Back in stock
Continuum
Following three studio albums (Stoa, 2006; Holon, 2008; and Lyria, 2010) plus a double live album (2012) with his electric band Ronin, Swiss pianist and composer Nik Bärtsch now unveils a new release with his original ensemble, Mobile – whose lineup partially overlaps with the current Ronin formation.
Originally formed in 1997, Mobile (here enhanced on three tracks by a string quintet) represents the foundation of Bärtsch's ritualistic approach to music-making. This distinctive style has been sh…
Affirmation
Norwegian bassist Arild Andersen, an ECM musician for more than fifty years, is a masterful player who has always welcomed a challenge. His first recording with his new quartet – including rising stars Marius Neset and Helge Lien (both bandleaders in their own right)– is almost entirely improvised. The players make the leap of faith together and find and develop forms at the moment, an object lesson in spontaneous group creativity. Affirmation was recorded in November 2021 at Oslo’s Rainbow Stud…
Timeless
*2024 stock* John Abercrombie’s ECM debut Timeless (recorded 1974) has proven to be exactly that. This fiery session with Jack DeJohnette and Jan Hammer still sounds as fresh as the year it was released. “Timeless comes as a major surprise in terms of its depth, scope and inventiveness,” wrote Tim Buckley’s guitarist Lee Underwood in the L.A. Free Press. "[It] indicates that John Abercrombie is a major musical voice of tomorrow.”
The Dip
The Dip is Thomas Ankersmit’s sixth album and first for Students of Decay. Composed on the Serge Modular, it blends psychoacoustic intensity with introspective, melodic depth. A cinematic, analog soundscape unfolds in two long pieces—an immersive, spatial, and quietly radical work.
Urban Bushmen
*2024 stock* Urban Bushmen is a live double album by the Art Ensemble of Chicago recorded at the Amerika Haus in Munich over two days in May 1980 and released on ECM in March 1982. The quintet comprises trumpeter Lester Bowie, saxophonists Joseph Jarman and Roscoe Mitchell and rhythm section Malachi Favors Maghostut and Don Moye.
Sacred Hymns
A series of piano transcriptions of some solemn, now-dark, now-affirmative religious hymns by one G.I. Gurdjieff, with none of the usual flourishes and heady flights usually associated with Keith Jarrett's solo records. Jarrett assumes the proper devotional position, playing with a steady tread but always with attention to dynamic extremes, producing a gorgeously rich piano tone with plenty of bass.
What Comes After
2024 stock. What Comes After introduced a new alliance with American bassist Barre Phillips whose freely creative arco playing is often the second lead voice (two of the compositions are also Barre’s). The unorthodox line-up includes contributions from powerhouse bass guitarist Sveinung Hovensjø, an important collaborator throughout the 70s (in the Odyssey band and other ensembles), and from classical oboist Erik Niord Larsen. Rypdal, Phillips and Christensen periodically played completely impro…
Conference of the Birds
*2023 stock* It had been preceded by ECM duo albums with Barre Phillips and with Derek Bailey as well as the cooperative band Circle’s great Paris Concert, but Conference of the Birds, recorded in 1972, was Dave Holland’s first album as a full-fledged leader. An album of driving, progressive jazz it is also of historical significance as the only occasion when Sam Rivers and Anthony Braxton, two of the music’s most strikingly original saxophonists, recorded together. Inside Dave’s compositions th…
A Dark Flaring
A Dark Flaring marks the Signum Quartett’s impressive return to ECM’s New Series after debuting for the label with striking performances on Erkki-Sven Tüür’s acclaimed chamber music recording Lost Prayers (2020). Here, the quartet has put together a unique programme dedicated to six South African composers, born in the 20th century, whose works for string quartet are united by the way they blend respect for the past with an instinct for the future in a wide-flung idiomatic scope. Whether writing…
Tractus
Tractus emphasizes Arvo Pärt compositions that blend the timbres of choir and string orchestra. New versions predominate, with focused performances from the Tallinn Chamber Orchestra and the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir under Tõnu Kaljuste’s direction that invite alert and concentrated listening. From the opening composition Littlemore Tractus, which takes as its starting point consoling reflections from a sermon by John Henry Newman, the idea of change, transfiguration and renewal resona…
Words Unspoken
The album title – Words Unspoken – alludes to the instant musical understanding found by the members of this nimble quartet assembled by great British reedman John Surman. „My idea was to put together some musical ideas that would offer a collective sense of purpose but still be open enough to allow each of us to suggest other ways of developing the material together. Everything fell into place immediately. But I soon realized it wasn‘t so much the musical ideas that made it work, it was the mus…
Angel Song
“Destined to go down in history as a jazz classic” was the verdict with which The Guardian greeted this album on its release in 1997, saying, “Wheeler’s compositions and four of the world’s greatest improvisers make for a tranquil set that rewards with every listening. This is beautiful, golden music.” Angel Song is among the apexes of the label’s catalogue, uniting four master-improvisers – each with a unique artistic identity – in an intimate, drummer-less quartet session. Kenny Wheeler is the…
Arbos
*2024 stock. Deluxe packaging* "This CD features some great performances by Pärt specialists of a variety of shorter works. The clamorous Arbos for brass makes a startling opening for those who expect abstracted reverence; the lament, An den Wassern, has a startling ending that builds in intensity and volume only to break off mid-phrase. The static Pari Intervallo for organ leads into De Profundis, with its sense of slow but unstoppable movement (every note the same length, every measure the sa…
Computer Music Concerto
1988 release ** Excellent documentation of Italian computer music of the 1980's.
Mauro Bagella - Poco prima della notte (1988) realized at the Studio per la Ricerca Elletroacustica Musicale (STREAM) in Rome.Nicola Sani - Tendenze (1987) realized and recorded at the C.P.R.F. of RAI in Rome on 9-12 February, 1987.Serena Tamburini - Per cieli e piani (1986) realized in 1986 at the S.I.M. (Societa Informatica Musicale) in Rome.Giorgio Nottoli - Grid (1985) realized at the S.I.M. in Rome.Francesco Ga…
Punti di ascolto 2005
2005 release ** Documentation of Italian electro-acoustic/computer music of the 2000's.
1. Massimo Carlentini (1966) riversi Mondi diversi (2003)for violin and electronics (11’09”)Diego Conti violinProduction: Edison Studio - Rome
2. Marco Marinoni (1974) WAHN (2005)for piano and electronics (7’24”)Marco Marinoni pianoProduction: composer’s studio.Live electronics project by Davide Tiso
3. Massimo Mariani (1960) Six-o-four (2003)for 8 channel tape and prerecorded voice (stereo version) (9'39")Li…
The Recordings (13 CD Box)
Restocked, reduced price * 13-CD limited edition box set with 300 page booklet * The Recordings, a box set edition compiling all Meredith Monk ECM New Series discs to date, is issued on the occasion of the composer and singer’s 80th birthday. With Dolmen Music in 1981 Meredith became the first singer to be the front person on an ECM recording. Included here are the albums Dolmen Music, Turtle Dreams, Do You Be, Book of Days, Facing North, ATLAS, Volcano Songs, mercy, impermanence, Songs of Ascen…
At The Deer Head Inn
Big Tip! ** One-time pressing, strictly limited edition ** After more than three decades of whispered reverence among jazz cognoscenti, the complete story of Keith Jarrett's transformative return to his musical birthplace can finally be told. At The Deer Head Inn: The Complete Recordings, a sumptuous 4LP box set to be released in August 2025, captures every note from what may be the most emotionally resonant performance in the pianist's extraordinary catalog. On September 16, 1992, something ext…
Sonatas For Viola / Piano And Viola Alone
*2025 stock* Pianist-composer Vijay Iyer follows his 2021 ECM disc Uneasy — the first to showcase his trio featuring bassist Linda May Han Oh and drummer Tyshawn Sorey — with Compassion, another album in league with these two gifted partners. The New York Times captured the special qualities of this group, pointing to the trio’s flair for playing “with a lithe range of motion and resplendent clarity… while stoking a kind of writhing internal tension. Crucial to that balance is their ability to c…
Voices Of The Dead
2006 release ** Limited to 250 handnumbered copies with a booklet containing an article about EVP and is packed in a special cardboard sleeve. "Dedicated to the electronic voice phenomenon (EVP). Voices Of The Dead" is based on audio and video recordings made during Noises Of Russia concert on 17.05.2005 in "DOM" cultural center, Moscow. The short version of the film was shown as part of Masha Godovannaya's program "Tired Snow III" at the festivals "Autumn #2" (14.10.2005, Modern Art Center, St.…
2partiMOLLItremolanti
2003 release ** In textured card envelope. 2partiMOLLItremolanti is a duo with Xabier Iriondo (guitars, tapes, live electronics) and Marco Tagliola (Pc, tapes). This project was born with the idea to compose and elaborate different kind of music source (concrete music, rock, electronics, italian melodies) inside a performance/composition. 2partiMOLLItremolanti like receivers of every sounds which encircle and stimulate us, like vehicle of interpretation of the present sounds in our daily life.