Jazz & Improvisation / Contemporary

** Carefully remastered. 4 page booklet with rare and unpublished photos.** Paris, May 13th 1968. There was a general strike. One last plane left the runway, strewn with flaming oil drums. On board were three jazz musicians wondering whether they would be able to return home one day. But for the time being they really want to make it to Madagascar where concerts and workshops with young local musicians were waiting for them. Pianist and bandleader Jef Gilson was accompanied by his bassist Gilber…

SML is the quintet of bassist Anna Butterss, synthesist Jeremiah Chiu, saxophonist Josh Johnson, percussionist Booker Stardrum, and guitarist Gregory Uhlmann. Their debut album 'Small Medium Large' began as a collection of long form improvisations recorded during two separate two-night stands at beloved Highland Park, Los Angeles venue ETA. Unfortunately, this major development site for the burgeoning new West Coast jazz & improvised music sound closed its doors permanently at the end of 2023. T…

“Urs Graf Consort, a collective with a corrupted genealogy, produce trail-blazing simulacra - songs nested within themselves, with the experimental accents of Ursonate. A protean duo operates under the name of Swiss engraver Urs Graf (1485 - c. 1529); Prune Bécheau and Adrien Bardi-Bienenstock are composers and performers for ensembles that are as varied as the motley company brought together in The Peasants War which Urs Graf depicted; Uva Ursi captures on-the-spot at acoustic vigils on the edg…

This fifth AXIS recording once again brings in a different approach to the music. With the exception of the group’s first album, Les Oiseaux De Matisse, which was largely recorded live in the studio, subsequent albums (Dream Feathers, Port Of Saints, Blutopia) have been built from Ron upwards – Ron recording with a small core of players and then arranged for larger groups via subsequent overdubs. This time round, Ron requested that he respond to completed tracks as the last player to record – to…

Despite the Covid-19 outbreak disrupting promotional and concert plans of the band Błoto, the three pressings of the debut album ‘Erozje’ have quickly sold out. Instead of leaving fans with old (recorded in 2018) material, the quartet decided to build the momentum and release the second album in 2020, entitled ‘Kwiatostan’ (‘Inflorescence’).

"Because I make records in a number of different styles, I often filter and change my saxophone playing to match the style of the record I’m making. But when I make a work like this, you hear my playing in my natural, unfiltered style, and that style is determined by the many AACM records which were most influential in forming my own playing. That’s especially true in this duo setting with Walt Shaw, where the music is stripped down to its essence of blues + abstraction. It’s really simple - I’m…

"27-year-old Tomin Perea-Chamblee is a brass- and reed-centered multi-instrumentalist, the composer and arranger of pieces with excellently thorny harmonies, an at-times reluctant musicker and enthusiastic Brooklynite (born and raised, so his admiration primarily concerns the borough’s pre-gentralification qualities), who, by day works as a bioinformatician. If you're in New York, there’s an ok chance that you’ve heard him play before, with young (jazz-adjacent) bands and musicians of some renow…

*Limited Edition* Immerse yourself in the charm of a Japanese piano trio session, elevated by the rhythmic enchantment of conga player Yohichi Ogawa. The trio, featuring Kunihiko Sugano on piano, Eizoh Honda on bass, and Teruhiko Takada on drums, takes on a sweet and dynamic quality. Ogawa's conga rhythms add a distinctive flair, injecting energy into Sugano's music—a blend of lyrical imagination, gentle swing, and freewheeling vitality. With extended tracks this session is a delightful explorat…

Joshua Abrams' Natural Information Society expanded into a larger community ensemble with Chicago tenor saxophonist Ari Brown, Hamid Drake, harp, cornets and saxophones around the core of guimbri, harmonium, drums and bass clarinet.

Adroit jazz guitar, prog rock fantasia, and Japanese environmental music all rest comfortably behind Leo Takami's Next Door. The follow up to the acclaimed Felis Catus & Silence, Next Door finds Takami ruminating on passages — of time, seasons, consciousness. Through music, Leo contemplates daily events and finds beauty in ordinary moments. He also seems to be questioning the value of being stuck in the world, allowing his mind to wander towards something beyond it. His music is earnest, deeply …

The ninth album in BBE Music's J Jazz Masterclass Series presents ‘At the Room 427’ by Koichi Matsukaze Trio Featuring Ryojiro Furusawa, a rarely heard exemplar of post-modal power bop and free jazz. Delivered by a trio playing with an intensity and energy that draws on classic Eric Dolphy and mid-era Coltrane but definitely with its own particular vibe, At the Room 427 is an exemplar of febrile improvised jazz that could only come from Japan. This deluxe reissue sees a welcome return to the J J…

**Yellow vinyl** Though Ornette Coleman and John Coltrane were two of the prime forces in what came to be known as free jazz, their approaches couldn't have been more different. While Coleman's music dispensed with chords and rejected instrumental virtuosity in favour of unbroken horizontal development of melodic line, Coltrane's music for the most part relied on stacking up chords in blocks and exploring the results with fearsomely complex, passionate harmonic interrogations. However Coltrane w…

*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…

*2024 stock* Before any instrumentation, Francisco Mela addresses his fellow musicians, pianist Matthew Shipp and bassist William Parker, with a sense of anticipation and affirmation, “Okay guys, ready? Rolling!” The sense of camaraderie and his artist-focused approach is heard throughout the album’s majestic improvisation—as well as in its inspiration, dedicated to Mela’s longtime musical partner, the legendary jazz musician McCoy Tyner. Tyner was well-known for his boundless musical talent, an…

*2024 stock* New York United is an experimental group at the musical intersection of a classic New York avant-garde scene and forward-looking electronic production. Comprised of multi-instrumentalist and 577-cofounder Daniel Carter (Saxophone, Flute, Trumpet, Clarinet), electronic producer Tobias Wilner from Blue Foundation (Synthesizers, Percussion, Vocals, Piano, Guitar), Wu-Tang Clan bass player Djibril Toure and 577’s Federico Ughi (Drums), their sound reflects their decades of collaboration…

The New Album by Francisco Mela and Zoh Amba 'Causa y Efecto, Vol. 2' is a celebration of differences and unity. Creativity in general and experimental music in particular can serve as a conduit to the inner soul of its creators, a kind of spiritual path that goes two ways and allows a deeper understanding also of ourselves. It's a light projecting the humanity of the players that simultaneously reflects the creator and the humanity in all of us. The vulnerability of the artists and what they se…

“A blissfully ecstatic sprawl of spiritual-jazz explorations of the most transcendent order” – Brooklyn Rail

If life is about how we react to what is thrown at us, Sana Nagano chose wisely in the summer of 2020. After nearly half a year of anguished isolation, the violinist made an album of honest, graceful free improvisations with two of her mentors. Anime Mundi, out October 28th on 577 Records, pairs her with pianist/vibraphonist Karl Berger and drummer Billy Martin, veteran players at home in the unknown. And though recorded during the stressful first year of Covid, there is joy and curiosity in the…

Long before the pandemic, Reed had been thinking about isolation, haunted by a 2015 story in The New York Times about the death of a resident named George Bell, a hoarder who passed away at home, his body undiscovered for nearly a week. In January 2022, Reed gathered a group of some of the most creative figures in Chicago’s experimental and improvised music community to put sound to those thoughts of forced seclusion: cornetist Ben LaMar Gay, poet and spoken word artist Marvin Tate, and members …

This new album was recorded in March of this year, as The Rempis Percussion Quartet made their debut in France after 15 years of touring almost everywhere else across Europe.  At the generous invitation of programmer Antoine de la Ronciere at Le Petit Faucheux in Tours, the band was the test pilot for a collaborative project amongst five venerable venues for improvised music in France. In a tightly packed week-long schedule, the band performed in Tours, Poitiers, Brest, Nantes, and Lyon, while a…

"This overdue duo record by longtime colleagues Tashi Dorji (guitar) and Dave Rempis (saxophones) is a monument to the endless musical curiosity that links them. These two come at it from remarkably different backgrounds – Dorji combining his Bhutanese ethnicity with a love for metal, punk, American blues and folk, and anarchist political theory, with Rempis riding the outer edges of the jazz world throughout his career, while also inspired by his Greek ethnicity and a longstanding interest in f…

On February 19, 1972, a crew of mostly Louisiana-raised musicians came together at the Leo Castelli Gallery on West Broadway in Soho to perform a wholly improvised concert. This ensemble’s solos spring from collective improvisations and a tumultuous backbeat, loosely inspired by the creations of Coltrane, Coleman, Albert Ayler, and their brethren. The de facto leader was Richard “Dickie” Landry, a saxophonist and keyboardist who joined composer Philip Glass’s group in 1969. Landry had become a f…

Space is the trio of Lisa Ullén, Elsa Bergman and Anna Lund based in Stockholm, Sweden.This is their second album. Their music is totally improvised and has a strong connection to the traditions of free jazz and European contemporary music.

Listen to Misha Panfilov's latest release and witness the mastery of beat, mood, and melody as he teams up with jazzaggression. None can do it better than Misha Panfilov!

The Aleksi Heinola Quartet presents a new take on vintage hard-bop with their latest record, featuring original compositions and reinterpretations of works by iconic jazz greats. Impeccable musicianship, groovy swing, and a distinct sense of style are on display, with Gábor Bolla on tenor sax, Jukkis Uotila on piano, and Daniel Franck on double bass. This quartet date is not to be missed!

After over five decades of making music at, in, and around the piano, Denman Maroney may have left New York for the more rustic climes of a quaint French town, but he has not abandoned his musical ambitions. Choosing March 2020 to travel, and kept in place by the pandemic shutdown, Maroney put down roots that are now flourishing in this double album with fresh local conspirators. Taking John Cage’s prepared piano and Conlon Nancarrow’s rhythmic innovations to new musical territories, Maroney’s p…

Xavier Camarasa - Fender Rhodes, Jean-Marc Foussat - Synthi AKS, voix jouets and Marc Maffiolo saxophone baryton

Xavier Camarasa - Fender Rhodes, Jean-Marc Foussat - Synthi AKS, voix jouets and Marc Maffiolo saxophone baryton

2024 stock. When the stage is soaked with gasoline, a simple spark of sound from one of them will be needed to blow everything up in the air. That fleeting moment, which barely lasts as long as it takes a note to emerge from the sax, a double bass string to start to vibrate, or to hit a drum head, will now carry on for an hour on the clock. Make no mistake, everything that seems to happen during that time, in fact, is contained in a very single instant. It is a big bang of musical energy expandi…

2024 stock. Natalia Kordiak is one of the most promising vocalists, we believe, not only on the Polish but also on the European jazz scene. Ytinamuh (Humanity) is her new album, the second in her career, recorded with a band composed of Poland's most talented young musicians. Maciej Lewenstein wrote in his review : "A clear Masterpiece, and one of the best Polish improvised vocal records of all times!!!"

2024 stock. "The Session. The day started out a little different - Park West Studio is in Brooklyn and so am I. It's not too far, but I would need to take the subway and walk a bit so I decided to make it easier on myself and take a cab. When I got in the cab, I started to space out and think about the music. The ride seemed like it was taking too long, and I regained consciousness and asked “are we going the right way?” The cabbie got short with me and said we were almost there. He stopped and …

2024 stock. The great maestro Ivo Perelman rarely gives samples of his playing in the setting of larger ensembles. This is perhaps the first time we have had the opportunity to listen to him in the setting of a sextet formation. Especially for this session, the ensemble consists of some of the greatest experts in their instrumental classes. Here, Nate Wooley meets vibraphonist Matt Moran, and all this is set against a backdrop of exquisite string players including Mat Maneri, Fred Lonberg Holm, …

2024 stock. Three years ago, the eminent pianist Elisabeth Harnik and the great trombone master Steve Swell released for the first time their joint album Tonotopic Organisation, which is highly regarded by both critics and fans of both musicians. Three years have passed and the duo is now launching the second instalment of their improvisatory explorations. Listen to how the musicians have changed over this time, and how their art has changed. We are happy to give you the Welcome To The Stratosph…

Legendary pianist Matthew Shipp, one of the greatest improvisers Joe Morris and fantastic drummer Jerome Deupree known from iconic band MORPHINE together!

In 2019, a year before the onset of the pandemic and three years before the full-scale war in Ukraine broke out, we released Illuminated Silence. This was the first album of a new trio consisting of the young Japanese-born, Irish-based pianist and composer Izumi Kimura and the greats of the improvised music world Barry Guy and Gerry Hemingway. The album was very much liked by listeners and I heard from many of them the question whether there is a chance that this formation will survive, because …

Kamil Piotrowicz - one of the brightest and most acclaimed for his creativity pianists on the artistic map of Poland, an artist associated with the new Scandinavian (Danish) improvised music scene accompanied by equally talented two musicians from Norway, trumpeter Erik Kimestad and drummer Simon Albertsen. The President is their first album recording. The material was created at DKDM studios in Copenhagen and mastered by another Polish artist highly regarded for his directorial efforts, Albert …

You all know Ivo Perelman, one of the world's most ardent and lyrical improvisers. The famous New Yorker in the company of artists he has never recorded with before, the legendary double bassist Mark Helias and the great leader and percussionist at the same time Tom Rainey.The album Truth Seeker is an item that shows Ivo Perelman's playing in a completely unprecedented context. Such fascinating recording sessions are worth waiting years for!

*2024 stock* Ketil Bjørnstad’s passion for the English metaphysical poet John Donne (1572-1631) is a lifelong affair. His settings of Donne’s verse have led to recordings including The Shadow, Grace and the ECM album The Light. “After working with the texts of John Donne for more than twenty years, I still find new approaches to understanding what he wrote and I find music throughout. It is in the language, in the rhythm, in the silence between the sentences – a passionate quest for meaning and …

2024 stock. This performance is a second coming together of a rather unusual but wonderful pair; Dame Evelyn Glennie, a household name in percussion, and Szilárd Mezei, a prolific free improviser, multi-instrumentalist, and composer. In 2018, these two artists came together in the Core-tet Project, one of Dame Evelyn’s significant forays into free improvisation. Since then, she also worked with TRIO HLK, but this live performance with Mezei and his quartet is a much different kind of performing…

Patryk Zakrocki - one of the most important improvisers, composers, and sound artists in Poland, and last time also guitarist as well as bassist Maciej Garbowski and drummer Krzysztof Gradziuk, known as the pillars of the best piano trio RGG on the Polish scene, are musicians representing completely different musical worlds. Their first studio meeting is an intimate oneiric improvisation framed by the conventions of ballad and blues. An astonishing encounter bringing music that is not made every…