31st August 2009

The Hurst Selection gets off to a truly soulful start this week with new music from one of the albums of the year so far: Michael Olatuja’s ‘Speak’. Further soulful notes follow from the forthcoming SK Radicals set and also Eric Roberson’s ‘Music Fan First’. 4 from this week highlights music from The Isley Brothers. With an excellent new Motown anthology due in the UK on the 21st September, now seems like a perfect opportunity to pay tribute to one of the greatest soul groups of all time. We’ve also new music from Whitney Houston, Will Downing, Terence Blanchard with Bilal, Ledisi and another track from the excellent George Benson set ‘Songs and Stories’.

Before Hour Two’s Jazzier Side of Life gets purposefully underway, there’s a classic from AWB with Ben E. King from the excellent 1977 album ‘Benny & Us’. It’s then time for some more of the new stuff, kicking off with Ronnie Laws and a fantastic track from his new album ‘Voices in the Water’ – a wonderful return to form by the way. There’s New Zealand’s finest: Nathan Haines, with the ‘Thorne Bay Bossa’ from last year’s ‘Music for Cocktail Lovers’ and then it’s time to brace yourself for four new tracks out of the Freestyle stable. Soul Sugar, The Perceptions, The Impellers and The Sound Stylistics will leave you in no doubt that all is well on the UK scene currently. On a slightly more Euro note, there’s Nicola Conte’s reworking of Fertile Ground’s ‘Yellow Daisies’, new music from the forthcoming set from The Milano Jazz Dance Combo, Santucci Scoppa, The Quietnights Orchestra and Rosalia de Souza, proving beyond all doubt that the jazz dancers are certainly being looked after too. Finally, Schema have rereleased the classic 1963 album ‘Summer Dawn’ from Sahib Shihab, which sounds as fresh as the proverbial daisy: a truly great album that is sits comfortably at home amongst the current crop of releases. We feature ‘Please Don’t Leave Me’ for the first time on The Hurst Selection and we think you’ll be happy we did!

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31st August 2009 Playlist

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