One could easily make the case for designating the Masters Apprentices as the best Australian rock band of the '60s. Featuring singer Jim Keays and songwriter/rhythm guitarist Mick Bower, the band's earliest recordings combined the gritty R&B/rock of Brits like the Pretty Things with the minor-key melodies of the Yardbirds. The compelling "Wars or Hands of Time" and the dreamy psychedelia of "Living in a Child's Dream" were undiscovered classics, although the latter was a Top Ten hit in Australia. Bower left the group after suffering a nervous breakdown in late 1967, and the Masters grew steadily less interesting, moving from flower pop and hard rock to progressive and acoustic sounds.

Quintessential jazz singer whose reedy voice and laconic style made her a legend for the ages. The first popular jazz singer to move audiences with the intense, personal feeling of classic blues, Billie Holiday changed the art of American pop vocals forever. More than a half-century after her death, it's difficult to believe that prior to her emergence, jazz and pop singers were tied to the Tin Pan Alley tradition and rarely personalized their songs; only blues singers like Bessie Smith and Ma Rainey actually gave the impression they had lived through what they were singing. Billie Holiday's highly stylized reading of this blues tradition revolutionized traditional pop, ripping the decades-long tradition of song plugging in two by refusing to compromise her artistry for either the song or the band.

One of those uniquely '70s groups, Middle of the Road were a Scottish pop vocal group whose singles "Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep," "Tweedle Dee Tweedle Dum," and "Soley Soley" were huge European hits, selling in the tens of millions. Formed by Sally Carr (vocals), Ian McCredie (guitar), Eric McCredie (bass), and drummer Ken Andrew in 1970 (the group had been playing together since 1967, but under the moniker of "Part Three") Middle of the Road had trouble finding success until they uprooted from the United Kingdom and settled in Italy. There they met famed producer Giacomo Tosti, who revamped the group, and molded them in the sound and image that would take them to pop heights.

Elephants of Scotland was formed in 2010 in Burlington, Vermont, where they set upon the challenge of starting a progressive rock band in a place better known for jam bands and cows. EoS released their debut album Home Away from Home in the spring of 2013 which was met with positive reviews and praise from the international progressive rock community. On the strength of this album alone, they were invited to play the prestigious three-day international progressive rock festival RoSfest in Gettysburg, PA in 2014.

This two-CD (plus DVD) set is a better bet than last year's A Night in Monte Carlo: it celebrates the same creative funkiness of the mid-80s Miles Davis bands that bass guitar virtuoso and composer/arranger Miller had a big hand in, but here in more focused form, without symphony orchestras or singers. The canny Miller still goes for a soul-pop bravura and some technical posturings Miles would have avoided (hard to imagine the Prince of Darkness doing anything as uncool as swapping quotes from Sonny Rollins's St Thomas with his sidemen, or letting his bass guitarist acknowledge a sharp sax solo with a congratulatory sliding-note whoop) but there's a lot of very inventive jazz-making here, particularly from the gifted young partnership of trumpeter Christian Scott and saxophonist Alex Han.

A relatively short span in the career of guitarist John Scofield, but one that really shows him changing a lot as well! Scofield first came up as a musician with a more breezy, open tune – that approach to jazz guitar that really blossomed in the 70s – particularly as some of the more soul-based players of the previous decade opened their minds to more spiritual and experimental settings, particularly on labels like ECM or Muse. Here, Scofield almost goes the other way – starting out with more of those open, chromatic hues that were one of his biggest calling cards in the 80s – then shifting into more groove-oriented material, pointing towards a stronger soul jazz direction he'd take as the 90s moved on. The five albums here cover the span of five years of recording – and each are presented in cool little LP-styled sleeves – in a package that includes the records Time On My Hands, Meant To Be, Grace Under Pressure, Hand Jive, and Groove Elation.

Helene Grimaud and Mat Hennek's fascinating multimedia project
Together with the Freiburg photographer Mat Hennek, the French star pianist Hélène Grimaud gave a series of spectacular multimedia concerts in the Elbphilharmonie in 2017. Hélène Grimaud accompanied Hennek's photo series »Woodlands« with music by romantic, impressionist and modern composers: Fauré, Ravel, Liszt, Janáček, Debussy, Berio and Takemitsu. The very different pieces were held together by seven small compositions that the British composer and DJ Nitin Sawhney wrote exclusively for Hélène Grimaud.

Giovanni Battista Pergolesi owes much of his fame to La Serva Padrona, a comic intermezzo designed to be performed between the acts of an opera seria. In it, a maid and a servant conspire to convince their master to marry the maid. When Aldo Tarabella was asked to direct a performance of Pergolesi’s intermezzo, he wanted to do more than simply pair it with one of the operas it traditionally sits alongside – so he composed Il Servo Padrone, a companion piece, and a kind of sequel, to Pergolesi’s original.

On Friday 3 March, Opera Rara releases Bellini’s first opera Adelson e Salvini, written in 1825 while the composer was still a student at the Naples Conservatory. Marking the company’s third complete opera recording by Bellini, following La straniera and Il Pirata, up and coming bel canto specialist Daniele Rustioni leads the BBC Symphony Orchestra in their fourth collaboration with Opera Rara. Daniela Barcellona sings the role of Nelly and is joined by Enea Scala as Salvini and Simone Alberghini as Lord Adelson.