Jazz /
Music Frees Our Souls Vol. 2
*2024 stock* Can music liberate us? Francisco Mela, who worked and partnered with the legendary jazz musician McCoy Tyner, believes so. On this album, the second volume of Music Frees Our Souls, Mela collaborates with pianist Cooper-Moore and bassist William Parker to build a 2-part extended track project of advanced dialogue between 3 of the genre's most important instruments. Tyner was well-known for his boundless musical talent, and perhaps best-known for playing in John Coltrane’s quartet, w…
Morning Prayer
*2024 stock* Chico Freeman wrote all the originals and arranged it for the septet. The music is an excellent documentation of what was going on in Chicago during the avant-garde period. The tunes and performances make challenging and rewarding listening. It is now thirty three years since this important, pioneering recording was made and it a testament to it's value that the music has matured so well and to this day remains vital, challenging and fresh. Chico Freeman - tenor & soprano saxophone,…
Bolivia
*2024 stock* "Ultimately, Bolivia is a sensual, musically adept, and groundbreaking recording, which offered Barbieri a chance to come in from the avant-garde before heading back to the fringes with the Latin America series. A fine effort that is finally getting the notoriety it deserves." - AllMusic
Teatro Amadeo Roldan Recital
For the third release in our Mr Bongo Cuban Classics series, we reissue the iconic 1974 debut album by the mighty Grupo Irakere. Led by Chucho Valdés, son of Cuban pianist and bandleader Bebo Valdés, the band would go on to become of the most influential and successful groups emanating from Cuba in this period. Their debut ‘Teatro Amadeo Roldan Recital’ is an in-demand and incredible Afro-Cuban, jazz-funk masterpiece originally landing on Cuba’s state-owned imprint, Areito. One of the jewels of …
Grupo Irakere
For the second instalment in our Cuban Classics series, we proudly present this sought-after slice of sublime Afro-Cuban jazz from 1976. It comes courtesy of one of Cuba’s most influential acts, Grupo Irakere. Founded in 1973 by Chucho Valdés (son of the Cuban pianist and bandleader Bebo Valdés) the group was home to many of Cuba’s finest musicians over the years. With an electrifying style and sound, they mixed traditional Cuban music with jazz, funk, and rock. This self-titled album includes t…
We Insist! Max Roach's Freedom Now Suite
One of the major statements in the history of Jazz and African American liberation movements. Originally released in 1960 on Candid Records, Max Roach’s Freedom Now Suite consists of five original compositions and performances staging and celebrating different moments and aspects of the African American history and culture. Here is a wonderful cast of musicians reunited around Max Roach – drums and Abbey Lincoln – vocals. Throughout the album you can find great contributions from the likes of Bo…
Japanese Jazz Spectacle Vol.II
Tip! "It is my great pleasure to introduce you to the second volume of the "Japanese Jazz Spectacle" series. Following the first compilation which focused on recordings from the Nippon Columbia catalog, this time we are digging into the King Records archives. It is almost impossible to capture the whole picture of Wa-Jazz in a couple of compilation albums since it is such a broad and deep genre, however, by extracting tracks from the Nippon Columbia and King Records collections - both labels hav…
Latino Con Cal Tjader
Vibraphonist Cal Tjader is heard leading five different groups throughout this set, but the identities of the flutists, bassists, and pianists are less important than knowing that Tjader, Willie Bobo (on drums and timbales), and the great conga player Mongo Santamaria are on every selection. The music really cooks, with torrid percussion, inspired ensembles, and occasional solos from the sidemen (which sometimes include pianists Lonnie Hewitt or Vince Guaraldi, bassist Al McKibbon, and flutist P…
Denga
Often affectionately referred to as the "Godfather of British Latin music" Robin Jones was truly one of the great performers on the international Latin scene. Denga, his first recording from 1971 is a scintillating fusion of Afro-Cuban and Afro-Brazillian rhythms laden with heavy Fender Rhodes sounds and no less than three Afro-Latin Percussionists. The hard-to-find album has now been reissued by legendary London jazz DJ Paul Murphy's Jazz Room Records imprint. It should be an essential purchase…
Prayer For Peace
Prayer for Peace is the first recording by violinist Billy Bang´s regular working quintet of the past five or so years. Featured with Bang are trumpeter James Zollar, pianist Andrew Bemkey, bassist Todd Nicholson and drummer Newman Taylor-Baker. Billy Bang has long been recognized as a true master on his chosen instrument and as one of the undisputed leaders of his generation of improvising musicians. This recording again demonstrates the reasons for this presenting Bang at his strongest both as…
Japanese Jazz Spectacle Vol.I
Tip! “Japanese jazz has been recognized and celebrated by music lovers worldwide for decades. The origins of this trend may be traced back to the rare groove movement that flourished in the 1990s, but its current deep and wide popularity seems to be connected to the fact that Japanese people have been reevaluating their own jazz since the mid-2000s, locally referred to as WaJazz ("Wa" meaning Japan but also the Shōwa emperor period, from 1926 to 1989). Since the beginning of the 2000s, there has…
Flute, Brass, Vibes And Percussion
In 1959, flutist Herbie Mann put together a very interesting band that was in its brief existence (before Mann's interests shifted elsewhere) one of the top in Afro-Cuban jazz. Utilizing four trumpets (including Doc Cheatham), up to three percussionists and a flute-vibes-bass-drums quartet, Mann performs four standards (including "Dearly Beloved," "I'll Remember April" and "Autumn Leaves") and two originals in a style that was beyond bop and much more African- and Cuban-oriented.
African Suite
Impressive session led jointly by Herbie Mann and John Rae. On side A, the group incessantly shifts from soft vibes-and-flute jazz to percussion-heavy Afro-Cuban rhythms to classic "Blue-Note" hard bop. Side B is the African Suite, a percussive trip across the Sahara.
Le - Le
Recorded in the 1980's and snapped up upon arrival in Europe by the Soho Boho's, Acid Jazzuals, Cuboppers, Jazz Massivists and Mojo Jazzmuziker, "Le-Le" by The Arpeggio Jazz Ensemble is a unique one off spiritual soul-jazz outing with avant garde touches and more than a hint of afro-cuban orientalism.The percussion drenched title track has that special worldwide sound and the cool jazz get down groove of "Wet Walnuts and Whipped Cream" is a DJ's delight, whether played over the airwaves or to a …
Into a New Journey
Unearthed by The Mighty Zaf for BBE Music, Into A New Journey by Ambiance is an impossibly rare and sought-after private label spiritual jazz masterpiece from 1982 with Latin, Brazilian and Afro overtones. Ambiance was the ‘nom de guerre’ of an ever-shifting jazz collective headed up by Nigeria-born, LA-tutored multi- instrumentalist, arranger, producer and photographer Daoud Abubakar Balewa.
Balewa studied composition and jazz improvisation at the feet of innovators such as Frank Mitchell (Art …
Live at Haight Levels Vol.2
The second instalment from Tramp of unearthed, long-lost recordings made in San Francisco during 1967 by the Afro-Blue Persuasion - led by jazz / funk mastermind Ulysses Crockett - Live at Haight Levels Vol. 2 captures the heights of afro-cuban jazz at its very best. Issued in a highly limited pressing of 500 copies, with the first volume already commanding high numbers on the secondary market, this one is bound to fly.
Black Is The Color: Live in Poughkeepsie and New Windsor 1969-70
Never-before-issued music from three very different settings in upstate New York, all recorded in the period running up to Poughkeepsie multi-instrumentalist Joe McPhee's Nation Time (CVSD 054CD). From a year before that landmark LP, in the same hall at Vassar College, McPhee led a band with soulful vibraphonist Ernie Bostic and voluble rhythm section of Tyrone Crabb and Bruce Thompson, both of Nation Time fame, performing a John Coltrane-oriented set that included versions of Mongo Santamaria's…
African Rhythms 1970-1982
**Feature a 12” sized 4pp booklet featuring rare photos and a comprehensive interview with Plunky Branch within liner notes by Chris Menist** Strut present a comprehensive 3LP compilation of the seminal Oneness Of Juju, led by Plunky J. Branch. Tracing their career from the band’s earliest work in 1970 with South African exiled jazzman Ndikho Xaba in San Francisco, the compilation covers the band’s journey to New York’s loft jazz scene, forming Juju and releasing two landmark albums of hard-hitt…
Orgy In Rhythm - Volume One
It is interesting how the Jazz sounds of the 1950s and early 1960s influenced later psychedelic bands and if you dig yourself through to the most influentual records of that mind expanding extraordinary wing of jazz music you will hit Art Blakey and this album directly with your nose. The title says it all and what you get to listen to here will surely take you away from the cold and grey reality and drag you onto a trip to the center of your galaxy. It starts with a haunting passage that shows …
Bossa Nova Carnival
Here's another beautiful example of the great impact of Brazilian music on American Jazz in the '60s. Vibraphonist Dave Pike, mostly known for his work with the likes of Herbie Mann, Bill Evans, and Paul Bley, displays a marvelous sextet performing music of Brazilian composer João Donato. Recorded and released in 1962 on the New jazz Label, and considered as one of Pike's essential albums, "Bossa Nova Carnival" sounds like a perfect combination of Brazilian sensuous flavor and Jazz-swing sensibi…