The Rifftides staff has done exhaustive auditioning, winnowing and 
selecting from among hundreds of CDs, DVDs and books hoping to be chosen. The result: a new batch of recommendations. They are compact discs by a pianist and a trumpeter who love Mingus, musical portraits of the seven deadly sins, a Nat King Cole concert that surfaced after 61 years in hiding, a DVD of two elderly avant-garde saxophonists with the energy of teenagers, and a book dedicated to the proposition that Louis Armstrong’s late period was glorious. Please see the listings in the right column under Doug’s Picks.