Customer Reviews

Evening With Windham Hill Live

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4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The Christmas season is usually the time of the year that I dig out my collection of Windham Hill CDs. The Windham Hill "new age" label, founded by guitarist Will Ackerman, issued a bunch of truly classic albums in the 80s, and this particular compilation is one of the label's very best.

"An Evening with Windham Hill Live" (1982, 7 tracks, 41 min.) is a sampler of some of the label's biggest names. The album starts off with 2 great guitar pieces: first the (late) Michael Hedges brings his wizardry on "Rickover's Dream", then it's Alex DeGrassi's 9 min. epic "Turning: Turning Back" ("it's just about a trip to Philadelphia!"). "Spare Change" finds Hedges surrounded by pianist Liz Story and bassist Michael Manring, outstanding! But wait! There's lots more! Guitarist (and then-label CEO) Will Ackerman teams up with Chuck Greenberg (of Shadowfax) and brings a soaring "Visting". The last 2 songs feature George Winston, on "Hawk Circle" he is joined by Ackerman and Hedges, and on "Reflections/Lotus Feet' it's Winston solo. Great great stuff.

The CD I have is a straight transfer from the vinyl album I had. I don't understand why this CD is out of print. This album is nothing short of a "all-star" collection of Windham Hill's best artists. If nothing else, this album should be reissued with a remastered sound AND bonus tracks, which surely exist (the sleeve notes indicate the songs were recorded over two nights). In any event, in these cold winter months, what better than to light up the open fire and to have Windham Hill music in the background while reading a good book!

i've been poor as of late. to the point that i've sold most of my cd's. this is one that i've held on to. and now that i see i could sell my mint copy for over $20, i would still never do it knowing i could never get it back. this is one of those albums i continually go back to and lost myself in. i rediscovered my dad's old windham hill vinyls back in 96 and this is one of those albums i heard countless times as a child, so putting it back on as a young adult was like deja vu in the best possible way. the songs are all great, the recording is great. i agree with a previous poster that they should release a new version of this disc with new tracks because they must exist. but even if they did release it again, i'd never part with this original, just as i won't ditch my original copies of "december" "autumn" and "winter into spring" in favor of the 20th anniversary editions.

First, there's not a bad note on the CD. In the years that followed, Windham Hill diversified in a number of different directions, but this was the "Wooden Music"....as Crosby, Stills & Nash might have labeled it...that put them on the map. It's this CD's performance of "Rickover's Dream" (by the late, tragically under-appreciated Michael Hedges) that best sums up what was at the heart of Windham Hill's "classic" sound. This CD is also notable because even though the term "New Age Music" later became synonymous with "garbage" as label after label after label lined up to clone Windham Hill's legacy, it was still young and innocent and fresh and vital here. Beautiful stuff...get it.

This was originally released on LP in 1982. It is 41 minutes long. Like all Windham Hill releases, the sound quality of the LP and the CD translation are excellent.

This is taken from 2 shows featuring performances by various Windham label recording artists. Much of the material is solo performances or different mixes of the performers. So, this disc comes off as a Windham Sampler. But, because of the choice of the material and the track order, it flows together pretty well.

The first two tracks are accoustic guitar solos and the last track is a piano solo. The remaining tracks are duets or trios, but with the author being the dominant player.

Only Clockwork is a real group effort. And, it turns out to be the weakest track on the album, simply because it is too long and repetitious. It has a beautiful sound with Daryl Angor on violin and especially Chuck Greenberg (formerly of Shadow Fax and now deceased) on lyricon.

It is just a very nice, pleasant CD with some very interesting parts. It makes a great a background music CD or something that you can sit down a listen to seriously....except for the cutesy little comments to introduce the music.

Now there is CD technology, it would be great if Windham Hill went back and released the whole concerts.

The Windham Hill label (named after founder William Ackerman's construction firm; he currently lives in Windham County, Vermont) was started in 1976 when some friends loaned Will $300 to record some of his guitar pieces (that are now available on his "Turtle's Navel" album).

Windham Hill was unfortunately labeled "New Age" (which, in the sense of endorsing crystals, chakras, and channeling, it never was; cf. Steven Halpern), but it had a very unique style of post-folk, pre-ambient soundscape music that is wonderful for relaxing, serving as a background while writing, or just "chilling" in general.

The period from 1979-1986 was WH's best: brilliant artists like George Winston, Michael Hedges, Alex DeGrassi (Will's cousin), Liz Story, and Mark Isham, and groups like Nightnoise, Montreux and Shadowfax were discovered and recorded in their prime (WH has "Retrospective" and "Pure" collections for these artists); Jim Brickman joined the label at the end, as well.

Unfortunately, after 1986, WH moved away from its roots and got into "smooth jazz" (e.g., the Commotion series), pop (High Street Records, such as Slow Sky), folk music (see Legacy: A Collection of New Folk Music), and even Hawaiian slack-key guitar (Hawaiian Slack Key Guitar Masters), and declined in sales until it was finally sold to BMG in 1992.

Their last "Sampler" album including new music was issued in 1996 (Windham Hill Sampler '96), and since then the corporate types have just focused on packaging compilations of WH's old catalog, and buying up other artists and labels and their previous music, and reissuing them under the WH label (e.g., Yanni, John Tesh, Andy Summers, Patrick O'Hearn).

Michael Hedges died in 1997, and Shadowfax disbanded after Chuck Greenberg's death in 1995; George Winston and William Ackerman are still occasionally turning out significant albums, but nothing of the quality of an Autumn (Windham Hill 20th Anniversary Edition), Passage, or Aerial Boundaries. We can't recapture the past, unfortunately...

This 1982 live album, however, features WH artists at their peak, and hearing the humorous song introductions is wonderfully appealing. This album is one you'll always want to keep---particularly since it's sadly out of print. (There's also a "Windham Hill in Concert" VHS or DVD [Windham Hill in Concert], of which a few expensive used copies are out there.)

Windham Hill has deleted quite a few of their classic albums lately. Hopefully this will not become one of them because this is one of the most natural sounding live albums in print. Michael Hedges' live performances here convinced me all those years ago that he really was doing all of that himself! If you are a fan of any of the artists on this disc, do yourself a favor and get it before WH changes their mind!

This CD is quite listenable. The live version of "Rickover's Dream" here far outshines the studio version, and "Spare Change" is quite good. A few cuts may be a trifle monotonous: but most cuts are tuneful, interesting and performed very well.

This was my first exposure to Windham Hill. This CD gives you a varied (live) selection and is very pleasing to listen to. This is great for a quiet evening, or even listening while you work. Good stuff!

I also had this album/tape in the old daze and the real standout for me was the very lushly gorgeous Reflections/Lotus East solo recording by George Winston that wrapped up this beautiful album wonderfully. It is one of those magic performances that can only be found in a live setting. Thanks so much for this one, George!

I was first turned on to this lp by a girlfriend of mine in college back in the early 80s. I find it says a lot about the music on this release in that even though I can hardly remember the girl's name, I still have and enjoy this music.