A significant release culminating the partnership of saxophonist Ivo Perelman and pianist Matthew Shipp, a distillation of their work after 8 duo recordings and dozens of collaborative albums, this 3 CD presents their work together in nearly telepathic terms: sympathetic and intimate without irascibility, a beautiful and introspective reflection of a shared ethic.

The very first album from Portugal's impressive Clean Feed Records is this live album at Auditorio do Forum Cultural do Seixal from the trio of Steve Swell on trombone, Ken Filiano on bass and Lou Grassi on drums, joined by Paulo Curado on alto sax and Rodrigo Amado on baritone sax, a significant concert merging free players from two nations with profound influence on jazz music.

Saxophonist Heath Watts' 3rd Leo release is an album of free improvisation with three Montana jazz mavens--Blue Armstrong on double bass, MJ Williams on trombone, piano & melodica, and Nancy Owens on violin--in nine recordings of sophisticated and intelligent interaction that naturally evolves new directions of irrepressibly enjoyable and diverse conversation.

As much a composed work as a work of improvisation, pianist and composer Simon Nabatov's String Trio with Garteh Lubbe on viola and Ben Davis perform six Nabatov compositions, chamber jazz works that express in both buyouantly intricate and languourosly beautiful abstraction, each piece leaving room for each player to improvise and express themselves.

A long-form 3-part work of collective improvisation from 3 masterful New York free jazz legends--Daniel Carter on flute, trumpet, clarinet, and saxophones, William Parker on bass, and Matthew Shipp on piano--performing live at Tufts University in 2017 in a beautifully thoughtful and lyrical concert presented after a screening of the '59 film "The Cry of Jazz".

Two fascinating experimental concepts executed by Roger Turner, Henry Kaiser, Martin Kuchen, Damon Smith, Jeff Coffin, Ed Pettersen, Tania Chen, & Jordan Muscatello; Disc 1, each musician improvised alone to NASA recordings from the Voyager spacecraft, the results mixed together over the Voyager track; Disc 2, three improvisers play together in response to Voyager tracks.

Half of the Italian improvising duo My Cat Is an Alien, Roberto Opalio uses prepared mini-keyboard, handmade shortwave receiver, alientronics, and vocalizations to create this improvised prelude and statement, a shifting work that draws the listener into mesmerizing sonic environments of alien origin and transports them deceptively between ringing and textured vistas.

Released in 1984 on Hal Wilner's Shemp records, this is the 1st reissue for late drummer Beaver Harris' 360-degree Experience with pianist Don Pullen on piano, in a stellar band with saxophonists Ricky Ford, Hamiet Bluiett, bassist Buster Williams, percussion from Candido & steel drummer Francis Haynes, and four french horn players, a truly forward-thinking jazz album.

Originally released on the Hat Hut label in 1979, this 2-CD set of saxophonist Steve Lacy's quintet with Steve Potts on saxophone, Irene Aebi on cello, voice & violin, Kent Carter on bass, and Oliver Johnson on drums, are heard live in two tour-de-force concerts, first at the 1977 Jazz Festival, in Willisau, Switzerland, then in 1978 at Jazz Au Totem in Paris, France.

Extending his interest in accompaniment with field recording, Chicago cellist Fred Lonberg-Holm took his cello into the Florida Everglades along with soundscape artist and field recordist Gustavo Matamoros, seeking out night creatures, particularly vocalizing frogs, edited down to six intriguing tracks of "outdoor interspecies improvisation".

Unexpected directions in this meeting between Swedish saxophonist Mats Gustafsson and Chicago vibraphonist Jason Adasiewicz, in an introspective album of beautiful tonal conversations, relaxed and sophisticated dialogs that mostly eschews the more aggressive side of both musicians in deference to a thoughtful, reflective and elegant set of tunes.

Chicago saxophonist Ken Vandermark is fascinated with the visual arts, and was drawn in the 60s to Toronto visual artist, director of the "New York Eye And Ear" film, and most notably here, pianist, Michael Snow; in 2015 they performed together for the first time, this startlingly explosive and informed album the complete recording of that event.

The quartet of Canadian electronics composer Chris Meloche and label leader Martin Archer on woodwinds and electronics orchestrated these pieces, performed with improvsations from Gino Robair on percussion and electronics and Lyn Hodnett on voice, for a 3 part work of rich interactive loops, drones and soundscape, ranging from spine-chilling to lush and lovely environments.

Univers Zero bassist Guy Seger brought this eclectic group of improvisers into the studio to develop the music on this genre-defying album, informed by a sextet of musicians who have performed and recorded with projects and artists including Vanishing Pictures, X-Legged Sally, Wrong Object, Tony Levin, Tony Bianco, Paul Schutze, Trevor Watts, Zeena Parkins, Jim O'Rourke, &c.

Saxophonist Martin Archer composed the five works on this, the 3rd release for Engine Room Favorites, his AACM-influenced big band with a tremendous orchestration of horns with drums, vibes, piano and bass, here with their most complex yet melodic and rich release yet, including melodic elements of folk music, powerful rhythms from prog-oriented rock, and free improv and jazz.

Having met at Middlesex University in 2001, this sophisticated London-based contemporary jazz/folk sextet formed in 2011, recently adding vocalist Kerry Andrew (Juice), as pianist Laura Cole composes music and text based on her personal experiences; pieces include two collective improvs and 2 reworkings of Ornette Coleman's "Lonely Woman".

This 2001 limited 6-CD box set of late trumpeter Bill Dixon's solo work in 5 CDs plus 1 CD of Dixon speaking, including two 32-page booklets containing essays, interviews, & writings, plus reproductions of 13 Dixon paintings, along with 3 inserts; an essential example of Dixon's incredible creative output, the final copies of which were recently discovered and available one last time.

Sound experimenter and electroacoustic organizer Jason Kahn revisits previous works and expands on them with the book and CD release, with an essay on his approach towards public space interventions and text / sound installations, a track listing, photographs from the locations of his field recordings, and texts and prose poems to accompany the listener.

John Zorn pens a powerful set of compositions for a quartet led by two astonishing guitarists--Julian Lage and Matt Hollengberg--with a solid driving force from the rhythm section of Trevor Dunn on bass and Kenny Grohowski on drums, as the band navigates a quick-shifting and utterly impressive blend of jazz, rock, funk, blues, and composed music.

The french electroacoustic improvising trio of synth player and engineer Jean-Marc Foussat (Fou Records) with the father/son pair of saxophonist Quentin Rollet (Workshop De Lyon) and drummer/percussionist Christian Rollet (Rectangle Records, Bisou), in a rich, intensifying and often enthusiastically exploding set of extended and masterful improvisations.

Celebrating 40 years as a performing ensemble, the West Coast saxophone quartet ROVA of Bruce Ackley on soprano saxophone, Steve Adams on alto & sopranino saxophones, Jon Raskin on baritone saxophone, and Larry Ochs on tenor saxophone, reworked compositions from all members transversing their past 34 years, in an absolutely impressive and diverse album.

The New Orleans bass-less free jazz trio of tenor saxophonist Kidd Jordan, drummer Alvin Fielder and pianist Joel Futterman are joined by New York trombonist Steve Swell for a concert at the Old US Mint for an absolutely superlative recording of lyrical and expansive collective improvisation, each player urging the other on as they create instant epics of modern jazz.

A proper reissue of the 1976 Incus album from guitarist Derek Bailey and cellist Tristan Honsinger, primarily from a live concert at at Verity's Place in London on February 7, 1976, with two unusual studio recordings punctuating the album, an early example of their long history of collaboration and a great example of their intense, joyful, and truly free improvisation together.

An impressive vinyl reissue of guitarist Derek Bailey, one of the most unique and influential free improvisers, in his 1974 solo recording on the Incus label, with Bailey playing on two amps and two volume pedals, a veritable duo split in the stereo field with occasional banter and observations, as he blends abstract and lyrical approaches on guitar in amazing ways.

With orchestration of harp, daxophone, idiophones, piano, cello, guitar, percussion, sampling & electronics, the Portuguese quintet Turbamulta (roughly translates to "rowdy mob", though clearly a very sophisticated mob) was born from the band Powertrio of Eduardo Raon, Joana Sa and Luis Martins, expanded to blend compositional, EA and improv approaches into something unique and beautiful.

The indefatigable Norwegian saxophonist Frode Gjerstad invites trombonist Steve Swell, with whom he collaborated in 2011 on the live album "At Constellation", to join his trio with Jon Rune Strom on double bass and drummer Paal Nilssen-Love, at Cleveland's Bop stop during their 2017 tour, recording this impressive concert of exemplary collective free jazz.

A peer of Tim Berne, David Binney, Sabir Mateen, Mark Helias, &c., Slovenian guitarist Samo Salamon presents an album of original compositions and one collective improvisation from his ever-changing Bassless Trio, here with drummer Roberto Dani and saxophonist Tony Malaby on tenor and soprano, in an introspective album of profound technique and lyrical playing.

Lisbon, Portugal native, singer and composer Sara Serpa in a trio with saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock and cellist Erik Friedlander, recording live at Pete's House, in Brooklyn, for an album of unusual and creative vocals inspired by experimentation and changing identities, bringing a unique approach to improvised voice, here in the company of accomplished players.

Swedish pianist Mattias Risberg demonstrates the passion he dedicates to vintage instruments like mellotron, Hammond organ, analog synthesizers, clavichord and pipe organs, here in a solo album of piano, with some light preparations, and the pedals of a Moog Taurus, in an inventive album of improvisations inspired by the vivid images of postage stamps.

A young and fresh voice in the creative Chicago improv scene, pianist and composer Matt Piet, who leads his own trio and the band Four Letter Words, and one third of Rempis/Piet/Daisy, introduces a new quartet with saxophonist Nick Mazzarella, cornet player Josh Berman, and drummer Tim Daisy, a superb example of the energetic and active Chicago scene.

Leveraging influences in improvisation and contemporary compositional music, Belgian/Oslo pianist Jonas Cambien, a member of Simiskina and Platform, extends his own trio of saxophonist Andre Rolighete and drummer Andreas Wildhagen with trumpeter Torstein Lavik Larsen on 2 tracks, as they balance jazz, avant, free improv and other hybrid forms in a compellingly creative album.

French pianist Benoit Delbecq brings together frequent collaborators from New York--Mark Turner on tenor saxophone and drummer Gerald Cleaver--and from Paris--Delbecq himself and double bassist John Hebert--for an album of refined and inventive contemporary jazz, the work of masterful players with years of experience and collaborations dating back to 2003.

Between 2014-16 Jakob Ullmann composed the orchestral work "steine, feuer, sterne" (stones, fire, stars) based on a modular structure, such that individual sections can be played outside of a complete performance, solo or in predetermined combinations; this album presents one section for solo bassoon titled "Muntzers stern" performed by Dafne Vicente-Sandoval.

The full two-hour performance of Cornelius Cardew's entire 193-page legendary Treatise graphic score, performed at Iklectik in London, England on January 28, 2017 in an 11-member ensemble of some of London's most interesting improvisers including participants in Scratch Orchestra, in a double CD release with liner notes by AMM founder Eddie Prevost.

A series of acoustic guitar duos between Henry Kaiser playing on an 18-string harp guitar, and Ed Pettersen, playing an 8-string Weissenborn guitar, freely improvised and with a psychedelic/cosmic impulse as the two draw on elements of Americana and roots-based folk music in four extended recordings, the camaraderie and mutual intent evident in this fascinating album.

Composer and vocalists Juliet Palmer leads an ensemble of vocalists through works that use layering of voices using lyrics from Emily Dickinson, Nicholas Power, Julie Salverson, Anna Cahtterton, and Christine Duncan, a fascinating mixture of haunting acappella interaction, solo voice, and one work with electronic backing and one over an ultrasound.

Pianist and vibraphonist Karl Berger is also a professor of composition, having won numerous awards and commissions for his work, here presenting the final part of a trilogy written for Tzadik, a beautiful 14-part suite for piano and string realized with Berger himself at the keys in a septet of well known NY performers including Ken Filiano, Tomas Ulrich, Jason Kao Hwang.

In 2012 choreographer Ivan Perez asked Rutger Zuydervelt (Machinefabriek) to work on a score for his dance piece, "Hide And Seek", and to create the piece in collaboration with cellist and multi-instrumentalist Aaron Martin, this album, a rich electroacoustic collaboration, presents the first sketches of what would eventually be one long continuous collage used in performance.

French composer and producer Hector Zazou's 2nd and last release with a "most exquisite and eccentric of groups, who hardly touched the world of working bands, and whose existence was tenuous, flickering, mythological - and yet who managed, stealthily, to find its way in time to legendary status by leaving an indelible trace in recorded form of their verifiable existence."

With the collaboration of percussionist Ches Smith, John Zorn creates a magnificent and dreamlike series of parallel tracks, a "modern reconstruction" and a set of faux 78rpm albums purportedly from 1923, as an homage to pre-dada absurdist, Romanian writer Urmuz (Demetru Dem), using the studio and card-file composition to create a bizarre and astonishing set of 8 x 2 pieces.

Pianist Anthony Pateras and guitarist Stephen O'Malley (Sunn O))) performed a concert in 2011 at Instants Chavires in 2011, which they took into the studio to deconstruct and recompose on 1/4 inch tape, creating a compelling landscape of fractured musique concrete, introspective meditations, electro-acoustic textures and heavy guitar; includes a 20 page interview with O'Malley.

A founder of the Slave Pianos collective and co-organizer of the Inland Concert Series, Australian computer and synth artist Rohan Drap joins keyboardist Anthony Pateras for an extended exploration of interlocking vintage electric organs, allowing their tones and timbres to interact in microtonal richness as they create tonal environments and gradually unfolding progressions.

Aishi Oyauchi is a free improvising alto saxophonist in the tradition of Kaoru Abe and who hails from the same first generation of Japanese free improvisers from the 1960s; this album finds him performing on alto and soprano sax at Performing Art Center, using space and abrupt diversions alongside unusual tone and technique with percussive asides.

Multi-instrumentalist improviser Harutaka Mochizuki releases this solo album performing on saxophone, performing two extended improvisations that explore the instrument as a whole, producing unusual sounds from the physical and mechanical aspects of the horn alongside more traditional playing, using an expanded range of dynamics to build tension and interest.

The second album from this Norwegian electric improvising power trio, using dark rhythmic grooves over which guitar, electric piano, amplified objects, no-input mixing board, and pianet emerge, creating hypnotic states that lead to exultant moments through sinuous melody, building and releasing intensity while maintaining a consistent gauzy undertone.

Massimo Pupillo (ZU, Laniakea), electronic artist Luciano Lamanna and string instrument virtuoso Roberto Zanisi combine to form Creta, creating sonic works that blend sci-fi ambient atmospheres with dark bass pulses and languid Mediterranean string instruments, an unusual yet surprisingly complementary set of approaches yielding a darkly lyrical album.

The 2nd album for NY-based saxophonist Yoni Kretzmer's Chamber-Improv ensemble New Dilemma with Frantz Loriot (viola), Christopher Hoffman (cello), Josh Sinton (bass clarinet), Pascal Niggenkemper (double bass) and Flin Van Hemmen (drums), investigating "the intricacies differentiating and combining the written and the improvised continue with further depth and chance".

Five years in the making, composer Scott Johnson transcribed the speech of philosopher Daniel C. Dennett (Committee for Skeptical Inquiry) into this extended, 8-movement suite, using a rich, detailed set of musical landscapes blending musical genres that run in parity with the voice of Dennett, as Johnson emphasizes and highlight his insightful thinking.

Bridging folk traditions with modern aesthetics, the duo of Evan Baker on guitar and Austin Glover on violin, both contributing songs, sing about everyday events, music, and life, the songs having a bluesy and even early Kinks feel at times, made unique through a cappella moments and languid instrumental sections.

A duo between two Italian born improvisers--New York based drummer and 577 Label leader Federico Ughi, and pianist Gabriele Meirano, active in the London jazz club scene for more than a decade--for an album of insightful free jazz in a dialog that shows both thoughtful and challenging moments in an open-minded, ultimately lyrical conversation between two like-minded players.