Various Artists: Into The Sixties - Towards A Cosmic Music, 3CD

•  “No art is worth much which doesn’t aim to change the world.” Lindsay Anderson

In the 1960's the monumental success of The Beatles re-wrote the language of pop, drove a revolution in social mobility and prompted a new creative confidence in the arts. They re-defined what it was to be British. By 1966 The Beatles were untouchable and in expansive mood - 'Revolver' found them drawing on an eclectic, wholly unprecedented palette of musical colours.

George Martin's passion for the impressionism of Debussy and Ravel and his knowledge of the inner workings of the orchestra facilitated the group's ambitions which culminated in ‘Sgt. Pepper’; a stunning synthesis of Modern and Indian classical music, electronic and avant-garde procedures, progressive jazz and surrealist poetry. In Britain, The Beatles' fearless pioneering prepared an enlightened audience for such indelible cultural landmarks as Lindsay Anderson's highly subversive if .... and Patrick McGoohan's dark fairytale, The Prisoner; radical productions which, like The Beatles in their pomp, struck at the very heart of the Establishment.

‘Into the Sixties’ is a panorama of the visionary musical forces that inspired The Beatles and such contemporaries as The Pink Floyd and The Mothers of Invention in their explosion of the decade. From Ornette Coleman to Coltrane to Cage, from Sun Ra to Stockhausen, from Berio to Varese; musical prophets, spiritual adventurers. What jazz critic John Fordham wrote of Coltrane might apply to each: "He always sounded as if he was striving for what still lay out of reach. It wasn't just the search for more music, or a different music. It sounded like the search for another world, and another life".

TRACK LISTING

DISC ONE

1  DAPHNE ORAM Ursa Major (Sun Mix)

2  ORNETTE COLEMAN Monk and the Nun

3  GUSTAV HOLST Jupiter, the Bringer of Jollity, from The Planets BBC Symphony Orchestra and Chorus / Sir Malcolm Sargent

4 OLIVIER MESSIAEN L'alouette Lulu from Catalogue d'oiseaux (Yvonne Loriod: piano)

5  JOHN COLTRANE Spiritual

6  JIMMY GIUFFRE 3 Flight

7  MORTON FELDMAN Piece for Four Pianos

8  RAVI SHANKAR Dhun Kāfi (Spring Season)

9 ALDOUS HUXLEY On Drugs, Dictators and Writing

10  CHARLES MINGUS Self-Portrait in Three Colors

11 ALLEN GINSBERG The Sunflower Sutra

12 JEAN SIBELIUS Allegro Molto Moderato, from Symphony 6 Royal Philharmonic Orchestra / Sir Thomas Beecham

13 EDITH SITWELL The Wind's Bastinado

14 JULIAN BREAM CONSORT Mounsiers Almaine

DISC TWO

1  JIMMY SMITH Flamingo (with Kenny Burrell & Lee Morgan)

2 MAURICE RAVEL Introduction and Allegro for Harp, Flute, Clarinet and String Quartet (The Melos Ensemble)

3  BILL EVANS TRIO Nardis

4  PIERRE BOULEZ Après "L'artisanat furieux", from Le Marteau sans maître.

Conductor: Robert Craft

5  LUCIANO BERIO O King from Sinfonia, for Eight Voices and Orchestra (The Swingle Singers: voices) Southwest German Radio Symphony Orchestra / Ernest Bour

6  KARLHEINZ STOCKHAUSEN Zeitmasse, for Flute, Oboe, English Horn, Clarinet and Bassoon, Op. 5. Conductor: Robert Craft

7 ARNOLD SCHOENBERG Andante, from Concerto For Piano And Orchestra, Op. 42 (Glenn Gould: piano). CBC Symphony Orchestra / Robert Craft

8  DMITRI SHOSTAKOVICH Largo, from Symphony No. 5 in D minor, Op. 47. Minnesota Orchestra / Stanislaw Skrowaczewski

9  CLAUDE DEBUSSY Sarabande from Pour le piano (Samson François: piano)

10  LILI BOULANGER Psalm 129 for Baritone, Chorus and Orchestra (Orchestra Lamoureux / Igor Markevitch)

11 SATYAJIT RAY On Style and Influences

12 ERIC DOLPHY Left Alone

DISC THREE

1  ERIK SATIE Gymnopédies Nr. 2 (Manfred Reinelt: piano)

2  JOHN CAGE Quodlibet from String Quartet in Four Parts (New Music String Quartet)

3  SUN RA AND HIS ARKESTRA Sun Song

4  EDGARD VARÈSE Hyperprism, for Small Orchestra and Percussion

Orchestre Du Domaine Musical / Pierre Boulez

5  GUSTAV MAHLER Andante moderato, from Symphony No. 6 in A minor 'Tragic'. Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra / Eduard Flipse

6  IGOR STRAVINSKY Symphonies for Wind Instruments. Eastman Wind Ensemble / Frederick Fennell

7  CLAUDE DEBUSSY Danses sacrée et profane - Danse sacrée 8 Danse profane (Susanne Cotelle: harp). Orchestre Lamoureux/ Igor Markevitch

9  DJANGO REINHARDT Manoir de mes rêves

10  GUSTAV HOLST Second Dance from Beni Mora. BBC Symphony Orchestra / Sir Malcolm Sargent

11  CONSTANT LAMBERT Valse for the Gemini (The Twins), from Horoscope Ballet.

Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra / Constant Lambert

12 EDITH SITWELL When Sir Beelzebub, from Façade. Chamber Orchestra / Frederik Prausnitz

13  ALEXANDER SCRIABIN The Poem of Ecstasy. Moscow Radio Symphony Orchestra / Nikolai Golovanov

14  MAURICE RAVEL Le Gibet, from Gaspard de la nuit (Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli: piano)