Jazz /
Nuclear Family
2016 release. Multi-instrumental master Joe McPheeand his longtime colleague, French saxophonist and clarinetist André Jaume, joined forces for this studio recording in 1979 that was prepared but never released. It is primarily structured around pairs of tunes by Charles Mingus, Thelonious Monk, and Duke Ellington (or Billy Strayhorn), adding Ornette Coleman's "Lonely Woman" for good measure. The results are stunningly intimate and show the twosome's capacity for creative interplay at a fairly e…
Alone Together
2015 release. A reissue of arguably the rarest LP of European free jazz, Axiom, recorded in 1963 for the Swedish label Sonet. Test pressings were released to the musicians, but they were not approved and the label never printed more than the two first copies. Tom Prehn's music, which is exclusively known from a 1967 release that was reissued on the Unheard Music Series, is not only impossibly uncommon, it is also exceptionally wonderful, featuring an extended tenor saxophone solo by Frits Krogh …
Tips
2015 release. A reissue of Steve Lacy and Steve Potts's Tips, originally released on Hat Hut Records in 1981. Soprano saxophonist Lacy wrote the suite of tunes for Tips to feature the aphorisms of painter Georges Braque, as sung by Irene Aebi. Together with his right-hand-man, alto saxophonist Potts, he and Aebi recorded these 14 anthemic tracks in Paris in 1979, and the young hat Hut Records label issued them on a now-rare LP. The music allowed Lacy to extend and deepen his longstanding interes…
Mother Ode
2014 release. In July 2013, a few months after the passing of his mother, cornetist Rob Mazurekperformed solo at the Corbett Vs. Dempsey gallery in Chicago. Mazurek is one of the highest profile figures in contemporary creative music, leading bands like the Exploding Star Orchestra, Skull Sessions Octet, and Starlicker. On this occasion, he brought a box filled with various implements -- his cornet, naturally, but flutes, bells, books, maracas, apples, and little electronics. This box became an …
The Loneliest Woman
2012 release. In 1981, Joe McPhee culled together one of his greatest bands to record Topology (1981), his classic outing for Hat Hut Records. Featuring an expanded version of Po Music, his ensemble with saxophonist André Jaume, guitarist Raymond Boni, and bassist François Mechali, the group included pianist Irene Schweizer, percussionist Pierre Favre, baritone saxophonist Daniel Bourquin, cellist Michael Overhage, and trombonist Radu Malfatti. One of the tracks left on the cutting room floor wa…
Variations On A Blue Line / 'Round Midnight
2012 release. A reissue of Joe McPhee's Variations On A Blue Line / 'Round Midnight, originally released on Hat Hut Records in 1979. Variations On A Blue Line / 'Round Midnight was recorded in October, 1977, during a highly significant period in Poughkeespie, New York, multi-instrumentalist Joe McPhee's work, as he was pioneering the transatlantic, collaborative spirit that has helped to define the last three decades of his career. Blue Line comes from a concert in Rouen, France, when McPhee pla…
Cut Air
Jim Denley has been playing flute since 1969 - after 50 years of a curious love/hate relationship with the instrument this is his first solo flute-only recording. He aims to situate this music within a global outlook, with a pacific perspective. Being from a continent, Australia, where there is no flute tradition, he’s taken cues and elements from flute traditions that still have power and currency — the European flute with it’s purity, brilliance and dexterity, the earthy simplicity of bamboos …
Refraction
I first met Mark sometime in the early 90’s when we were both working in Chelmsford. He was running Soundworld Records above the musical instrument shop of the same name, I was over the other side of town in an insurance brokers. I’d played quite a bit of free improvisation at that point, mostly at the old LMC in a quartet called Make Shift together with Peter Urpeth, Stuart Wilding and long-time colleague and playing partner Geoff Collins. But had been away from it for a few years and wa…
Prophecy
ESP-Disk present a reissue of Albert Ayler's Prophecy, originally released in 1975. Recorded in concert at the Cellar Cafe, NYC, June 14, 1964. Three weeks before this trio recorded ESP-Disk's first jazz album, the epochal Spiritual Unity (ESPDISK 1002CD/LP), it was captured "live" by Canadian poet Paul Haines, who also recorded the New York Eye and Ear Control soundtrack (ESPDISK 1016CD/LP). This is one of the most influential groups in jazz history, a coming together of like-minded innovators …
The Conscience
Paul Rutherford's been making amazing sounds on trombone for decades – and he still sounds incredible here on this late 90s performance in Japan – a set that has the trombonist working with percussionist Sabu Toyozumi – but at a level that really seems to let Paul take the lead on most numbers! The set begins in a slightly tentative way – with Rutherford maybe going for some more familiar modes of expression, but quickly opening up as Toyozumi fills in the spaces between the notes – always in wa…
Veskunoita
Actor/singer/flautist Vesa-Matti Loiri's third album 'Veskunoita' (1973) delves deeper into the kind of vocal jazz-pop which he mastered on his second record, 'Vesku Suomesta', but with a more light-hearted approach. During the recordings Loiri was joined by a host of well known Finnish jazz and rock musicians. This is the first ever reissue of this title of which original copies are almost impossible to find.
Jazz am Rhein 1967-1968
It was the summer of love in 1967, and more than 12 000 people found their way into the Rheinpark in Cologne – situated opposite the majestic cathedral and right at the bank of the Rhine river – for the first German open air jazz festival. Featured on those two sunny days in September were three big bands – including ace musicians like Jiggs Whigham, Dusko Gojkovic, Manfred Schoof and Volker Kriegel – and the Kenny Clarke - Francy Boland Sextet. When the festival was revived the following year, …
Kami Fusen
Itaru Oki – trumpet, bamboo fluteNobuyoshi Ino - bassChoi Sun Bae - trumpet
Port of Call
Port of Call is a studio-recorded duet by Klaus Treuheit and Lou Grassi. The latter is an American drummer who runs the gamut of ragtime (Max Morath) to no time (Gunter Hampel, Burton Greene). Treuheit is a German pianist who studied under Herbie Hancock and modern classical composer George Crumb. Mostly co-composed, this Port takes in the elemental blues, as on “Mysterioso IV”. This series of duos has a somewhat free-ish conversational cast, especially in “L’Space Sonore”, while “Lament #PB III…
A Wing Dissolved in Light
Peter Evans - piccolo trumpetJohn Butcher - tenor and soprano saxophonesFrédéric Blondy - pianoClayton Thomas - double bassPaul Lovens - selected and unselected drums and cymbals
Live From The Magic City (Birmingham, Alabama)
Joe McPhee and Raymond Boni at Hulsey Recital Hall on the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) campus on April 20, 1985. Joe McPhee - soprano saxophone, electronics and voice; Raymond Boni - electric guitar and electronics. The complete was concert inspired by the words of Eric Dolphy: "When you hear music, After it's over, It's gone, In the air, You can never capture it again."
Bricktop
Joe McPhee and Ingebrigt Haker Flaten at the Sugar Maple/Okka Fest on Saturday, June 6th, 2015. Joe McPhee - tenor and soprano saxophone. Ingebrigt Haker Flaten - double bass. Recorded live by Dave Zuchowski. Mastered by Martin Siewert in July/August 2016.
Blue City (Live At Blue City Osaka / Japan 16. October 1997)
Following the death of German trombonist Johannes Bauer in May 2016, Peter Brötzmann decided to pay tribute to the many years of comradery and collaboration he and Bauer shared, from Globe Unity in the '70s to the Peter Brötzmann Group and the Chicago Tentet. This disc presents a previously unreleased recording of a beautiful live duo performance from Osaka, 1997, which had been waiting in Brötzmann's archives for a release. Peter Brötzmann: tenor and alto saxophones, tárogató, B-flat clarinet; …
Threnody, At The Gates
Johan Berthling: double bass; Martin Küchen: tenor and soprano saxophones, retardophone, flute; Steve Noble: drums and percussion. Recorded by David Carlsson at Gula Studion, Malmö, Sweden, November 1, 2015. Mixed by David Carlsson. Mastered by Martin Siewert. Cover photo by Donald Boström.
Hidros6
"A significant part of the success is down to the amazing tour de force by Norwegian experimental vocalist Stine Janvind Motland who brings an affecting mix of vulnerability, sexuality and sheer prowess to the party. Gustafsson selected a line from each of 20 favorite Little Richard songs to serve as the basic text for Motland to embroider. Via a graphic score Mats Gustafsson also ensures ample solo space for his illustrious cast, as well as composed sections peppered throughout the performance.…