Alim Qasimov, (born in 1957), is an Azerbaijani musician and is one of the foremost mugham singers in Azerbaijan. He was awarded the prestigious International IMC-UNESCO Music Prize in 1999, one of the highest international accolades for music. His music is characterised by his vocal improvisation and represents a move away from the traditional style of mugham. His work has been influenced by, and compared to, the music of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. Qasimov has recorded nine albums, three of which are mugham albums with his daughter, Ferghana Qasimova. He has performed internationally, including concerts in: France, the United Kingdom, Germany, Belgium, Spain, Brazil, Iran and the United States.

Kronos Quartet is a string quartet founded by violinist David Harrington in 1973 in Seattle, Washington. Since 1978, the quartet has been based in San Francisco, California. The longest-running combination of performers (from 1978 to 1999) had Harrington and John Sherba on violin, Hank Dutt on viola, and Joan Jeanrenaud on cello. In 1999, Joan Jeanrenaud left Kronos because she was “eager for something new”;[1] she was replaced by Jennifer Culp[2] who, in turn, left in 2005 and was replaced by Jeffrey Zeigler. With almost forty studio albums to their credit and having performed worldwide, they were called “probably the most famous ‘new music’ group in the world”[3] and were praised in philosophical studies of music for the inclusiveness of their repertoire.[4]
By the time the quartet celebrated their twenty-fifth anniversary, in 1999, they had a repertoire of over 600 works, which included 400 string quartets written for them, more than 3,000 performances, seven first-prize ASCAP awards, Edison Awards in classical and popular music, and had sold more than 1.5 million records.[5] Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.