Dedicated to Derek Bailey, these long out of print, subtle and delicate duo recordings captured in Chicago between Mats Gustafsson on tenor sax, fluteophone, flute & "junk" and Jim O'Rourke on guitar, accordeon and also on "junk", were originally released in 1999 on the Incus label, here remastered, in some cases remixed, and adding previously unreleased material.
Performing live at Porgy & Bess in Vienna, Austria in 2018, the trio of Conrad Bauer on trombone, Georg Graewe on piano and John Lindberg on double bass present eight free improvisations based around compositionsal structures from all three musicians, their tight interaction, intent listening and powerful technical skills a testement to their long history in European Free Jazz.
A well-balanced early 80s album in it's first reissue from Sun Ra with a 16-piece Arkestra, recording at Squat Theater in New York City, 1982 for a mix of Ra original numbers and songs including "Children of the Sun" and "Cosmo-Party Blues", plus a wild Sun Ra solo synthesizer improv, blues and traditional jazz numbers, and a layered percussion jam.
Blurring the lines between composed and improvised music, John Zorn's ten-part composition in his "Suite for Piano" was inspired in part by the Goldberg Variations and Schoenberg's solo piano music, set in the classic piano trio format and performed by extraordinary New York musicians and improvisers, Brian Marsella on piano, Jorge Roeder on bass, and Ches Smith on drums.
Focusing on the compositions of Swedish pianist Per Henrik Wallin, the energetic piano trio of Simon Sieger on piano, Joel Grip on double bass and Michael Griener on drums puts new life into Wallin's 1998 trio album Coyote with the intention of putting Wallin's music in front of a new audience while clearly reveling in his compositions amid their own impressive mastery.
Three recordings from percussionist Hans Lingens in his 2nd solo album on Umlaut, working at the intersection between improvised and composed forms of experimental music: "Nacht", a montage of prerecorded layers of mostly rolls and brush sounds; and two recordings in one take using close miking as he performs on a single cymbal with mallets ("Hund") and a bass bow ("Manatee").
Their group name Die Hochstapler translating to "The Impostors", the fourth exuberant free jazz album from the Berlin quartet of Pierre Borel on alto saxophone, cymbals & bird calls, Louis Laurain on trumpet & vocals, Antonio Borghini on double bass and Hannes Lingens on drums & vibraphone was recorded during their February 2022 residency at Au Topsi Pohl.
Founded by violinists Amaryllis Billet and Anna Jalving, with Fanny Paccoud on viola and Sarah Ledoux on cello, Quatuor Umlaut presents their first recordings, joined by clarinetist Joris Ruhl for two pieces: "Calques" by composer Karl Naegelen using effects of transparency and fusion of tones; and Morton Feldman's highly textured "Clarinet and String Quartet".
A tongue-in-cheek album packaged like a Deutsche Grammophon release of a string quartet by fictional composer Frieda Bertelsohn Martholdys (1878-1907), which is instead a superb live ea-improv performance at the 2018 Music Unlimited Festival in Austria by Gaudenz Badrutt (electronics), Kai Fagaschinski (clarinette), Jonas Kocher (accordion) & Christof Kurzmann (electronics).
A superb chamber jazz trio from NY improviser and violinist Sana Nagano, with Karl Berger on piano & vibraphone and Billy Martin on drums & percussion, Nagano having a long history with each through Berger's Improvisers Orchestra and with Martin through Creative Music Studio, their connections evident in their articulately energetic and confident collective conversations.
The French Dark Tree label continues its curation of the unreleased material of West Coast pianist and band leader Horace Tapscott with this exuberant and substantial collection of live sessions at Catalina's Bar & Grill in Hollywood with Michael Session on saxophones, Thurman Green on trombone, Roberto Miranda on double bass, Fritz Wise on drums and vocal stylist Dwight Trible.
The chameleonic configuration of Angles is here an octet, in a powerfully building and passionate set of three recordings performed by Martin Kuchen (alto sax), Magnus Broo & Goran Kajfes (trumpets), Mats Aleklint (trombone), Mattias Stahl (vibraphone), Alexander Zethson (piano & synth), Konrad Agnas (drums) and Johan Berthling (double bass); exemplary.
An introduction to Amsterdam-based, Slovenian pianist & composer Miha Gantar in a specially priced 5-CD box, performing his diverse and sophisticated compositions in a variety of configurations from solo, duo, trio, quartet & large ensemble, with notable participants including Gerry Hemingway, Christian Lillinger and Axel Dorner; liner notes by Nate Wooley.
The first quartet album for electronic improviser Rafael Toral's Space Quartet is a live album from Casa das Artes Bissaya Barreto in Coimbra, performed with Hugo Antunes on double bass, Nuno Morao on drums & percussion, Nuno Torres on alto saxophone & electronic instrument, with Toral using acoustic & electronic feedback to bring the classic jazz quartet lineup into new spaces.
With one foot in 60s free jazz and the other in contemporary improvisation, the pianoless Italian trio Fade In of Federico Calcagno on bass clarinet & clarinet, Pietro Elia Barcellona on contrabass and Marco Luparia on drums perform original compositions, spirited pieces with inventive elements, solid melodic foundation and surprising twists and turns.
Amsterdam-based bass clarinetist Ziv Taubenfeld's sextet perform the leader's innovative compositions that include a tribute to alto saxophonist Jemeel Moondoc, and a graphic composition for Sunny Murray, in a band with Michael Moore (sax & clarinet), Joost Buis (trombone), Nico Chientaroli (piano), Omer Govreen (double bass) and Onno Govaert (drums & percussion).
The Tarbaby trio of pianist Orrin Evans, drummer Nasheet Waits and double bassist Eric Revis, is joined by trumpeter Josh Lawrence and as with previous albums, featuring acclaimed alto saxophonist Oliver Lake (+ percussionist Dana Murray on track) in an album mixing post-bop, free and lyrical approaches to jazz, with compositions from all four plus a Prince cover.
Performing the embracingly angular compositions of Russian-born, German-based saxophonist Yaroslav Likhachev that pivot on hard bop transformed through inventive approaches, since 2016 Likhachev's Quartet with Yannis Anft on piano, Conrad Noll on bass and Moritz Baranczyk on drums have pursued new forms of expression while maintaining jazz, traditions here in nine well-defined "sketches".
Active collaborators for six years at the time of this recording, this is the first time Swedish improvisers Cornelia Nilsson on drums, Johnny Aman on double bass and Mathias Landaeus on piano & keys have recorded together as a trio, performing seven engagingly lyrical compositions from leader Landaeus, on several tracks adding an unusual edge through the use of synths.
A new trio from NY bassist Max Johnson with Anna Webber on tenor saxophone & flute and Michael Sarin on drums, performing five lyrically inclined yet inventive compositions from Johnson, allowing distinction for each performer as they bridge sections between fluid straight-ahead playing and spaciously singular experimentation, keeping player and listener on their toes.
A seeming contradiction in terms, the unison voices and divergent polyphony that emerges best describes the subtle interactions between these two Swiss reed players--Markus Eichenberger on clarinet and Christoph Gallio (Day & Taxi) on soprano and C-Melody saxophones--their "harmony of coherence" strategies guiding their melodic interlacing and fragmentation.
Combining the two Italian ESP/BASE LPs from 1982 and the 1995 ESP reissues, this spectacular concert with perhaps Ayler's most essential band--Ayler on tenor sax, Donald Ayler on trumpet, Michel Samson on violin, Lewis Worrell on double bass and Ronald Shannon Jackson on drums--is fully remastered to bring out more details from the complete, ecstatic 1966 concert.
Changing approaches to his music with new quartet of Jimmy Lyons on alto sax, Alan Silva on double bass and Andrew Cyrille on drums, pianist Cecil Taylor's incredible 1966 concert in Paris presented four extended compositions, here remastered and reissued with a track from a compilation LP--"With (Exit)"--extending his quartet with Bill Dixon on trumpet and Henry Grimes on double bass.
"As Frogworth says in one review: 'Two giants of Australian avant-garde music getting together here, dedicating their record to Australian composer Peggy Glanville-Hicks, whose house in Paddington, Sydney is used for residencies/sabbatic...
An expansive double album from Australian violinist and mad genius Jon Rose, in solo, duo and odd orchestral settings, including tracks with Jim Denley, Clayton Thomas, Robbie Avenaim, &c.; a project with a 32-string automaton violin + string ensemble; a work for a casino-music driven player-piano; a dueling banjo and interactively bowed violin, &c. &c.; masterfully inexplicable!
The 2nd album from the duo of Japanese circuit bender Kayu Nakada, using circuit boards from electronic instruments short circuited for new effects, and Japan-based Canadian electronic instrument maker Tim Olive (845 Audio) on shortwave radio, magnetic pickups & undokai, recorded together in Kobe, Japan and then edited and composed into these two intriguing works.
Inspired by Miles Davis, particularly his album On The Corner and Davis' respect and interest in the work Karlheinz Stockhausen, LaPlante wrote Wild Tapestry as a commission from Seth Knopp of Vermont's The Yellow Barn Music Festival in 2021, exploring how direct inspiration between musicians is translated into musical composition and strategy.
A determined set of electric jazz from the Brooklyn, NYC trio of Nathaniel Morgan (Buckminster) on alto saxophone, Dustin Carlson on guitar & bass and Kate Gentile on drums & vibraphone, bringing driving rock and experimental music approaches to their improvisations, a uniquely voice and tenacious trio of unorthodox improvisers.
A set of blues songs of a personal nature, concepts for a broken yet hopeful age, written and sung by improvising guitarist Marcin "M" Olak (Gadt/Osborne/Zakrocki/Olak, Agusti Fernandez) performed and expanded by a set of stellar improvisers: Ben Stapp on tuba, Fred Lonberg-Holm on cello, Marco Colonna on flute and Steve Swell on trombone.
Drawing on previous collaborations between Amsterdam pianist Kaja Draksler and wind player Ab Baars, here on tenor sax, clarinet & shakuhachi, and two duo albums between Baars and guitarist Terrie Ex, this meeting as a trio took place at the 2018 Konfrontationen Festival in Nickelsdorf, Austria for a diverse journey from uniquely introspective to wildly energetic conversation.
An incredible solo concert from legendary New York pianist Cecil Taylor in October, 1968 at the Sala Kongresowa (Congress Hall, Palace of Culture and Science) in Warsaw during the Jazz Jamboree, recorded by Polski Radio and remastered in 2021, an excellent example of the nimble mind and quick technical skills of Taylor's personal take on improvisation; stunning!
The Polish piano trio RGG of Lukasz Ojdana on piano, Maciej Garbowski on bass and Krzysztof Gradziuk on drums & percussion are joined by vocalists Marta Grzywacz, trumpet player Artur Majewski and block flutes virtuoso Dominic Strycharski to close out the 2020, 15th Ad Libitum Festival in Warsaw Poland, presenting seven improvisations in a beautifully informed journey.
Blurring free improvisation and compositional strategies in this encounter at the "First Meeting Series" at FAB Music Studio Chicago between New York violinist Mark Feldman and Chicago cellist Katinka Kleijn, a remarkable concert in two parts showing imaginative skills of phenomenal technical expertise and experience, instant compositions of the highest order.
Six raw instrumentals bridging free jazz and free rock forms, clearly influenced by both Brötzmann and Sunn O))) (as referenced in the track "SunnA)))") from the French Hippie Diktat trio of Antoine Viard on amplified baritone sax, Julien Chamla on drums and Richard Comte on guitar, recording at l'Ecluse, in Reims in 2013 for six ruggedly inspired tracks.
The first recording of an ongoing collaboration between violinist Maya Bennardo, bass clarinetist Erik Blennow Calälv, and kacapi (similar to a Japanese koto) musician Kristofer Svensson, presenting two restrained and lovely compositions bringing together contemporary classical, free improvisation and Sundanese music in a unique chamber format.
Composer Michael Pisaro-Liu asked guitarist Jameson Feakes and saxophonist Josten Myburgh to each select a location in Western Australia and make a set of field recordings at different times of day, providing the basis for a musical scroll akin to Chinese scroll paintings, each musician then a poetic character placed into the virtual landscape of their recordings.
Australian sound poet and vocalist Sage J Harlow aka Sage Pbbbt, whose innovative vocal work takes inspiration from Tuvan and Mongolian overtone singing and Inuit throat singing, created this mysterious set of electroacoustic compositions on the unceeded lands of the Whadjuk People of the Noongar Nation, developing four works of spellbinding spectral ambience.
An album of evocative electronic and acousmatic soundscapes from German composer, electronic artist and keyboardist John Franek, who performs the four pieces on this album on organ and electronics, interweaving rich harmonics with stark tones, melding his sounds in slowly evolving interaction, like beams of light piercing peaceful atmospheres.
An album of concentrated expression for solo piano in three works from French composer Anastassis Philippakopoulos and meticulously performed by Serbian pianist Teodora Stepancic, exploring intervals through minimalistic progressions, titled "Piano 1", "Piano 2" & "Piano 3", each in two or three parts as they build to explosive moments in the final movement.
Starting with a systematic variation of polyphony in each of the three movements of "Bis 4-Stimmung", German composer and pianist Florian Wittenburg deviates from strict structures through a component of randomly generated core notes which he then makes coherent through harmony and melody, each part punctuated with layers of Wittenburg reciting Dutch poet Cees Noteboom.
A work for percussion in thirty-four succinct movements from German composer Eva-Maria Houben and performed by the Frantic Percussion Ensemble of Markus Behn, David Gutfleisch, Simon Gutfleisch, Gunnar Kötke and Jonathan Szegedi, each section using broad and patient spacing to highlight a fascinating mix of traditional and unusual percussive devices.
The first recording between French improvisers, guitarist Guillaume Gargaud and double bassist Patrice Grente, who began their work together in 2016 performing noise and minimalist music, increasing the frequency of their collaborations until a forced 1 year break, meeting again in 2021 to record this beautifully complementing set of all-acoustic duos.
The first volume of powerful free playing and intimate conversation bringing together two New York-based improvisers, Cuban native drummer/percussionist Francisco Mela and Tennessee native reed & wind player Zoh Amba, both sharing a mountain region upbringing that brings a uniquely reflective quality to their playing, fortified by the exploratory NY improv scene.
Phil Venable, the Chapel Hill, North Carolina bass player known for his work in the free jazz outfit Tragic Assembly, pairs up with Tragic Assembly drummer Charles Chace for an excursion into the outer limits of improvisation, the album title a reference to a medicinal clay and a riff off of the Charles Mingus song "Moanin".
Seeking to combine the interdisciplinary practices of Swedish percussionist, artist and philosopher Larsson Andreas Hiroui and his ensemble of Johanna Arve and Johan Jutterstrom into a single method, this extended work compiles their collective history into digital archives that are presented in a layered set of spoken observations and instrumental improvisations.
Performed with Stockholm musicians including pianist Alexander Zethson, wind player Martin Küchen and trombonist Mats Äleklint, organist Linnéa Talp explores the areas of sound that emulate breathing, push/pull or back & forth motion, in eight beautifully paced recordings led by the organ's rich and microtonal vibrations & timbre and imbued by the contributor's subtle additions.
Two exceptional live performances of John Zorn's interactive "Fencing" concept leading free improv into unusual directions, from the early Downtown NY scene in 1978, first at Zorn's own loft in the trio of guitarists Eugene Chadbourne, Duck Baker and Randy Hutton; then at Bard College, in Kingston, NY with Zorn on multiple reeds, Chadbourne on guitar and Polly Bradfield on violin.
A large work from Downtown New York improviser and innovator Ikue Mori, seven piece dedicated to women artists whose vision found them creating into their 80's & 90s, performed in an ensemble with Sylvie Courvoisier, Ned Rothenberg, Zeena Parkins, Satoko Fujii, Natsuki Tamura, Erik Friedlander, David Watson, Makigami Koichi, Charmaine Lee & Sae Hashimoto.
The fifth album on Leo Records for vibraphonist Sergio Armaroli, and his second with NY guitarist, saxophonist & electronic artist Elliott Sharp and bassist Steve Piccolo, using lyrical interpretations of jazz standards as a jumping off point for experimental and unusual approaches to improvisation, a unique balancing point in a fascinating collection.
