Jazz /
Open Sesame
Trumpeter Freddie Hubbard burst upon the Blue Note scene in June 1960 with his auspicious debut album Open Sesame. Within 6 months Hubbard had already recorded a follow-up (Goin’ Up) and appeared as a sideman on sessions with Tina Brooks (True Blue),…
Think!
One of the funkiest & most inventive organists to ever walk the earth, Dr. Lonnie Smith made his name on Blue Note beginning with his 1968 label debut Think! Produced by Francis Wolff, the album featured trumpeter Lee Morgan, tenor saxophonist David …
Blue Mode
For his third Blue Note album Blue Mode (1969), organist Reuben Wilson kept it right in the pocket and laid down one of the funkiest soul jazz workouts of the late-60s. Produced by Francis Wolff, the date featured Wilson at the helm of an airtight qu…
Grant's First Stand
Grant Green's debut album, Grant's First Stand, still ranks as one of his greatest pure soul-jazz outings, a set of killer grooves laid down by a hard-swinging organ trio. For having such a small lineup, just organist Baby Face Willette and drummer B…
Alive!
After a prolific 5-year run from 1961-1965 when he made more than 20 great hard bop & soul jazz albums for Blue Note, guitarist Grant Green took a 4-year hiatus from recording. When he returned to Blue Note in 1969, Green’s style had moved into funki…
Blacks And Blues
Flutist Bobbi Humphrey found wide success with Blacks and Blues (1973), her breakout third album for Blue Note, working with the Mizell Brothers (who had recently hooked up with Donald Byrd to produce the trumpeter’s landmark album Black Byrd) to cre…
Basra
By the time drummer Pete La Roca recorded his debut album Basra in 1965 he had already appeared on 9 Blue Note sessions as a sideman and spent time in bands led by Sonny Rollins and John Coltrane. But it was another tenor titan, Joe Henderson, that L…
Takin' Off
On his debut album Takin’ Off—recorded and released in 1962—jazz legend Herbie Hancock arrived fully formed at the helm of an impressive quintet with trumpeter Freddie Hubbard, tenor saxophonist Dexter Gordon, bassist Butch Warren, and drummer Billy …
Inventions & Dimensions
For his third Blue Note album Inventions & Dimensions (1963), pianist Herbie Hancock began moving away from the modernist hard bop sound that defined his first two albums Takin’ Off and My Point Of View. Inspired by explorers like Eric Dolphy and Ton…
Deep Stream
It was way back in 1979 when multi-instrumentalist Dawan Muhammad joined forces with a swathe of talented fellow jazz musicians to record and ultimately release Deep Stream, a private press exploration of spiritual jazz that has long been a must-have…
Universal Silence
What can be said about Don Cherry that hasn’t been said? He was a musical bridge between countless cultures - a titan of the avant-garde and jazz - one of the great, visionary voices of 20th century music for whom there was, and remains, no equivalen…
The Music Finds a Way
In the post World War II era, dozens of young African Americans in South Central Los Angeles found their way to careers in music. In a community facing challenging social conditions and with little to no outside support, they would become artists, su…
Fruits Of Solitude
With a superb septet of improvisers also versed in contemporary music, trumpeter Franz Koglmann presents sophisticated compositions that interject the concept of "solitude" in the three-part title track, alongside Koglmann compositions and Jimmy Giuf…
Lines
The long-running duo since 1987 of spouses, pianist Hildegard Kleeb and trombonist Roland Dahinden, are joined by Swiss-born/ Berlin-based percussionist & vibraphonist Alexandre Babel for an album of interweaving and contrasting instrumental lines, b…
Graz Live 1961
After introducing his new trio with pianist Paul Bley and double bassist Steve Swallow in two 1961 albums on Verve, clarinetist Jimmy Giuffre embarked on a tour of Europe, this recently discovered, well-recorded concert in Graf, Austria the perfect e…
The Song Is You
Drawing on material from Billy Strayhorn, Thelonious Monk, Michel Legrand, Harry Warren, and Victor Young, the lyrical duo of saxophonist Alex Hendriksen (Swiss Jazz Orchestra) and double bassist Fabian Gisler (Jurg Wickihalder European Quartet) cite…
Ways
An essential part of the New York jazz scene since the mid-80s, pianist Russ Lossing's compositions employ concept and space in unique and personal ways, as heard in these 8 original works performed with his trio of long-time collaborators, double ba…
Lotus Crash
Trumpeter Marco von Orelli's piano-less quartet with Tommy Meier on tenor saxophone, bass clarinet, Luca Sisera on double bass, and Sheldon Suter on drums is caught live at Theater am Gleis, in Winterthur, Switzerland in 2018, and at Boudoir au Revoi…
Consequences
Though short-lived, the New York Contemporary Five brought together NY free players Don Moore on bass, J.C. Moses on drums, Archie Shepp on tenor saxophone, and Don Cherry on trumpet with Danish alto saxophonist John Tchicai, in a remastered edition …
Heliocentric Worlds 1 and 2
The two volumes of "Heliocentric Worlds", recorded 7 months apart in 1965, represent perhaps one of greatest chapters in Sun Ra's legacy, bringing together his immense orchestration skills with future-leaning free jazz, allowing his players expanse i…