Classical/ Michel Dervan
Young Ears
Stravinsky: "Rite Of Spring; Firebird" Columbia SO/Igor Stravinsky Sony Classical (mid-price)
The truly young rarely miss the point of Stravinsky's earth-shaking Rite Of Spring. The composer's sharply-etched 1960 recording is newly reissued on a single disc.
Beethoven: Symphonies 5 & 7. Vienna Philharmonic/Carlos Kleiber (DG, mid-price) There's always someone waiting to discover Beethoven's Fifth. What better way than through the thrills of Carlos Kleiber's classic recording?
Ravel: L'Enfant et les sortileges; L'Heure espagnole. ORTF/Lorin Maazel (DG, mid-price)
Ravel's naughty child, punished by the objects and animals he has abused, inhabits one of music's most magical soundscapes.
Prokofiev: "Peter And The Wolf"; Poulenc: "Babar The Elephant"; Britten: "Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra" Dame Edna Everage, Barry Humphries, Melbourne SO/John Lanchbery (Naxos, £4.99)
The three great classics among compositions for children. Dame Edna twangs her way through Prokofiev and Britten; alter ego Barry Humphries recounts the rise of Babar.
Trendy Ears
Anonymous 4: "11,000 Virgins - Chants For The Feast Of St Ursula" (Harmonia Mundi)
The music of medieval mystic Hildegard von Bingen can never have sounded as beautiful as it does from the American allgirl group Anonymous 4.
Huss: Piano Concerto; Schelling: Suite Fantastique. Ian Hobson, BBC Scottish SO/Martyn Brabbins (Hyperion)
Impress your friends with knowledge of Huss and Schelling, two Americans whose lushly indulgent turn-of-the-century piano concertos look fondly backwards.
Arvo Part: Collage. Philharmonia /Neeme Jarvi (Chandos) The Arvo Part boom continues unabated. Chandos's 1992 recordings under fellow-Estonian, Neeme Jarvi, provide a useful cross-section, reaching back to the 1960s.
Giya Kancheli: "Bright Sorrow; Mourned by the Wind" Georgian State SO/Jansug Kakhidze. (BMG Melodiya, mid-price)
Beyond Part there's the Georgian, Giya Kancheli, whose extremes of haunting dolour and violence are here captured in performances of strong ethnic flavour.
Seasoned Ears
Steven Isserlis plays Schumann(RCA)
"Revelatory" is the only word for Steven Isserlis in Schumann's elusive late Cello Concerto.
Bartok: "Miraculous Mandarin"Budapest Festival Orchestra/Ivan Fischer. (Philips) Ivan Fischer cuts right to the heard of one of Bartok's most under-rated scores, the sensual and violent Miraculous Mandarin, imaginatively coupling it with arrangements of folk-dances.
Schubert: Mass in A flat, D678. Arnold Schoenberg Choir, Chamber Orchestra of Europe/Nikolaus Harnoncourt (Teldec)
Harnoncourt deals this Schubert mass a reading notable for its unusual gravity, darkness, and well sustained tension at finely measured tempos.
Beethoven: Complete String Quartets. Emerson Quartet (DG, 7 discs) The Emersons here set a new high-water mark for technical perfection in the art of string quartet playing.
Expert Ears
Rostropovich: "The Russian Years" (EMI, 13 discs, about £73)
A personal selection of tapings (many live, including some premieres) from the pre-exile years of the great cellist's career. At once a history of one extraordinary man's wide-ranging musical adventuring and a major document of an era.
Ruth Crawford Seeger Portrait. Schonberg Ensemble/Oliver Knussen (DG) Oliver Knussen has prepared an eloquent testament to the questing spirit of one of America's early modernists, broadening the picture of a woman best-known through her single string quartet.
"The Ecstasy Of The Moment" the Bar- ton Workshop play Morton Feldman (Etcetera, 3 discs)
Morton Feldman (1926-1987) is celebrated for the long, slow, quiet pieces of his later years. These discs (31 works, 11 of them recorded premieres) also sift illuminatingly through earlier works, right back to 1947.
Friedrich Cerha: "Eine Art Chansons" (Largo)
If you think contemporary music has lost its spark of wit, Cerha's Eine Art Chansons, recorded at the South Bank's Alternative Vienna festival, will put you right.
Jazz/Ray Comiskey
Young Ears
Pass: they tend to get into it after adolescence.
Trendy Ears
Afro-Cuban All Stars: "A Toda Cuba Le Gusta" (World Circuit)
With Cuban music enjoying quite a vogue now, this is one of the best places to start imbibing the tradition.
Michael "Patches" Stewart: "Blue Patches" (Hip Bop)
Trendy label has trumpeter Stewart, shades and all, from New Orleans, home of Harry Connick - but he gets his musical DNA from Miles Davis.
Johnny Hartman: "And I Thought About You" (Roost)
Clint Eastwood did some good with The Bridges Of Madison County - he used Hartman's rich baritone on the movie's soundtrack and made people realise what a great singer he was.
Seasoned Ears
Jeri Southern; "Meets Cole Porter" and "At The Crescendo" (EMI)
This sophisticated singer blended warmth, wit and a kind of coolly virginal eroticism into a style perfect for the Great American Songbook.
Warren Vache: "Warren Plays Warren" (Nagel-Heyer)
One of jazz's most accessible players, cornettist Vache leads an excellent quintet through a programme by one of America's great melodists, multiple best-song Oscar winner, Harry Warren.
Rosemary Clooney: "Dedicated To Nelson" (Concord)
Age has added to the lived-in quality of Clooney's voice, but her phrasing is still immaculate and she is surrounded by seasoned jazzmen in this orchestral tribute to the late Nelson Riddle.
Scott Hamilton with Strings: "Christmas Love Song" (Concord)
A quality jazz saxophonist, strings and a Christmas repertoire that even includes Little Drummer Boy. To each his (or her) own.
Expert Ears
Gerry Mulligan/Ben Webster: "The Com- plete Gerry Mulligan Meets Ben Webster sessions" (Verve)
Lovely double-CD souvenir of a classic mainstream encounter between two of the most celebrated saxophonists in jazz.
Lee Konitz-Brad Mehldau-Charlie Haden:
"Alone Together" (Blue Note)
Veterans Konitz and Haden joined piano wunderkind Mehldau in an LA club last December for a live recording on which risk-taking gave an edge-of-the-seat inventiveness to a vintage meeting of minds.
Paulo Fresu: "Wanderlust" (BMG)
The lyrical trumpet and flugelhorn of Paulo Fresu leads a fine sextet through what might be called a contemporary slant on bop.
Grant Green: "The Complete Quartets With Sonny Clark" (Blue Note)
Three of the brilliant, bluesy guitarist's rarest and finest albums - Airegin, Gooden's Corner and Oleo - combine to make this double CD a must for Green fans.
Roots/ Joe Breen
Young Ears
BB King: "Deuces Wild" (MCA)
Never too young for BB King, particularly with the varied fare of his sizzling duets album.
Crescent City Soul: "The Sound Of New Orleans" (EMI).
A seriously enlightening two-CD set of the artists who helped give the city its musical name.
Trendy Ears
Ron Sexsmith: "Other Songs" (Interscope)
Ron Sexsmith's wonderfully understated second album.
Wilco: "Being There" (Reprise)
OP8's whispered intimacies on Slush (V2) are enticing; and no wonder, with Lisa Germano involved.
Seasoned Ears
The Band (Capitol)
Simply the re-release of the year, an event marred only by the absence of any biographical material or critical appraisal.
Introducing Reuben Gonzalez (World Circuit) Featured, according to Ry Cooder, `the greatest piano player I have ever heard in my life".
Cabo Verde (BMG) Pure enchantment enriched by Cesaria Evora's cool and exotic vocals.
Expert Ears
Alison Krauss and Union Station: "So Long So Wrong" (Rounder) They justified their already high reputation with an album that never forgot its bluegrass roots.
Buddy Miller: "Poison Love" (Hightone)
Guitarist, songwriter and country singer without peer.
Eric Bibb: "Good Stuff" (Opus 3)
A sublime modern evocation of the art of country blues.
Rock/Kevin Courtney
Young Ears
1. Various Artists: "Best Of Shine '97" (Polygram TV)
Just the job for that student in your life, this collection features the best of this year's "indie" bands.
2. All Saints: "All Saints" (London)
Forget The Spice Girls - the discerning young teen of today will accept no less than the fab female foursome of Nic, Nat, Mel and Shaz.
3. Various Artists: "The Greatest Hits of 1997" (Telstar-TV)
The music goes right across the board from Oasis to The Spice Girls, Coolio to No Doubt, and Ash to Boyzone, and don't worry - it also features Aqua's Barbie Girl.
4. Various Artists: "Anthems For The Chemical Generation" (Virgin) Don't be put off by the word "chemical" in the title, nor by the gurning pink face on the cover - this is a pretty straight selection of "young people's music".
Trendy Ears
1. Roni Size Reprazent: "New Forms" (Talkin' Loud)
This year's Mercury Music Prize winner is a cool, collective evolution of drum 'n' bass.
3. Various Artists: "Cream Anthems 1997"
For the clubber in your life, here's some of the year's top choons, mixed by those cool Cream DJs. Paul Oakenfold and Nick Warren.
4. Erykah Badu: "Baduizm" (Universal)
The coolest, funkiest, most sultry album of 1997, Baduizm is God's gift to anyone who likes jazzy styles, ethnic beats and slinky sensual sounds.
4. Various Artists: "Lounge-A-Palooza" (Hollywood Records)
In these laid-back grooves, you'll find Esquivel, Edwyn Collins, Glen Campbell, Ben Folds Five and Fun Lovin' Criminals, all doing the easy-listening thing to some of pop's best-known tunes.
Seasoned Ears
1. Various Artists: "Diana Princess Of Wales Tribute" (Columbia)
The perfect gift for granny, since she's more likely than you to remember such ancient pop relics as Cliff Richard, Babs Streisand, Rod Stewart and The Spice Girls.
2. Various Artists: "Gael Force" (RTE CD)
A soothing selection of Celtic music which includes The Chieftains, Christy Moore, Clannad, Altan and Sinead O'Connor.
3. Enya: "A Box Of Dreams" (WEA, £38.99)
A lavish, triple-CD box set which will delight that New Age pensioner in your family.
4. Various Artists: "The Full Monty Original Soundtrack" (RCA Victor)
Your dad and his mates won't exactly "get us kit off", but they will do some embarrassing dances to this male stripper soundtrack from the year's biggest British movie.
Expert Ears
1. Beach Boys: "The Pet Sounds Sessions" (Capitol, £47.99)
You'd need expert ears to appreciate the fine nuances of Brian Wilson's production, the masterful orchestral arrangements, the genius harmonies, the gobsmackingly great song-writing etc.
2. David Bowie: "The Best Of David Bowie 1969-1974" (EMI)
This is one of the best Bowie collections ever, condensing the greatest hits from his Space Oddity/Ziggy Stardust/Aladdin Sane/Diamond Dogs period, and containing some of the man's finest songs.
3. Various Artists: "Mojo Workin': Blues For The Next Generation" (Columbia)
The blues aficionado in your family will appreciate the comprehensive choice of music on this 22-track CD, featuring such "legendary blues giants" as Muddy Waters, Robert Johnson, Son House and Blind Willie Johnson.
4. Led Zeppelin: "The BBC Sessions" (Atlantic) Your beloved Zep completist will drool at the prospect of this collection from the archives of the BBC.
