With electric guitarist
Andy Powell
sitting in on the title track,
Renaissance
delivered its best, and first fully formed album, mixing Russian, French, and Indian influences in musical settings that are both lively and elegant. The title track is one of the few lengthy progressive-rock pieces of the era that holds up, and the rest of the material runs the gamut from folk (
"Carpet of the Sun"
) to Impressionist ("At the Harbor"), all of it hauntingly beautiful and enlivening. Reissued in 1993 by One Way Records, with excellent sound. ~ Bruce Eder