The Polish trio OWL of Marcin Halat on violin, Maciej Garbowski on double bass, and Krzysztof Gradziuk on drums invited German pianist Pablo Held for a concert at Loft in Cologne, 2019, to perform three lyrical and dynamic compositions from violinist Halat, alongside a 6-part "IMPRO" collective improvisation, balancing free and lyrical approches to superb modern jazz.

The 5th album from the UK collective improvising progressive rock band of reedist Martin Archer, drummer Steve Dinsdale, bassists Lorin Halsall & Terry Todd, percussionist Walt Shaw, keyboardist Andy Peake, violinist Yvonna Magda and string player & vocalist Jad Todd, merging acoustic and electronic instruments in rich and often dreamlike forms that flow with spirited refinement.

This year's An Ayler Xmas, the 4th in the series from saxophonist Mars Williams, expands to a double CD with recordings from two bands: Josh Berman, Jim Baker, Kent Kessler, Brian Sandstrom & Steve Hunt (Chicago); and Steve Swell, Hilliard Greene, Chris Corsano, Nels Cline & Fred Lonberg-Holm (NYC); in incredible free jazz mashups and bash-ups of Holiday favorites.

The 2nd orchestral album from saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock, two very different but complementary sets of compositions using electronics in mostly acoustic settings: the 1st with the larger EOS Chamber Orchestra and guests including Cory Smythe, Tom Rainey, & Sam Pluta; the 2nd a smaller group of Laubrock, Smythe & Pluta + guests Adam Motlock, Josh Modney, and Zeena Parkins.

A rollicking album of electric & acoustic jazz from guitarist Dave Gisler's trio with Raffaele Bossard on bass and Lionel Friedli on drums, with guest Jamie Branch on trumpet, recorded live at unerhort!-Festival, in Zurich, Switzerland in 2019, performing all Gisler compositions of ebullient drive pushing all 4 to exultant and impressive soloing.

An exceptional example of fully free collective improvisation with an emphasis on string interaction from the trio of Lisa Cameron on drums & feedback, Damon Smith on double bass, and Alex Cunningham on violin, recording in the studio in the St. Louis area for five energetic and explorative improvisations, at time dense but with remarkable clarity and direction.

Working together first in Chico Hamilton's quartet in 1971, through his quartet with Drew Gress and Joey Barron, pianist Marc Copland's close friend and collaborator, guitarist and composer John Abercrombie, passed in 2017; this solo album of Abercrombie's compositions is expressed with a unique insight and compassion that no other player could convey.

A major figure in the 1970s loft scene, tenor saxophonist Frank Lowe is heard on this 1975 studio album in the company of some of New York's finest free jazz players--Leo Smith on trumpet, Joseph Bowie on trombone, Alex Black on acoustic & electric bass, and Charles "Bobo" Shaw on drums--performing compositions from Lowe, Bowie, Smith & Shaw and one collective improvisation.

A reissue of Don Cherry's 1969 Blue Note album with Ed Blackwell on drums, Henry Grimes on bass, and Pharoah Sanders on tenor saxophone & piccolo, with liner notes by Ornette Coleman, originally recorded in 1966 by Rudy Van Gelder at his studio in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, using abstract foundations to allow for well-focused group interaction and freedom.

Fay Victor's cry of frustration over the state of the country and a determination to find power and joy in spontaneous creativity, as manifested via voice, song and text in 8 Victor compositions performed with an authoritative set of improvisers — Sam Newsom on soprano sax, Joe Morris on electric guitar, and Reggie Nicholson on drums — recorded in concert at Firehouse 12.

A live concert at Area Sismica, Forlì, in 2019 between two masterful French improvisers--double bassist Joëlle Léandre and accordionist Pascal Contet-- each pushing each other in both melodic and abstract improvisations with occasional vocal asides, as they engage their listeners through surprising twists and turns while exploring the farthest reaches of their instruments.

Quirky, embraceable songs from NY guitarist/song-writer Wendy Eisenberg, performed with an eclectic set of musicians who subvert rock forms in inventive ways, from subtle ambience to quickly shifting genre forms and illusively complex avant figures, while Eisenberg's words exposes vulnerability and provide insight, observation, and eccentrically descriptive lyrics.

Pianist Espen Eriksen takes his trio of bassist Lars Tormod Jenset and drummer Andreas Bye back to their roots in their first pure trio record in five years with this beautifully rendered set of original Eriksen compositions, lyrical and touching music with a melancholic tinge, as Eriksen focuses on unforced melodic character that belies an optimistic glow.

Pianist Espen Eriksen takes his trio of bassist Lars Tormod Jenset and drummer Andreas Bye back to their roots in their first pure trio record in five years with this beautifully rendered set of original Eriksen compositions, lyrical and touching music with a melancholic tinge, as Eriksen focuses on unforced melodic character that belies an optimistic glow.

Two works of tension, timing and dramatic presentation, one performed by the Bearthoven trio of piano, bass and percussion, repeating polyrhythmic contrapuntal figures; and one performed by the Bent Duo of David Friend and Bill Solomon using vibraphones and piano, drawing on harmonic dissonance to create sonic interference that draws attention to Hennie's composition.

Distilling his work with the trio The Necks, Australian pianist Chris Abrahams extends his solo discography with this gorgeous album of two extended improvisations recorded in the studio in Sydney, performing on a beautifully resonant acoustic piano as he unfolds each work, intensely personal and rich in Abrahams' unique way of evolving melody and form.

With the same title as his autobiography, this 1978 solo piano album, originally released in a small pressing and now properly reissued, shows both the intimate and the technical mastery of the West Coast pianist and leader of the Pan-Afrikan People's Orchestra, through original compositions and works by Billy Strayhorn, Elmo Hope, Cal Massey &c.

Initiated by West Coast drummer John Hanrahan, A Love Supreme Electric examines John Coltrane's A Love Supreme and Meditations album, asking to merge the two as one spiritual ecstatic piece of music, as performed on this 2 CD set with Vinny Golia on sax, Bob Moses on percussion, Henry Kaiser on guitar, Mike Watt on bass and Wayne Peet on organ; profound and powerful!

Blurring the lines between jazz and rock in ECM and blues-tinged playing in compositions with a solid melodic center, Washington-area guitarist Anthony Pirog presents an album of lyrical music tinged by electronics and rich with evocative environments, performed with Michael Formanek on acoustic and electric bass, and Chess Smith on drums, percussion & electronics.

Taken from the personal archives of UK drummer/percussionist Tony Oxley, this extremely well recorded duo session with frequent collaborator, iconoclastic NY pianist Cecil Taylor, are heard in a live performance at the Ulrichsberg Festival, Austria in 2002 for a brilliantly frenetic and masterfully controlled, creative set of two jaw-dropping extended dialogs.

Eight melodically structured song pieces from French composer and pianist Melaine Dalibert, his fifth album, presenting an embraceable and heartfelt set of compositions quite different from his typical algorithmic approach to writing, conceived by David Sylvian and recorded with outstanding fidelity on a Steinway at the chapel of the Rennes Conservatory.

Two compositions for two pianos by Jürg Frey and performed Reinier van Houdt abd Dante Boon: "Entre les deux l"instant" (2017/2018) where pianist interchange playing "Melody" and note(s) from a "List of Sounds" with flexibility in performance; and "toucher l"air" (2019) where two pianists play each part at the same time with subtle similarities but in different tempos.

Pianist & improviser Steve Beresford performing on prepared piano, toys & electronic, percussionist Valentina Magaletti and bass player Pierpaolo Martino are heard in this cataclysmically interesting album based around Beresford's compositions, each piece a vignette that merges elements of free improv, rock, sound & avant structures in inventive and compelling ways.

After twenty years playing together, the Sealed Knot trio of Burkhard Beins on amplified percussion, Rhodri Davies on amplified lap harp, and Mark Wastell on dual 32 past tam tams, gongs & nepalese singing bowls, performed live at Cafe OTO to record this beautifully captured, contemplative concert of tone, texture and ringing sound, like a 20-year dream reflected.

Two extremely compatible guitarists are heard in two live recordings in Tokyo, Japan, at OTOOTO and at Permian, in 2017 & 2018, using unusual tunings, extended techniques and a patient sense of space and momentum that allows each of their contributions to resonate distinctively while maintaining a confident dialog of connected abstraction and exploration.

Recorded in a winery in Gorizia, Italy, in 2019, Austrian based pianist and composer Elisabeth Harnik, who works in both composed and improvised music, joined with Italian-born American composer, percussionist, multimedia artist and Ictus label leader Andrea Centazzo to perform this series of creative and authoritative "Duophonic Landscapes".

A uniquely eccentric free improv album by Fred Frith on electric guitar and Lol Coxhill on soprano sax, originally released in 1983 on the French AAA label, the album assembles recordings from the "Musiques de Traverses" Festival 1981, 1978 concerts in Sainte Croix, in Poitiers, and at M.J.C. Aliénor D'Aquitaine in Limoges, plus additional material from 1999 in Munchen & London.

Double bassist Joshua Abrams provides the compositions for this studio album performed with Ari Brown on tenor sax, Jeff Parker on guitar and Gerald Cleaver on drums, an exceptional quartet of master improvisers who balance lyrical and soulful playing with explorative impulse, fueled by an empathetic responsiveness that only a long history of collaboration can engender.

One of the most distinctive and introspective voices on the piano in modern improvised music, New York pianist Matthew Shipp presents a solo suite in four movements, each movement a side of this magnificently produced double LP, released to coincide with his 60th birthday, including liner notes from late poet and collaborator Steve Dalichinsky; a wonderful gift for 2020.

Containing eight complete albums originally released between 1956 and 1960 on Atlantic and Verve Records, this box set serves as an excellent introduction to Texas/West Coast and New York-based American jazz clarinettist, saxophonist, composer, and arranger Jimmy Giuiffre, presenting his work in more traditional, albeit uniquely creative, jazz settings.

Restricted by pandemic, bassist John Edwards took compositions for Remote Viewers written by Dave Petts along with recordings from himself and saxophonists Caroline Kraabel, Sue Lynch, Adrian Northover & David Petts, using digital compositional methods to maintain Petts' concepts while manipulating and inverting each piece in wonderfully riotous and unexpected ways.

The eighth release in the Kontrans "Improvisers" series is a live recording from Elastic Arts, in Chicago in 2019 from the trio of Jaap Blonk on voice & electronics, Lou Mallozzi on turntables, cds, mixer, microphone & organ pipes, and Ken Vandermark on clarinet, bass clarinet, & tenor & baritone saxophones, in a uniquely quirky, exuberant and extraordinary set of improvisations.

An immersive record of free improvisation from the French trio of analog synth player Jean-Marc Foussat, trombonist Christiane Bopp, and vocalist Emmanuelle Parrenin, 4 works inspired by a still life painting by Duane Keiser, each an impressive evolution and transmutation of sound in dream-like environments that envelop then surprise its listeners.

Bass clarinetist Chris Cundy, uses the studio as a performance tool for accompaniment along with pre-recorded tapes, as he contrasts two different composers--Cornelius Cardew & Ton de Leeuw and their compositions titled "Mountains", alongside a Cardew graphic score piece, and 2 work for 5 bass clarinets, from Thanos Chrysakis and John Cage, the latter from his Numbers series.

Five CDs with unique and joyfully creative aspects of saxophonist and composer Trevor Watts' work, from concerts and studio settings in the UK, US and South Americal in configurations of Trevor Watts Moiré Music Group, with the Enjambre Acustico Urukungolo, Trevor Watts' Moiré Music Drum Orchestra, and duos with Jamie Harris, and with Marc Hewins.

Seven succinct dialogs between two masterful rhythm improvisers--bassist Bernard Santacruz and drummer Michael Zerang--whose previous work with Jeff Parker, Joelle Leandre, Douglas Eward and Jean-Luc Cappozzo is distilled to this intimate setting, employing innate lyricism and unique approaches to their instruments to fascinate and captivate their listeners.

Investigating the continuity of our perceptions through sound--the one sense that flows continuously into our awareness--through a concert at Baza Club in Krakow, Poland in 2018 between alto saxophonist Keir Neuringer and acoustic bass guitarist Rafał Mazur, using magnificent technique as they tentatively then boldy exchanges waves of the past, present and future.

Four settings with improvising bass guitarist Rafal Mazur, 4 CDs, the first a solo studio recording of two extended improvisations; the 2nd a duo with clarinetist Guillermo Gregorio; the 3rd a live concert at Baza Club in Krakow with trumpeter Artur Majewski; the 4th a quintet session with Gregorio, Satoko Fujii (piano), Natsuki Tamura (trumpet), Ramon Lopez (drums).

Picking up where the 2013 Clean Feed album Tone Hunting left off, the quartet of Anna Kaluza on alto saxophone, Artur Majewski on cornet, Rafal Mazur on acoustic bass guitar, with drummer/percussionist Vasco Trilla replacing Kuba Suchar, the refreshed quartet is heard live at the University of Zielona Gora, Poland for an informed 6-part free improvisation.

The title referring to the spatial arrangement where sounds of different frequency are processed in the brain, New York trombonist Steve Swell and Austrian Elisabeth Harnik performing inside and out of the piano, are captured live at Martinsschlossl, in Vienna, Austria in 2019 for 8 free improvisations of immense creative drive and ebullient rapport.

The 4th album on Another Timbre from a series of pieces by composer Antoine Beuger, each acknowledging a cultural or intellectual figure, here titled for philosopher, musicologist, educator and one-time member of the French Resistance, Vladimir Jankélévitch, represented by Beuger in a large dramatic work performed by the Apartment House sextet.

The first new Sun Ra Arkestra album in twenty years, recorded in Philadelphia under the direction of saxophonist Marshall Allan, with long-standing Arkestra members including Danny Ray Thompson, Michael Ray, Vincent Chancey, Knoel Scott, Cecil Brooks, Atakatune, Elson Nascimento and Tyler Mitchel, with new material and new renderings of classic Ra compositions.

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The 1st in SpleenCoffin's double-7" series, each featuring exclusive material and packaged in reclaimed 7" audio reel boxes, this volume featuring audio tracks by French synth duo FEMME; NYC's Sunk Heaven; a piece composed from a group recording of Jeph Jerman, Tim Barnes, Bill Hutson & Ten Byrnes; and a work from Romanian audio artist SOMNOROASE PĂSĂRELE.

This year's An Ayler Xmas, the 4th in the series from saxophonist Mars Williams, expands to a double CD with recordings from two bands: Josh Berman, Jim Baker, Kent Kessler, Brian Sandstrom & Steve Hunt (Chicago); and Steve Swell, Hilliard Greene, Chris Corsano, Nels Cline & Fred Lonberg-Holm (NYC); in incredible free jazz mashups and bash-ups of Holiday favorites.

"Elytra" are the protective fore-wings of beetles & crickets, which are raised and scraped to create a resonating and projecting sound; Greek composer and sound artist Thanos Chryaskis composed these seven works of deeply detailed, resonant and layered sonic interaction as a form of emulation to the action of the elytron, each piece an absorbing sonic experience.

The EMS Synthi AKS was introduced in 1972 as a portable analog synthesizer, used in many avant rock & electronic settings; on Spielgelungen both Jean-Marc Foussat and Thomas Lehn perform on the Synthi, their adept skills and experience with the instrument in free improv highlight both their incredible creative drive and the flexibility of the AKS.

NY tenor saxophonist Sabir Mateen joins the German trio of Christopher Dell on vibes, Christian Ramond on double bass, and Klaus Kugel on drums, all memebers of the Theo Jorgensmann Quartet, for a live recording at A-Trane, in Berlin in 2012, finding all three energetically enthusiastic and often driven by Mateen's unique personality in performance.

Five fascinating works by the Belgian composer Maya Verlaak, realized by Apartment House and soloists Sarah Saviet & Mark Knoop, experimental compositions including a work of personal reflection based on "Alouette"; a conceptual game piece; a composition layering pre-recorded segments of "Greensleaves"; and two interactive acoustic & computer pieces.

Referring to "Study Time", Zeitstudie presents two works each for two instruments developed by sound artist Akio Suzuki and recorded in Germany in 1984: the ANALAPOS, an echo instrument used to project the performer's voice across a coil spring; and the "De Koolmees" glass harmonica, 5 glass tubes in a metal frame that are struck or rubbed to create unique sounds.

Three minimal works for small ensemble incorporating electronics by Australian-born, UK-resident composer Newton Armstrong: 2 performed by the London-based Plus-Minus Ensemble directed by Mark Knoop as an acoustic quartet configuration and one as an electroacoustic quartet; and a solo work for multiple cello layers and resonance performed by Séverine Ballon.

The UK Apartment House ensemble perform four chamber works or lyrical ballads of slowly meandering melody, referenced as slow dances, by Toronto composer Martin Arnold: "Lutra" for solo cello & humming; "Stain Ballad" for a sextet of strings, piano, reed organ & percussion; "Trousers" for violin & cello; and "Slip" for cello, violin, bass clarinet & piano.

After a performance in 2019, Kobe-based Canadian sound artist Tim Olive and Calgary percussionist, experimenter and Bug Incision lAfter a performance in 2019, Kobe-based Canadian sound artist Tim Olive and Calgary percussionist, experimenter & Bug Incision label leader Chris Dadge recorded these two studio pieces using Dadge's amplified percussion, small instruments & electronics, as well as Olive's magnetic pickup/electronics system, running through a number of guitar & bass amplifiers.abel leader Chris Dadge recorded these two studio pieces using Dadge's amplified percussion, small instruments & electronics, as well as Olive's magnetic pickup/electronics system, running through a number of guitar & bass amplifiers.

UK sound artist Fermata Ark, aka Harry Smith, composed this work from improvisations recorded by Mark Wastell performing on cello, double bass and harmonium, and Spencer Grady performing on 5-string banjo, ebow, violin bow and brass slide, creating an extended work of immersive and mesmerizing textures and tones, sounds rising and falling in sublime and passionate ways.

Recording in two locations in Seoul by Taku Unami, electronic, sound and noise artists Choi Joonyong and Jin Sangtae present a series of unusual interactions using sonic events, concrete and acousmatic interjections and aberrant expression, patiently conveying each event with clarity and intention and an almost theatrical sense of drama and narrative.

Three piano works by Italian composer Giacinto Scelsi: 'Suite No.9 "Ttai"' (1953); 'Quattro illustrazioni' (1953); and 'Un Adieu' (1978/1988); performed live in Tel Aviv by Israeli pianist Shira Legmann, who found these pieces particularly fascinating as she studied Scelsi's oeuvre, impressed by his compositional method of notating improvisations to create finished pieces.

A warm and relaxed saxophone trio album led by Finnish tenor saxophonist Pauli Lyytinen (Raoul Bjorkenheim's eCsTaSy), Polish double bassist Maciej Garbowski and drummer Krzysztof Gradziuk (RGG), the three focused on deeply expressive interaction and lyrical finesse, while performing live at Institute of Music Performance, in Katowice, Poland, in 2019.

Stymied by Covid-19, the planned May 2020 tour of sound artists Tim Olive and Phil Maguire was cancelled, motivating each to create four 10-minute solo pieces which were then overlayed to create four "distant duo" pieces, merging Olive's textured home-made electronics and Maguire's reductive approach to audio simplicity and spare sonic environments.

Inspired by a work by John Stevens from 1991, Mark Wastell developed this work merging narration and improvisation by transcribing the text from Steven's performance, preseanted here by an electroacoustic ensemble including Phil Durrant, Dominic Lash, Bertrand Denzler, Jennifer Allum &c, yielding an enveloping and fascinatingly mysterious piece presented in two versions.

As though an elegy for the departed pianist and composer, Keith Tippett does not perform on this work, which was commissioned for the 2004 Norwich and Norfolk Festival, but conducts an ensemble that includes Julie Tippetts on voice, a saxophone octet that includes long-time collaborator Paul Dunmall, and the polyphonic choir of the BBC Singers; an exquisite and stirring work.