Five works from US composer often based in Amsterdam, Evan Johnson, in solo, duo and trio settings including a triptych titled "L'art de toucher" in three configurations, demonstrating his unique approach to writing using disparate musical influences from modern to Baroque, mated to anarchic experimentalism and a Wandelweiser sensibility; fascinating!

With titles taken from different kinds of water nymphs in Greek mythology, composer Mark Iddon's four-part work is a hauntingly beautiful set of compositions of seeming siren calls and rich percussion, realized by an octet configuration of the UK ensemble Apartment House, with two pianists (Philip Thomas and Mark Knoop), three strings, clarinet, flute and percussion.

A remarkable, intense and startlingly virtuosic solo performance from Berlin violinist Sarah Saviet in a long-form extension of an originally 15-minute work commissioned by Saviet of UK composer Bryn Harrison, developed together to allow the score to be variable in length through performer choices to re-sequence the events and repetition of the composition.

Two days of concerts in 2018 at Alchemia Club, in Krakow, Poland and a recording at Radio Krakow the next day from English composer, band leader and a bass player Barry Guy, in varying configurations at Alchemia of duos & trios with some of Europe & The UK's leading improvisers, culminating in an 11-piece ensemble at Radio Krakow performing the large work "For To End Yet Again".

Three chamber works in single and multiple movements by minimalist composer Jurg Frey, exploring time & duration, form & shape and a balance of material, performed by a core quartet from the UK ensemble Apartment House, orchestrated for clarinet and bass clarinet, violin and cello, the final work adding piano, viola and percussion in a septet reworking of a 2014 composition.

Three albums and three distinct groupings in this essential remaster & reissue of two late 60s and one 70s Impulse! albums from saxophonist and composer Archie Shepp, in configurations of septets and nonets with luminaries of the day performing Shepp's rhythm-centric jazz focused on the Afrocentric experience, drawing on blues and spirituals in free jazz settings.

Revisiting and remastering two 1958 albums on the Riverside Label (Monk in Action and Misterioso), then remastered as At The Five Spot on Milestone in 1977, this quartet show a different take on Monk's music through the authoritative playing and interpretations of Monk's music by tenor saxophonist Johnny Griffin, intensified by drummer Roy Haynes and bassist Ahmed Abdul-Malik's solid support.

Referencing their influences as Punkt.Vrt.Plastik or the Kris Davis Trio, the uniquely voiced young piano trio of Simon Lucaciu on piano, Florian Muller on double bass and Lukas Heckers on drums formed in 2016 to compose and perform original work, inspired by Christopher Dell's possibilities of differentiation and unusual forms, receiving the Central German Jazz Prize in 2022.

With masterful technique and remarkable creative drive, the Canadian duo of clarinetist François Houle and Joe Sorbara explore unorthodox sound worlds through microtones, pad percussives, circular breathing to stretch phrasing, Houle taking apart his instrument to affect tone and pitch, and Sorbara using idiosyncratic percussive instruments including "back porch piano guts".

The second volume of Music Frees Our Souls, the trio of Francisco Mela on drums, Cooper-Moore on piano and William Parker on bass, recording in the studio in Brooklyn two extended, far reaching and powerful collective improvisations of music performed under the influence of Mela's work with, mentorship by and encouragement from pianist McCoy Tyner.

Aside from her exceptional trumpet work in free improvisation settings, Portuguese trumpeter Susana Santos, currently based in Stockholm, is also an electro-acoustic composer, these six compelling compositions merging field recordings--particularly birds, waters and yes, a phone--along with her trumpet playing and Irish flute, the album title a reference to John Cage's book Silence.

Swiss vocalist Sarah Buechi leads a new trio with Franz Hellmüller on guitar and Rafael Jerjen on bass, putting a uniquely expressive touch to a mix of original Buechi songs, standards including "I Thought About You" and "Moon River", and traditional song, the intimate and adept playing of Hellmüller and Jerjen enveloping the trio with a warm glow.

Leveraging more than a decade of collaboration, New York saxophonist Tim Berne and pianist Matt Mitchell present an intimate live concert in Montreal at Club Soda, performing mostly Berne compositions and one by Julius Hemphill ("Number 2") in a thoughtful and innately lyrical set of seemingly telepathic dialogs interpreting Berne's intricate and innovative works.

The long-running Boston trio of Pandelis Karayorgis on piano, Nate McBride on bass and Luther Gray on drums explore the music of Hasaan Ibn Ali through four compositions transcribed by Karayorgis from Hasaan's so-called "lost" Atlantic album Metaphysics, interleaved with six of the band's favorite tracks from Thelonious Monk and three tracks from Monk peer Elmo Hope.

Three albums of three duos between three frequent Boston collaborators and improvisers -- Jeb Bishop on trombone, Pandelis Karayorgis on piano and Damon Smith on double bass -- each CD respectively a combination of trombone & bass, piano & bass and piano & trombone, each recorded during the last year of Jeb Bishop's residency in Boston between 2016-2022.

Two Chicago improvising cellists--Tomeka Reid & Fred Lonberg-Holm--explore the repertoire for cello music in jazz, presenting works by Fred Katz ("Pluck It"), Sam Jones ("In Walked Ray"), Ron Carter ("Rally") and Harry Babsin ("Monti-Cello"), adding 3 new, original works by Fred Lonberg-Holm and a piece by Tomeka Reid paying homage to bassist Charles Mingus & violinist Billy Bang.

A 2nd album of inexplicable and fascinating genre merging based around Americana roots music sliced and diced with jazz/improv, electronica, and Downtown NY forms, from the core trio of Sam Day Harmet (mandolin), Sana Nagano (violin), and Zachary Swanson (upright bass) with guests Susan Alcorn on pedal steel guitar, avant bluegrass guitarist Stash Wyslouch and Soundpainter Walter Thompson.

The opening and closing tracks from the new Blazing/Freezing album on a 7" single by the genre-merging Downtown NY trio of Sam Day Harmet (mandolin), Sana Nagano (violin) and Zachary Swanson (upright bass) deconstructing Americana roots music by slicing and dicing it with jazz/improv, electronica, sample sources, and inexplicable errata.

John Zorn's extended solo organ improvisation at the 2022 Big Ears Festival in Knoxville, TN performing on the Goulding & Wood seventy-rank organ at St. John's Cathedral, Zorn's performance inspired by Aleister Crowley's Liber Liberi vel Lapidis Lazuli and performed in a kind of trance state, as he traversed moods and mystery in a 44 minute journey of massive sound.

Bringing together John Zorn's trio from Suite for Piano (Brian Marsella, Jorge Roeder, Ches Smith) with guitarist Julian Lage, this new jazz quartet is a versatile and flexible unit capable of instantaneous changes in direction of genre or mood with virtuosic finesse and sensitivity, as Zorn's compositions explore concepts from Freud, Sartre, and the Uncertainty Principle.

The final collaboration of innovative electronic artist J.A. Deane, working remotely with violinist Jason Kao Hwang who sent Deane improvised solo acoustic violin recordings that Deane edited into 57 gestures, mapping them to a keyboard and creating six tracks of morphed electronics which Hwang improvised over with an electric violin to complete this unique and fascinating album.

Bringing decades of experience from far-reaching careers as leaders and in collaboration with some of the most luminary improvisers in creative jazz, this first meeting between bassist Mark Helias and pianist Matthew Shipp evokes nine inspired dialogs from two consequentially compatible jazz musicians, beautifully captured in the warmth of the Park West Studios in Brooklyn.

Performing on the family of clarinets, reedists Michael Marcus and Perry Robinson recorded this album in 2016 in New Haven with drummer Jay Rosen, performing three Marcus and one Rosen composition, weaving their playing in a balanced triangle of sound, Rosen's diverse rhythmic approaches — mallets, drum kit, brush work — adding warmth and energy to a well-balanced album.

The long-established trio Disorder At The Border of Zlatko Kaucic on drums, Giovanni Maier on bass and Daniele D'Agaro on saxophone & clarinet invitee multi-reedist Tobias Delius to perform this extended free improvisation, Kataklisma in four parts, captured live at the Brda Contemporary Music Festival, in Šmartno Goriska Brda, Slovenia in 2017.

Arranged by Joe Morris while Agusti Fernandez was in the NY Metropolitan area, this concert at Firehouse 12 in New Haven, brings together four distinctive string players with Morris on guitar, Fernandez on piano, Brad Barrett on bass and Do Yeon Kim on guyageum, seemingly taking their listeners to rapid galaxies through intensive, pointillistic and imaginative improvisation.

While in Calgary as a Killam Visiting Scholar, guitarist Joe Morris worked with multi-wind player and professor Jeremy Brown, whose solo work impressed Morris so much that they began performing regularly as a duo, deciding to rehearse and record this remarkable series of improvised duos that Morris describes as unique to his catalog, something conversationally precise and organic.

A truly inventive collective trio of free improvisers from Denman Maroney on hyperpiano (a conventional piano played with one hand on the keys and other inside the piano), West Coast double bassist Scott Walton and French drummer Denis Fournier, performing within the piano trio format and then turning it on its side with unexpected approaches to their conversations.

An intimate encounter with Portuguese tenor saxophone player Rodrigo Amado, performing three original compositions -- the extended "Sweet Freedom", "Singular Blow" and "Shadow Waltz" -- performed at the Church of The Holy Ghost (Igreja do Espirito Santo) in Caldas da Rainha, an often introspective and innately lyrical set that reaches emphatic moments while always speaking directly.

An absolutely intense sax & drum duo recorded in Chiba Prefecture, Japan at Kashiwa Church in 1986 between free improvising saxophonist Akira Sakata and drummer Takeo Moriyama, two influential performers whose work began in the Yosuke Yamashita Trio in the early 70's, here in concentrated form for 18 improvisations, including a burning version of Albert Ayler's "Ghosts".

Known for the psychedelic dance band Gunerius & Verdensveven or The Harvey Steel Show, Norwegian guitarist and multi-instrumentalist Thomas Bergsten assembles an ensemble that blurs the lines between long improvisation and psychedelic-spiritual jazz, from freak jams to ECM-like electric beauty, tinged with Captain Beefheart or Faust; difficult to describe, intensely creative.

Performing on double bass, amp and a volume pedal, Gonçalo Almeida (LAMA, Albatre, The Attic) explores new sonic environments and possiblities for the large strings, using feedback that modifies based on the physical location between the amp and the resonator of the double bass, Almeida improvises with bowing strokes, pizzicato and unusual string preparations.

Appropriately recorded at Seizures Palace in Brooklyn, the 3rd release from the NY trio Pulverize the Sound of Peter Evans on trumpet, Tim Dahl on electric bass and Mike Pride on drums & glockenspiel, expands on this 10 year working band's assertive approach to collective free improv, doing so with innovation, breathtaking technical skill and a wide range of mood and texture.

Hand selected by Montreal clarinetist Lori Freedman and assembled during a 2022 residency in Berlin, the BeingFive quintet brought together ea-improvisers Yorgos Dimitriadis (percussion), Axel Dorner (trumpet), Andrea Parkins (accordion & objects) and Christopher Williams (double bass) for a workshop approach to creating sonic environments of incredible depth and expressiveness.

Performing on viola, violin and a stroh (a string instrument mechanically amplified by a metal resonator and horn attached to its body) the NY duo of Joanna Mattrey and Gabby Fluke-Mogul present eight dialogs of ominous and prophetic divination, titles including "The Vision", "The Potion" or "The Omen", as they weave and tear at their strings in startling and impressive ways.

After working with the Trondheim Jazz Orchestra, pianist Corey Smythe assmebled this incredible ensemble that includes Peter Evans (trumpet), Ingrid Laubrock (sax), Stephan Crump (bass), Tomeka Reid (cello), &c., performing works influenced by the Kern/Harbach standard "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes", which Smythe then interprets abstractly in 7 solo renderings.

Mississippi born, saxophonist Frank Wright followed Albert Ayler to NYC to join the free jazz scene of the mid-60s, signed to ESP on the spot after label owner Bernard Stollman heard him sit in with John Coltrane, this his first release on label in a trio with bassist Henry Grimes and drummer Tom Price as they rip through three original Wright compositions.

Brooklyn-based Slovenian saxophonist Igor Lumpert draws on his life experiences through eight original compositions and a Bosnian folk song performed with his core band of alto saxophonist Greg Ward, drummer Kenny Grohwoski and bassist Chris Tordini, expanded to a sextet and octet with stellar improvisers including trumpeter Peter Evans, guitarist Jeff Miles, &c.

A swinging album of modern jazz from the Portuguese trio of Ricardo Toscano on alto sax, Romeu Tristao on double bass and Joao Pereira on drums, recording in 2021 concert at Theatro Sao Luiz in Lisbon, featuring two original Toscano compositions, one from drummer Joao Pereira, a traditional fardo song and the effusive Thelonious Monk tune "Played Twice".

A truly unique improvisational setting between three Norwegian artists--inspired tap dancer JanneEraker, fiddle player and vocalist Vegar Vardal and double bassist Roger Arntzen--finding an exuberant excitement through the percussion of body movement, strange and slippery vocalizations and two emphatic strings; virtually indescribable and absolutely enthralling.

Powerful, modern jazz from a Norwegian ensemble of cross-genre improvisers, bringing an eclectic mix of jazz, electronic, African & orchestral expression into a series of works by double bassist Per Zanussi that explore the concept of "Li", a neo-Confucian term for fixed and dynamic patterns in nature, expressed through passionate ensemble work and exemplary soloing.

Collaborators in Montreal projects including Ensemble Supermusique and Ratchet Orchestra, bass clarinetist Lori Freedman (Queen Mab Trio) and trombonist Scott Thomson (Monicker) have also worked as a duo for more than 15 years, starting with the Barnyard Record album Plumb, their long history allowing flexibility in unusual dialog and utterance that captivates naturally.

Assertive, sometimes skronky, masterful playing from the Gorilla Mask trio of Peter Van Huffel on alto & baritone saxes, Roland Fidezius on electric bass and Rudi Fischerlehner on drums & percussion, in their 5th album in 13 years, nuancing their sound with electronics while adhering to power trio playing fed by new collaborative and conceptual approaches from all band members.

From post/hard bop to African-influenced spiritual jazz, the 2nd release from saxophonist & clarinetist Avram Fefer's quartet with Marc Ribot on guitar, Eric Revis on bass and Chad Taylor on drums swings freely or finds introspective grooves in nine original Fefer compositions of rich melodies around unusual time signatures, yielding extraordinary soloing and group interplay.

Recorded for radio for the series Jazz in der Kammer Nr 71, this 1974 concert was the first in East Germany for Peter Brötzmann, Fred Van Hove, and Han Bennink, bridging the divided German states through an energetic set of improvisations that extended traditional jazz with outrageous approaches to improv in an exciting, quirky and profoundly masterful set of European Free Jazz.

Evolving from a standards-based jazz band formed in 2010 into a collective free improv band of great depth and complex rhythmical approach, with an innate lyrical sense garnered from their roots, the Puerto Rican trio of alto saxophonist Jonathan Suazo, guitarist Gabriel Vicéns, and drummer Leonardo Osuna present a double album of spontaneous composition and sophisticated conversation.

Three drummer/percussionists and bass make up vibraphonist, marimbist, improviser and composer Patricia Brennan's sophomore album, reimagining the percussion quartet through jazz, new music and latin influences including Mexican folkloric roots, working with deceptively relaxed, highly interactive grooves that turn angular melodies into warmly irresistible music.

Bringing together veteran bassist Drew Gress with younger generation players, Belgian-American saxophonist Robin Verheyen (Bram De Looze) and drummer Mark Ferber (Gary Peacock, Ralph Alessi), pianist Marc Copland's new quartet presents a lyrical album of original compositions and standards; virtuosic, energetic and sensitively interpreted works of modern jazz.

An unusual narrative of field recordings, electronics and chamber instrumentation from composer Vanessa Rossetto, through two CDs weaving an abstracted and detailed story of recurring motifs, indescribably intertwined with spoken word, equestrian moments, environmental recordings, and melodic progressions of strings and harps; a momentous work of collaged composition.

Engrossing interactions of electronic sound, abstract percussion, static, metallic ringing and other ephemeral sonic assertions, from French-based Spanish sound artist Clara de Asís and UK-based Japanese-Korean installation & sound artist Ryoko Akama: three tracks of live electroacoustic improvisation, and three compositions extracted from those sessions.

Unusually orchestrated, spacious and exotic free improvisation from New York-based musicians Lucie Vítková, originally from Czech Republic and performing on accordion, hichiriki (a Japanese double reed flute), synth & harmonica, and Korean-born improviser Leo Chang performing on VOCALNORI (Amplified Gongs via Voice) and Piri (a Korean double reed instrument).

Mapping an improvisational framework onto a myriad of musical forms with contributions from each member, the trio of bassist Henry Fraser (NYC), drummer Jason Nazary (NYC) and flautist Camilo Angeles (PERU/CDMX) have collaborated in a number of configurations over the years, forming this specific and uniquely voiced trio in 2021 to record this mysteriously beautiful album.

Amongst the most unique of early electronic music instruments, the Ondes Martenot is heard in six duo recordings performed at the Barcelona studio of Spanish Ondiste, Tomomi Kubo, in conversation with tenor saxophonist Camila Nebbia, both using loop pedals and Nebbia adding her voice at times, creating otherworldly and unconventional interactions of free improv.

An apt title for this collection of improvised works for double bass and feedback mixer between long-time collaborators Kyle Motl and Carlos Domínguez Reinhardt, both members of the band Not the Circus and having previously released the duo album Artabotrys Hexapetalus, this album recorded in 2020 at Rat's Mouth in Florida for five diverse and often abrasive interactions.

The first meeting of the quartet of electronic artist Miguel A. Garcia, accordionist Garazi Navas, double bassist Alex Reviriego and percussionist Vasco Trilla is this live performance at Convent de Sant Agusti, in Barcelona, using the natural resonance of the chapel to influence their introspective interactions of deep bass, evolving tones and mysterious percussive punctuations.

Chilean double bassist, vocalist, improviser & composer Amanda Irarrázabal and Brooklyn double bassist Nat Baldwin in a live performance first-time meeting at the IRL concert space during Irarrázabal's week-long tour through NYC, this concert a profound meeting of deep strings, bowed, plucked and mutated through unique technical approaches to their instruments.

A series of concise noise explorations from Italian-born, Brooklyn-based guitarist Matteo Liberatore, more typically heard in composed and improv/experimental forms including work with Elliott Sharp & Weasel Walter, here in an assertive album of guitar-driven analog synthesis & noise using unusual structures, alien utterances and intense twists and turns.

A 3-volume set from four night's performances at The Jazz Gallery in NYC by the Tyshawn Sorey trio of drummer Sorey, pianist Aaron Diehl and bassist Russell Hall, joined by alto saxophonist Greg Osby for sets of exceptionally sophisticated and passionate interpretations of jazz standards including work by Miles Davis, Billy Strayhorn, Cole Porter, Thelonious Monk, McCoy Tyner, &c.

An urgent album of modern jazz, underground urban and electronic music, from the international collective of MCs HPrizm (NYC) & Gaston Bandimic (Dakar), saxophonists Steve Lehman (Los Angeles) & Maciek Lasserre (Paris) and drummer Damon Reid, exploring Islamic mysticism of al-Ghaib with the voices of Billy Higgins and Jackie McLean heard throughout the album.

Beginning in February 2022 on the 1st Saturday of the month Mark Wastell would bring his cello to the Hundred Years Gallery in London with the grace of gallery owners Graham MacKeachan and Montse Gallego and play, not as a performance, not as a rehearsal, just to play and record his improvisations as he expands his reach on the instrument, heard here in 17 fascinating excerpts.

In 1980 Duck Baker's first label deal had expired and the label changed direction, as did Baker himself from arranging traditional tunes into compositions for improvisation; still, these well-recorded demos from 1982 held an appeal through song selection and a uniquely edgy yet lyrical approach to his playing, now finally released to the public 40 years later.

All three having met in the London Improvisers Orchestra, Neil Metcalfe on flute and violinist Philipp Wachsmann each worked with drummer Emil Karlsen in separate projects including Tern, and then at Karlsen's suggestion creating this new Spaces Unfolding trio, heard in their first album, recording in the natural resonance of St. Mary's Old Church in Stoke Newington.

An astonishingly diverse album of solo piano works performed by pianist and composer Claudio Sanna, performing works from eight Sardinian composers including his own, weaving improvisation, acousmatic & musique concrete elements, turntablism, electronics, inside piano playing, chalk-board writing and more into lyrical and experimental pieces that flow together exquisitely.

Recorded in the same October 1956 Rudy Van Gelder sessions that are heard on Miles Davis' Cookin' and Steamin' albums, these alternate takes with his quintet of John Coltrane on tenor saxophone, Red Garland on piano, Paul Chambers on double bass and Philly Joe Jones on drums give us a unique view on the consistency and strength of the famous and foundational hard bop band.

Annette Peacock's response to the free-blowing loft scene was to compose using spacious intervals, allowing great harmonic and rhythmic freedom, inspiring pianist Paul Bley and his trio as heard in two unique interpretations of the same pieces from two exceptional working bands: one with bassist & drummer Mark Levinson & Barry Altschul, the other with Gary Peacock & Billy Elgart.

A series of instrumental pieces and songs from Chinese-American composer, cellist, and vocalist Theresa Wong, inspired by the sounds of the natural world and a personal sense of "sonic genetic memory", her works merging composition and improvisation, the album recorded by Wong herself using specific microphone placement to bring out the warmth of her instrument and voice.

A uniquely configured electroacoustic trio recording live in the studio in Lisbon in 2018 between Mexican flutist and founding member of the improv collective Generación Espontánea, Wilfrido Terrazas, and Portuguese improvisers Mariana Carvalho on prepared piano and Abdul Moimeme using two electric guitars and objects, balancing introspective moments with periods of uninhibited excitement.

The sixth release by Creative Sources' detailed electroacoustic improvising group Suspensão led by violist Ernesto Rodrigues, with Guilherme Rodrigues on cello, Nuno Torres on alto sax, Antonio Chaparreiro on electric guitar, Carlos Santos on computer and Jose Oliveira on percussion & inside piano, is this impressive performance at "Temporada Miso Music 2009" in Lisbon.

The 8-piece String Theory ensemble directed by violist Ernesto Rodrigues in a live performance at O'Culto da Ajuda in Lisbon of a beautiful and subtle work inspired by a poem written by Rodrigues, ".. dans cette immensite ", realized through viola, violin, cellos, viola de gamba, double bass, piano, zither and objects, a deceptively tranquil work of detail and dexterous execution.

Performing on clarinets and theremin, Udo Schindler follows up his series Salon für Klang+Kunst after 99 events with this new series at BASIS_Klangraum in Munich's historic BASIS Booksalon at MUCCA, in a concert with instrument maker Ardhi Engle performing on a diverse set of acoustic and electronic inventions for nine concise collective conversations.

Eleven detailed improvised conversations between Portuguese cellist living in Berlin Guilherme Rodrigues and Belgian guitarist Dirk Serries, employing powerful and unusual techniques on their instruments in dialogs that run the gamut from quiet or abstract interaction to rapid outbursts of challenging intercourse that mesh and diverge in unexpected ways.

An 8-part studio improvisation in Lisbon, 2022 from Portuguese musicians Ernesto Rodrigues on viola, Bruno Parrinha on flute & bass clarinet and Joao Madeira on double bass in a quartet with French tenor saxophonist Michel Stawicki, sometimes introspective and moody through highly detailed playing but building to periods of tumultuous and exciting activity.

An unusual trio configuration for violist Ernesto Rodrigues, joined by Bruno Parrinha on soprano & alto saxophones, and by electric guitarist Flak, who brings an experimental almost ea- approach to their 3-part improvisation, aptly named for it's deceptively calm setting, gradually becoming intricate and active through colored motion like a curious breeze that builds and recedes.

An immersive album of understated but incredibly detailed free improvisation from the quartet of Ernesto Rodrigues on viola, Bruno Parrinha on bass clarinet, Emidio Buchinho on electric guitar and Carla Santana on electronics, performing live at Escola Superior de Teatro e Cinema, in Amadora, Portugal for a four part concentration on silence through sound.

Performing live at SMUP, in Parede, Portugal in 2022, the bass-oriented chamber quintet of Ernesto Rodrigues on viola, Bruno Parrinha on bass clarinet, Joao Madeira on double bass, Hernani Faustino on double bass and Jose Oliveira on percussion balance jazz and contemporary compositional approaches to their sophisticated and extremely detailed improvisations.

A four-part suite from the Creative Sources string core of violist Ernesto Rodrigues and cellist Guilherme Rodrigue, recording in Berlin in 2021 with free jazz trombonist Matthias Muller and trumpeter Brad Henkel, through each movement approaching their playing through a balance of nonidiomatic and free jazz, subtly understated and meticulously intricate.

The first complete solo release from Seattle, Washington bassist and vocalist Kelsey Mines, active in both classical music as a member of Yakima Symphony, Symphony Tacoma and the Paramount Orchestra, and as an improviser, here presenting a series of improvised solo-duets that explore how listening to our on-going internal dialogue helps us conjure honest, outward expressions.

Continuing their exploration of isotopes, here focusing on the unstable element Uranium, the Portuguese Isotope Ensemble led by violist Ernesto Rodrigues presents two stunningly detailed concert performances from the 2021 CSFest XV at O'Culto da Ajuda in Lisbon, with some of Europe's leading improvisers taking on U92 in both "Electroacoustic" and "Acoustic" properties.

An album of extended and unusual techniques between German trumpeter Franz Hautzinger and Beirut trumpeter Mazen Kerbaj, opening with only the errata of their instruments through breath and thump, slowly adding identifiable brass sounds contrasted with rich utterance and elusively electronic-sounding output, always maintaining a solid and fascinating dialog

A statesman of the French free improvisation scene, Sylvain Guerineau, who has performed with Sunny Murray, Joëlle Léandre and more recently as part of a trio with Didier Lasserre and Paul Rogers, joins with next-generation double bassist Fred Marty integrating advanced techniques into lyrical contexts, for five satisfying improvisations, the last a reference to Sonny Rollins.

An unusual sax and drum duo from saxophonist Seymour Wright and percussionist Paul Abbott, taking recordings from a dozen years of their work together and assembling, mixing and re-recording them into these two impressive works of "mutated multiphonics and triggered percussion" offset with periods of reflection; startling, unexpected, amusing, awe inspiring.

The continued evolution and renewal of the Nu Band anchored by the rhythm section of drummer Lou Grassi and bassist Joe Fonda, with Thomas Heberer in his 2nd album with the band taking the palce of late trumpeter Roy Campbell, and guitarist Kenny Wessel taking the place of late saxophonist Mark Whitecage; superb melodic free playing with compositions from all four members.

A chamber jazz quintet orchestrated for three strings, saxophone and percussion from Ernesto Rodrigues on viola, Jose Lencastre on alto saxophone, Miguel Mira on cello, Hernani Faustino on double bass and Joao Lencastre on drums, technically advanced collective playing that simmers with an underlying jazz fire unique to many of Rodrigues' groupings.

Translating loosely to "Something begs the patience of the clouds", the collaborative electroacoustic quintet of Ernesto Rodrigues on viola, Guilherme Rodrigues on cello, Bruno Parrinha on bass clarinet, Luisa Goncalves on piano and Carlos Santos on electronics present two extended improvisations of tension, masterfully adept technical skill and intensively close listening.

After the Lisbon String Trio for the Dada album, Bruno Parrinha on B-flat, alto and bass clarinets joins with the string pairing of violist Ernesto Rodrigues and cellist Guilherme Rodrigues to record this impressionistic 3-part work, the title translating to "Without Forgetting The Trees", each movement expanding into darkly colored branches of remarkable control.

Approaching the string trio of viola, cello and double bass through improvisation and exceptionally extended techniques, the Portuguese trio of Ernesto Rodrigues on viola, Guilherme Rodrigues on cello, and Joao Madeira on double bass "scratch, stretch and strop timbers" as they express a unique universe of string interaction from raucous to reflective.