaz "The Dawn”

After you’ve heard this album, you will no longer have doubts as to what jazz is and, what’s more, how one should play it.

Truffaz’s music puts an end to the deliberations over genres and their distinctiveness, and furthermore, it illustrates the pointlessness of talking about music in terms of a single genre. One shouldn’t compose according to a defined genre. One should compose to create a personal message, to which all means of expression should be subjected. That’s what allows us to experience this incomparable quality – an ingenious harmony from which beautiful melodies are born. On top of that, the voice of one of the best rap singers on the other side of the planet (Nya). Everything served at the pace of a city that frightens, but that also gives shelter.

Majeran

Lenny Kravitz "Mama said"

Following the classics, Lenny Kravitz himself became a classic. On “Mama said” one can spot all the artist’s musical fascinations. Starting from jazz and blues masters, passing through the giants of the hippie era, ending with the funk rock stars. Lenny mixes them all and nonchalantly serves in a surprisingly light and varied form. The more interesting if we consider the unusual economy of employed means. Simply, a dry guitar sound, or a guitar with an overdrive. Here and there some organs or a quartet. All of it recorded in a very tight and raw fashion. The power of this album lies in its brilliant and skillfully arranged compositions, at one time played with a wild energy (the rough “Always on the Run”), while at some other time - with a child’s gentleness (“It ain’t Over till it’s Over”), or even intimacy (my favourite “Flowers for Zoe”). On top of that, some catchy riffs, a number of ballads… and there it is - a classic record.

David Daniels "Handel: Operatic Arias"

Could the barque machines for singing, i.e. the castrates, achieve an equally staggering artistic success nowadays? One cannot tell. What one can tell, however, is that their voice used to mesmerize and captivate the crowds. If you want to hear what they might have sounded like, you should listen to David Daniels. As a child, he used to sing as a soprano, as an adolescent – as a tenor and baritone. As a grown-up man, he became a countertenor. The album features the excellent Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment conducted by Sir Roger Norrington, playing a set of Haendel’s arias composed especially for castrates. Daniels’ beautiful, warm and affected voice at times resembles a voice of a woman. And, for that matter, of a woman you always want to return to.