Jazz /
Ist Gefallen In Den Schnee
Magnus Granberg, piano. Angharad Davies, violin. Leo Svensson Sander, cello. Erik Carlsson, percussion. John Eriksson, vibraphone & crotales. Petter Wstberg, electronics. Henrik Olsson, bowls and glasses. Anna Lindal, violin. Toshimaru Nakamura, no input mixing board.
“Ist gefallen in den Schnee is a single, hour long composition scored by Magnus Granberg and performed by the group Skogen, which on this occasion consisted of nine musicians, seven of them Swedish and two of them (Toshi…
Thread
'We all met in Berlin at different times. Anthea and I had been playing as a duo since about 2006. Anthea also developed a performance/installation project with Annette I think around 2008. About a year later, I organised a house concert and we decided to play as a trio, which seemed very organic and easy immediately. We recorded parts of the album shortly after that. [] There was not much editing involved in either of the recordings, just minor changes. As for the general style - we act…
Zero Plus Zero
'Lucio Capece (soprano saxophone, bass clarinet, sruti box, double plugged equalizer, ring modulator, sine waves). Recorded at Berlin between 2009 and 2011. Zero Plus Zero can be described as a suite consisting of six structured pieces, where Lucio Capece expresses his huge creativity by exploring the possibilities of his main instruments - soprano saxophone and bass clarinet with preparations - as some others such as struti box and various electronic devices. Lucio Capece keeps on worki…
Roots Run Deep
Nicolas Humbert and his co-author Marc Parisotto decided to make a further montage of the readings and songs for the album "Roots Run Deep". There are short stories and poems set to music, beautifully interwoven with the music Yusef Lateef had played during the shooting of the film "Brother Yusef". "I return as in a dream of a great American musician" says the old man in a great passage about Lester Young, as sounds and words melt into one song, drawing us closer to the aura of a great ja…
Spontaneous Suite For Two Pianos
A 4-CD box set of 9 "Spontaneous Sweets", elaborate, magnificent and melodic piano improvisations, recorded by Connie Crothers & David Arner performing in the Richard B. Fisher Center for the Performing Arts, NY. "It was magical from the beginning. The music seemed to create itself" "We trusted our spontaneity, our intuitive logic, our sense of form." "We had no set tempos, no preconception about soloing or accompanying." "We had no set themes or referents. What we did have was complete trust, i…
Luz Azul
Ah now, this is a lovely little CD. The group i treni inerti began life a decade or so ago now as the trio of Ruth Barberan, Alfredo Costa Monteiro and Matt Davis, and when their first album came out as one of the very first Creative Sources releases however long ago Brian Olewnick wrote what to this day remains one of my favourite opening lines to a review- something like “Yeah I can hear you sigh, yet another trumpet/trumpet/accordion trio…” In 2012, as David has long left Barcelona the group …
Scope
The disc is a recent release on the Monotype label by a group named LHZ+H, who are the semi regular trio of Thomas Lehn, (analogue synth) Carl Ludwig Hübsch (tuba) and Philip Zoubek (piano) augmented on this 2008 occasion by the trumpeter Franz Hautzinger, who on this occasion added a delay pedal to his instrument. The release contains four improvised tracks, and is named Scope. Now, I have been known to describe some improvised music as brooding a good few times before, perhaps trying to …
Flame Thrower
Rob Mazurek (cornet), Chad Taylor (drums), Noel Kupersmith (bass) & Jeff Parker (guitar) are 4 of the busiest members of Chicago's creative music scene, from Tortoise to Brokeback to Sam Prekop's band to Isotope 217 to the Chicago Underground Duo to Fred Anderson's Velvet Lounge. As the 'Trio' their unique sound balances free jazz w/electronica & tuneful post-bop compositions. Recorded & mixed by Bundy K. Brown. RECOMMENDED
Chronicle
Rob Mazurek & Chad Taylor have been part of the heart & soul of the Chicago Underground groups for over a decade. Bassist Jason Ajemian makes his debut bringing a wide range of musical influences to the table. "...the trio's music is never frenetic: it is lapidary in its precision. W/ painterly splashes of organ & electronics, it casts a nocturnal spectral glow." NY Times
Synesthesia
3rd release from duo of Rob Mazurek (ISOTOPE 217)+Chad Taylor (SAM PREKOP BAND) is a stark departure from the sound cultivated on their last LP. Utilizing electronics, found sounds, moog & studio manipulations they have made not just a jazz record but one that defies categorization in any particular genre. With assistance of studio engineer JOHN McENTIRE they overdubbed, dissected & reassembled a selection of recorded & found sounds making a record that is not only very listenable but is …
Baro 101
Collaborations like this one are a dime a dozen in the world of free improv / free jazz, but few have the delightful energy of Baro 101, an impromptu session in a hotel room by Norwegian drummer extraordinaire Paal Nilssen-Love, Swedish sax legend Mats Gustafsson and Ethiopian krar virtuoso Mesele Asmamaw. Nilssen-Love and Gustafsson were in Addis Ababa with Dutch post-rock-turned-avant-garde outfit The Ex, and were so enamoured with the sounds they encountered in the East African country that t…
the Faruq box
A special 26 only copies box, with an extra LP: the tenor sax of Faruq Z Bey sounds really wonderful here – blown soulfully and openly, with a depth that draws on all of Bey's many years in jazz, yet never falls into any sort of easy, overdone modes! Instead, there's a vitality here that reminds us of sounds that Charles Gayle or Arthur Doyle were giving us over a decade ago – nicely unstructured in the setting of this loose quartet, yet still focused with a sense of soul that's undeniable! The …
West Africa Tour (Sierra Leone, Liberia & Guinea), April 1985
special box in 26 copies, made in high quality leather various African objects/artworks from various African tribes, stunning booklet with many rare photos (30) of the Tour (mostly color and b&w) cola nuts (to break the colanut with somebody african saying, which means to make friendship) an extra one-sided LP (I side) on gold and gold/green wax, - ALL recordings available here for the 1st time! "One of music's most amazing powers is its ability to tell a story. In the case of The African Tapes,…
Outside darkness
Michel Henritzi, lapsteel, guitar, effects. Fukuoka Rinji, violin, bells, effects, vocals. A stark and moving collaboration between the French avant-garde guitarist Michel Henritzi and Fukuoka Rinji, formerly of Overhang Party and currently of Majutsu no Niwa. The track titles of their first duo album limn a cosmos out of joint, hopeless and despairing - suns in eclipse, falling angels, the ghosts of Fukushima. The mood is emphasized in the bleak, dystopian photography of the jacket with …
Velvet Songs (To Baba Fred Anderson)
"This 2 cd set recorded live at the Velvet Lounge a year before the legendary Fred Anderson passed away, is a fitting tribute by 3 Chicagoans to one of their own, the master tenor player, teacher, Velvet Lounge owner, advocate and AACM member, who has helped foster the musical scene in that city possibly more than anyone else. This artistic outing is a pilgrimage in sound taking us into the deepest recesses of this eclectic medium known as "jazz". These pieces conceived/composed by the 3 …
Numbers
A beautiful set of compositions from saxophonist Roscoe Mitchell, presenting works recorded in the 2000s with performers including Thomas Buckner, Stephen Rush, Nils Bultman, William Winant, &c - "In the 45 years since he recorded Sound, Roscoe Mitchell's music has steadily evolved and diversified, making the idea of a comprehensive one-disc survey an impossibility. However, as much as any album, the both/and nature of Roscoe Mitchell's music is vividly represented on Numbers." -Bill Shoemaker, …
Reception
The Sons of God: 32 amplified iron plates. Mats Gustafsson: live electronics. Recorded by Olof Madsen on the 5th of March 2006 at Frgfabriken, Stockholm, Sweden. Reception was a sound installation at Frgfabriken (February 18 - March 5, 2006). by the Sons of God and Emanuel Swedenborg and a part of the festival Place and Space, Stockholm New Music. The festival was curated by Magnus Haglund and Magnus Andersson. During the installation period, the following guest-artists were invited for performa…
Mucho Acustica
Piero Bittolo Bon is one of Italian Jazz’s youngest and most acclaimed rising stars. A mostly self-taught player, he mainly plays alto but is also at ease on baritone, bass clarinet, contralto, clarinet and flute. Passionate and vibrant, his music reverberates with echoes of the best of free jazz, “fire music”, torrid improvisations, sharp attacks and continuous inventions bar after bar. Member of El Gallo Rojo collective, he collaborated with some of the best italian creative musicians (…
The Count Visits
"Recorded at Brooklyn's Issue Project Room, this live burble features Flower on Japan Banjo, Corsano on tubs and Heyner (or Bobby McGee or Count 'fucking' Chocula or whatever he's calling himself here) doubling on bass (three tracks) and tubs (one track). Corsano's in his ferocious carpet bomb mode, laying down a thick lumpy rug of imaginary bubble wrap for the others to prance upon, and prance they do. Flower's doing a kind of China Pig upward spiraling wail on his axe, and Heyner (I mea…
The Magic Of Ju-Ju
Gatefold 180 gram reissue of tenor saxophonist Archie Shepp's 1967 "tour de force." "...combining free jazz tenor with steady frenetic African drumming. Shepp's emotional and fiery tenor takes off immediately, gradually morphing with the five percussionists -- Beaver Harris, Norman Connor, Ed Blackwell, Frank Charles, and Dennis Charles -- who perform on instruments including rhythm logs and talking drums. Shepp never loses the initial energy, moving forward like a man possessed as the dr…