Matthew Clay, Crown Yourself King It’s pretty amazing what can come out of the do-it-yourself movement. Matthew Clay appears to be an artist with a new record on an indie label, but it doesn’t take much sleuthing to figure out that the Ottumwa, Iowa-based Freakin Records (as in, “Give me my Freakin Records”) is a one-man outfit, promoting only Clay.
William Walton’s classic oratorio Belshazzar’s Feast is a monument in the British musical canon and a perfect example of the British fascination with large-scale choral music. Feast is a synthesis of massive orchestral composition (the work calls for double brass) and towering choral forces.
After a one-month absence to allow for a guest conductor, Quad City Symphony Orchestra (QCSO) Music Director Donald Schleicher returned to the podium to conduct a concert of extremes on March 2: silly juxtaposed with the serious, German romanticism alongside “contemporary” American music, and program music leading into pure music.
The Japanese band Elekibass produces a type of music that both loses and gains something in translation, almost as if aliens visited Earth and tried to combine several types of sugar-sweet pop as a way of explaining Western music.
People who don't yet have the blues - or those who just don't know quite what the blues are or how they came to be - have a fantastic resource in the form of a new book-and-CD package put together by the Davenport-based Mississippi Valley Blues Society.
Wicked Liz & The Bellyswirls might create the softest rock music anybody’s ever heard. Even at its hardest – even when the band is making a serious effort – there’s not a sharp edge to be found, with nothing remotely threatening.
Over the past few years, there have been times when the Quad City Symphony Orchestra (QCSO) has dazzled the audience and received well-deserved praise and ovation. The conductor and orchestra, working so closely, produce a fluid, uncompromised musical revelation.
Although this is the third year for the Quad City Symphony Orchestra (QCSO) series of chamber-music concerts, I had never been to the Outing Club performance. When I was finally able to attend the concert this year, I was surprised at what I found.
Nnenna Freelon's passion for singing in public was ignited at the age of seven, when she faced an audience alone for the first time. She said that she was petrified, but after finishing singing "Amazing Grace" and seeing the smiles and hearing the clapping and "Amen"s, she wanted more.
The Dave Holland Quintet might be the finest jazz group ever to perform in the Quad Cities. In the latest Downbeat readers' poll (published in the December 2002 issue), Dave Holland took first place in four categories: best jazz artist, best jazz album (Not for Nothin'), best acoustic jazz group, and best acoustic bass player.

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