Jazz /
To March Is To Love
If cellist/composer Janel Leppin’s wonderful and widely celebrated 2022 solo debut album Ensemble Volcanic Ash was a creative eruption, her follow up To March Is to Love is a glowing magma flow that greatly expands her singular band’s sonic terrain. The project thrums with immediacy as Leppin and her all-star sextet honor their musical ancestors and reflect on disquieting times. Bandcamp Daily declared “There’s no end to the melodic intensity of Ensemble Volcanic Ash. Even at its lushest and mo…
Frice
Before Don Cherry appeared in Ornette Coleman's quartet, the band's trumpeter was Bobby Bradford. Responsibility for his family dissuaded him from his career as a nomadic musician. It's a well-known story, but it's hard not to wonder "what would have happened if Bradford had stayed in New York and continued to create with Coleman?" This thought is even more intriguing when we learn that the marriage, which dominated the development of the young musician, broke up in 1970.I like to think that if …
Ephemeral Shapes
We have a special relationship with Ivo Perelman, so when his latest trio with Cuban-born and hugely respected pianist Aruan Ortiz and Spanish-born but French-based friend of our label Ramon Lopez finally came about, we felt that their first studio meeting had to be in our catalog. Their first album, Ephemeral Shapes, was recorded in Catalonia's Rosazul studio under the delectable ear of Ferran Conangla himself. We are all the more pleased that the band has entered the roster of the famous Akamu…
Ecstasy
One of the most brilliant contemporary improvisers playing the recorder, Dominik Strycharski is not the first time he has appeared on recordings in our catalog. An album featuring him came out nearly a decade ago, Myriad Duo, recorded with bass guitar virtuoso Rafal Mazur, sometime later a solo recital Flauto Dolphy, dedicated to the music of the great Eric Dolphy. And then October Suite, a disc documenting the anniversary concert of the RGG formation, during which Dominik was a special guest al…
Ephemeral Locations
Udo Schindler is truly a man of many talents. He was a rock musician, an educated architect, a pretty well-educated instrumentalist, and a virtuoso playing clarinets, saxophones and flutes. His extensive activity in the field of art includes composition, improvisation and live performance, and in each of these areas Udo Schindler has gained a reputation as a deep-thinking explorer and expert. This resulted in collaborations with musicians such as Hubert Bergmann, Gerry Hemingway, Eddie Prévost, …
Plays The Music Of Derek Bailey & Thelonious Monk
The Derek Bailey transcription were performed at the Holywell music room in October 2005 as part of a concert organised by Fran Ryan, who wanted to hear me playpiano in a more composed setting. I agreed to play music based on Derek Bailey’s early recordings and brilliantly transcribed by Chris Burn, which he had sent me, I was inter-ested in the challenge and the obvious contradiction of performing free improvisationsas compostions, especially Derek’s, knowing his view on the use of transcriptio…
Radiance
“Radiance” is the first album of solo piano improvisations from Keith Jarrett in a decade. The last such was “La Scala”, recorded 1995, released 1997. (In between, in 1999, Jarrett issued the home recording “The Melody At Night With You”, a solo album of standards and folk songs). Four years ago, Jarrett told interviewers it was unlikely he would return to solo piano performance. Having been sidelined for several seasons by illness, he had attempted two solo concerts in Japan in the autumn of 19…
Dimensions Of The Drums
This album was inspired by the music coming out of Jamaica in the mid 1970s, in particular the use of drum machines by Lee Perry and Aston Family Man Barrett (and Sly Stone in the USA) but also the instrumentals and dubs by Keith Hudson and Im & Count Ossie etc. Searching out, buying and listening to those records had a deep and profound effect on me and became a big influence on me as a musician, which continues to this day.
Variety Orchestra
Followers of our Quarterly will recall, about 6 years back, Woodbury's inspired arrangement of 'Shenandoah', which managed to embrace the whole of America history in under 10 minutes. Since then he has been working on completing this collection, his first full ensemble instrumental CD. The interest starts with the ensemble itself, half as expected for Latin, Jazz and Big band arrangements and half traditional American: pedal steel, banjo, accordion and fiddles. One thinks of Van Dyke Parks', and…
Subtle Movements
"In the spirit of expansive expression; deep connection to the Sea as it furthers the Sound. The rumination of consideration put forth thru a profound triumvirate of Beings, Fathers, Sons, Family Members, Loved Ones. The Most Powerful Movements of Love are Subtle. They are sublime. They are felt before and after any note is played by the three of us. We are supportive of each other as people, in the true spirit of a Trio. Equilateral in the degrees of consideration towards each portion of our h…
This Celestial Engine
This Celestial Engine, an exciting new project that fuses the talents of three remarkable musicians from diverse musical backgrounds, announce the release of their debut album in January 2024. Featuring the extraordinary lineup of drummer Ted Parsons (Swans, Prong, Godflesh, Killing Joke, Jesu), bassist Dave Sturt (Gong, Steve Hillage Band, Bill Nelson), and keyboardist Roy Powell (InterStatic, Anthony Braxton, Mumpbeak with Bill Laswell), the album delivers a unique blend of experimental ambien…
Geologic Time
The Jazz Times has described Barrett’s style as “diced bits of Derek Bailey skronk” infused with “Delta blues twang,” and the Free Music Collective has lauded his playing as “singularly rhythmically genius.” In 2019, his first album, Cowboy Transfiguration—featuring Joe Morris on guitar and MacArthur Fellow Tyshawn Sorey on percussion—garnered critical acclaim for its distinctive sonic landscapes and virtuosity. Last few years Brad performed with jazz luminaries such as Jason Moran, Sheila Jorda…
No Better Than Butcher Bird
"All lovers of free improvised music know them well saxophonist Paul Dunmall one of the fathers of the British free impro scene, Tobias Delius one of the Old Continent's most respected saxophonists and clarinetists and the marvelous rhythm section of Olie Brice double bass and Mark Sanders. Such four seasoned artists together in a recording studio guarantee great things will happen." - Fundacja Słuchaj
Flight Mode (Live In Berlin 2023)
"Legendary saxophonist and improviser Harri Sjostrom knows how to build bands. This has certainly been the case since the Lifting The Bandstand album, but back then the great Cecil Taylor was the leader. This is certainly one of the many lessons Harri Sjostrom has learned from the brilliant pianist and leader. He has since given evidence of this an endless number of times. The latest band he has established is a quartet with Elisabeth Harnik, arguably one of the most important pianists in improv…
In The Light Of The Current Myth
"The time in Porto when Barry Guy and The Blue Shroud Band recorded an album all this here would also be a time when a group of outstanding artists and warm friends also had the opportunity to spend time making music together outside the big band formula. It's not easy to bring together some of Europe's most original artists, and it's not easy to assemble such a stellar quintet with Savina Yannatou, Julius Gabriel, Agusti Fernendez, Barry Guy and Ramon Lopez. It's a great thing to be able to doc…
Live In St. Johann
"The legend of the world of improvisation and the field of double bass virtuosity, Joelle Leandre, needs no introduction. She is one of the most expressive and original artists in the world! The singer and composer Elisabeth Harnik is probably already remembered by music lovers enough to follow her musical journey with bated breath, and Zlatko Kaucic, well, if you are in love with percussion painting, sensitivity, and expression combined with communication skills, this is one of the best address…
Seasons
Organic, electric, freeform. Pete Jolly's Seasons is comprised of melodies and textures composed live and without pretense—its grooves contain a complete and divine listening experience that surpasses all others of the era in which it was originally released, coming as close to transcendent musical meditation incarnate as one could possibly imagine. Seasons is an unsung masterpiece of ensemble groove and stellar musicianship, equally unsurpassed and inspired in its quiet excellence.
Conflagration
*Comes in a CD-sized papersleeve album replica (gatefold), with obi-strip and insert of notes mostly in Japanese..2024 stock* Second album by The Trio, formed by J. Thurman, B. Phillips and S. Martin. The Trio's second album was recorded with a 15-strong line-up, including Alan Skidmore and John Taylor, who were at the forefront of British jazz at the time, as well as Chick Corea. The sharply incisive electric piano, John Marshall's rock-inspired rhythms and the way the group improvised together…
The Trio
*Comes in a CD-sized papersleeve album replica (gatefold), with obi-strip and insert of notes mostly in Japanese..2024 stock* The ‘70, two-CD debut of The Trio, formed by John Thurman, who was taking European jazz by storm with his baritone saxophone playing with incredible speed and power, with Barre Phillips (b) and Stu Martin (ds). ' A great classic album that symbolises the British scene, which was undergoing a remarkable evolution in the early 70s as it united with rock, with a musicality t…
Black Hole Quartet
*2024 stock* Daniele Cavallanti (sax) and Tiziano Tononi (drums), famous names in Italian jazz, in an unprecedented electro-acoustic quartet with two of the best names on the new scene, Michelangelo Flammia (electric bass) and Walter Donatiello (electric guitar). Music that combines Coltrane's jazz with the rock of Robert Fripp and Bill Bruford's King Crimson.