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Here's confirmation of the Foote orchestral works CD now released by Naxos. Also released is the third volume of their Martucci survey.

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Welcome to the new Unsung Composers Forum, which replaces the old Raff Forums, sadly hacked to death by some mindless moron.

Hopefully a repetition of that attack will be avoided through the use both of modern, more secure software and of a more secure host server. The software itself is a development of the software used to power the Raff Forums and so, although the site has a shiny new look, the way everything works should be familiar to you.

Because at this stage the integrity of the old forum's database remains suspect, it's not possible to carry any member details over from it and so you will have to register again, but that's a one-off chore.

Although we will try and retrieve the old forum's posts to be available as an archive, it may not be possible to do so unless the effects of the hacking attack can be isolated and, in any event, for now the priority had to be to get the forum back online.

Do please read the opening message on each of the other sub-forums. Alan and I are very keen to develop the site the way that you want it to develop and so your feedback is essential.

It only remains for Alan and I to say:

Welcome back!

As the tag line says, this sub-forum is "The place for discussion of new recordings: news, opinions and suggestions". It seems sensible to split out this topic, although it will need a little discipline to begin with not to allow the discussion to stray off topic. It is possible to disable replies, turning this sub-forum into more of a notification area, but I think that's to be avoided if we can.

As you'll read here, we're very open to suggestions for new sub-forums or other extensions to the site now that it's up and running.

Being a new site, the Unsung Composers Forum is work in progress and so it gives us all the opportunity to create a site which over time has the features which its users want it to have. It begins life as a bare Forum because we were eager not to delay the replacement of the Raff Forums any longer than necessary.

The layout and feature set of the Forum itself more or less replicates the old Forums but it need not - you'll see by looking in the Help pages that there are more features (a Calendar for example) which could be enabled if we all feel we'd like them and, perhaps more importantly, would use them.  Don't jump straight in but have a look around, get used to this new Forum and then let us know what's on your wish list.

Secondly, the sub-forums, of which this is one, aren't fixed in stone. They're what Alan and I felt was needed to begin with. You'll see that we thought it might be sensible to split out news and discussion of new recordings, for example. We can add more or have fewer. Once again, your input is very welcome once you've used the site a bit.

One idea we have had is of building up a comprehensive listing of unsung composers' web sites such as those for Felix Draeseke and Joachim Raff. A list of CD and download retailers is another. These could be either further sub-forums or a static web page. No doubt you'll have other ideas and, again, we'd like to see them.

Inevitably, there's a caveat. As I'm providing the web space and am ultimately responsible both for what's published here and designing and coding the site, I'm afraid that I reserve the right of veto! So, no change there then... 

This is a brand new site and forum software with which we are all, myself included, unfamiliar. There are bound to be some bugs which I need telling about, or something which you think should be available and isn't. Please don't be shy in letting me know here if you come across any problems.

Before you do put finger to keyboard, though, take a look at the Help section (second item in the top menu). You might find the answer there first.