Jazz & Improvisation / Free Improvisation

2024 repress. "Mondays at The Enfield Tennis Academy, x2 LPs of long-form, lyrical, groove-based free improv by acclaimed guitarist & composer Jeff Parker's ETA IVtet, is at last here. Recorded live at ETA (referencing David Foster Wallace), a bar in LA's Highland Park neighborhood with just enough space in the back for Parker, drummer Jay Bellerose, bassist Anna Butterss, & alto saxophonist Josh Johnson to convene in extraordinarily depthful & exploratory music making. Gleaned for the stoniest …

Sun & Rain is a fully collaborative quartet that thus far has practiced a painstaking process of co-composing music together. Because of this extreme sense of collaboration and only working on the music when all four members were physically together, the album Waterfall took six years to compose. Beginning in 2014 the band gathered at Laplante’s residence in Vermont for semi-annual rehearsal retreats. These were not particularly relaxing retreats, as the band held themselves to a rigorous work e…

Recorded at Kammerspiele (Schauspielhaus Bochum), October 31, 2022, mixed and mastered by Peter Böhm.Frank Gratkowski — clarinets Maria Gstättner — bassoon Martin Siewert — guitars, electronics Sara Kowal — harp Joanna Lewis—violin Laura Strobl—viola Melissa Coleman—cello Peter Herbert — double bass Els Vandeweyer — vibes, percussion Gerry Hemingway — drums, percussion Georg Graewe — piano

Huge Tip! Double LP, Gatefold edition. Born on November 23rd, 1944 in Paris, France, Frédéric Rabold already played with his father in American Army Clubs at age 16. In 1965, Rabold joined the Axel Lauser Quartet, three years later he finally founded his own band, the Frédéric Rabold Crew. In the following years he collaborated with guitarist Martin Ederer, singer Lauren Newton, as well as avant-garde jazz musicians such as Gunter Hampel, Leszek Zadlo, Lester Bowie, Manfred Schoof, Albert Mangel…

Special edition box. An iconic, innovative and internationally renowned force in avant-garde music The Art Ensemble of Chicago released their 50th anniversary celebratory album We Are On The Edge in April, and Erased Tapes are honoured to announce the vinyl edition of this exceptional body of work. Led by surviving founding members Roscoe Mitchell and drummer Famoudou Don Moye, these brand new recordings involve a staggering array of contemporary artists ranging from across the jazz, experimenta…

Double LP, Gatefold edition. This landmark compilation continues the unfoldment of diabolically obscure yet culturally and artistically essential recordings that have been hidden and precariously balanced on the precipice of obsolescence. For the first time ever, Tramp Records is proud to present an "all German" artists version of the Peace Chant series, including liner notes printed in German exclusively with an English translation downloadable. Focused on rare recordings from German musicians …

Black Vinyl. John Coltrane saw the album-length suite A Love Supreme as his gift to God. The world has come to see it as a classic –not only Coltrane’s best-known work, but one of the most important and influential jazz records ever made. Featuring the Classic Quartet of pianist McCoy Tyner, bassist Jimmy Garrison and drummer Elvin Jones, A Love Supreme is one of the most honest musical performances put to tape. Its beauty and appeal are timeless.

2024 Stock. The Peace Chant compilation series is a Temple, a reliquary of sacred harmonious statements made by enlightened artists throughout time. With Tramp Records' latest offerings, "Peace Chant, Raw Deep and Spiritual Jazz volumes 5 & 6, deeper, darker, and even more remote chambers of this already exalted temple are brought to light. The team at Tramp, with their torch of love and with reverence for those builders who came before, have returned from their quest with musical treasures unfa…

2024 Stock. The Peace Chant compilation series is a Temple, a reliquary of sacred harmonious statements made by enlightened artists throughout time. With Tramp Records' latest offerings, "Peace Chant, Raw Deep and Spiritual Jazz volumes 5 & 6, deeper, darker, and even more remote chambers of this already exalted temple are brought to light. The team at Tramp, with their torch of love and with reverence for those builders who came before, have returned from their quest with musical treasures unfa…

Duo a la Bibliothéque de Massy le 13 novembre 1980.

Concert recorded at 28 rue Dunois, 9th May 1982, ... Text d'Antonin Artaud, extrait de la prèface du Théatre et son double, 1938. (Text by Antonin Artaud, extract from the preface to Le Théatre et son double, 1938).

Huge tip! It is a huge honour to announce the publication of Peter Brotzmann’s final concerts on Otoroku. When we invited Peter to do a residency at Cafe OTO back in February 2023 we had no idea these would be his last ever shows and he played with such power it would have been hard for anyone present to believe he would never play publicly again. Recorded over two nights this grouping of Jason Adasiewicz on vibraphone, John Edwards on bass and Steve Noble on drums feels especially resonant and …

"The music is never the same. It verifies its positions and conditions, its peculiar way of listening to the cavities, the motions started, the tensions between sound and silence, tone and memory. Nature is present not only as trees and clouds, light and shadows. It is a readiness for what is constantly changing, a heightened awareness on the minimal variations in the materials and processes at hand, what it means to slowly examine a rough surface, the transformation of a rhythm, a melodic phras…

Specially released for Record Store Day 2012, April 21th. Recorded during two 'Saxophone' projects of The Ex in Ethiopia. Trio-side December 28 2009 in the Bateau Ivre, Kazanchis, Addis Abeba. Solo-side Februari 22 2011 at Yared Music School, Sidist Kilo, Addis Abeba.

List of Demands, Damon Locks’s first foray into creating an entire album from spoken and text-based work, finds the Chicago-based musician and educator collecting cultural abstractions and reorganizing them into a firm truth. The album lays out a vision of Black liberation and transmits it outward as a song cycle of bite-sized Nikki Giovanni-meets-MF DOOM-style rhythm experiments. The sample-based constructions are steeped in a lifetime of not only keen cultural observation, but direct communal …

*100 copies limited edition* The Pennsylvania improvising trio of Kevin Sims, James Searfoss, and Justin Dorsey continue to hone their fierce and potent relationship with texture, rhythm, and amorphous sound forms. This album is laced with musical paths travelled and skirted, conversant with drone, electroacoustics, and free jazz. “Glint” functions as a bit of an overture, and as “Once Threw” expands on the clatter and clamber, Dorsey’s bass becomes a focal point, taking a prominent position in …

Ovules is a series of improvisations performed by ZAÄAR in various spaces over the kingdom of Belgium. Ovules is a triptych inspired by Tchouang-Tseu's fable “The Dream of the Butterfly” (莊周夢蝶) about dream and reality reciprocity. Ovules is a surrealist jazz manifestation due to a collaboration between labels WV Sorcerer Productions and Subsound Records and the preacher of the band's first proper studio album. ZAÄAR is a Belgian collective, twin project of Neptunian Maximalism, the cosmic free-j…

To begin with, there was only me, and John Stevens. Not in person, of course - this was 2021, many years after he died. But I had this plugin that I liked, designed to spice up drum loops, and I wondered what would happen if I put free jazz drumming into it. I sourced a solo recording of Mr Stevens, and was very taken with the results. I put some layers on top, and contacted Richard Harding to add some Chapman Stick. A couple more layers, and I had a track I was very taken with. So taken, in fac…

"This, the third release from the sequence of remarkable performances by Cecil Taylor’s Unit recorded at Fat. Tuesday’s in New York from 8-10 February 1980 (the previous two are It Is In the Brewing Luminous [Hat Hut], and Live At Fat Tuesday’s, February 9, 1980 [ezz-thetics 101]), is a further illumination of the transformational premise which conceptualized and catalyzed Taylor’s music, from creative impulse to spiritual and self-defining fulfillment." – Art Lange

"Would the following advice alone be sufficient? Look at the cover of this album, then close your eyes and listen to the wonderful performances of these two musicians. Because in the end, all art speaks for itself." – Rudolf Amstutz

Brian Marsella, Jorge Roeder, Ches Smith. "Ou Phrontis" means 'who cares' in Greek. Inscribed on the lintel above the door of Thomas Edward Lawrence's cottage on Clouds Hill, it symbolized a place where Lawrence felt at home, free from the cares of the world. This fourth CD by the dynamic piano trio of Brian Marsella, Jorge Roeder and Ches Smith ("Suite for Piano," "The Fourth Way," "Ballades") features eight challenging Zorn compositions inspired by Stoic philosophy and science. The telepathic …

Big Tip! Luxurious 180-gram LP in a special edition on yellow vinyl. Bengt 'Beche' Berger is undoubtedly one of the most formidable forces of Swedish jazz. Ever since the 70s, he has been involved in developing and renewing the music. You can hear him on albums with Arbete & Fritid, Rena Rama, Don Cherry, Bernt Rosengren and more, to name just a few in addition to all his own projects. Beche is a true musical master who operates far beyond genre boundaries! He recently turned 80 but continues to…

2 LPs packaged in cardboard sleeve with paper insert | Produced and directed by Christopher Williams | Executive production by John Corbett & Jim Dempsey | Edition: 500. Inklusive is a play written by Bavarian playwright Franz Xaver Kroetz. It is part of a trilogy of radio plays from 1971 titled Trilogie Münchener Lebens. The play was first broadcast as a radio play in former West Germany on Südwestfunk in 1972. A second version was broadcast in former East Germany on Rundfunk der DDR in 1974. T…

NYC Bassist Brandon Lopez Teams Up with Gayageum Master DoYeon Kim in New Album, Redefining What We Thought Was Possible with Improvisation. Prepare to have your wig blown back by the improvisational force of nature that is adored bassist Brandon Lopez.  He has returned to 577 Records once again – this time with gayageum master DoYeon Kim!  Syzygy, Vol. 1 delivers a cosmic blast of experimental fascination that will open the door for you to leave our reality. Based in NYC, Brandon Lopez has been…

Noah Howard's 1971 album, recorded in the Netherlands with Misha Mengelberg, Han Bennink and Earl Freeman and the first he released on his own Altsax label. Free jazz built on melody and pattern.

Bomb! Obscure and outstanding free jazz album reissued for the first time since its original release in 1969. Old-style gatefold LP, with liner notes by Ed Hazell. In the late 1960s, young jazz musician Bobby Naughton, a keyboardist and vibraphonist, faced significant challenges as he sought to record his first album. With major record labels and jazz clubs catering only to big names, Naughton and other creative musicians of his generation found themselves sidelined by the mainstream music indus…

* Edition of 300 copies. High thickness cardboard with opaque laminated cover. Comes with a printed insert. * “Beautiful United Harmony Happening” / “The Education of an Amphibian” - the second release by Alga Marghen’s brand new free jazz imprint, Formalibera - is also dedicated to the output of John Tchicai following his return to Copenhagen during the mid 1960s. Comprising two pieces, remarkably, this single LP effectively bookends a rich period of activity for the saxophonist, capturing one …

* Edition of 300 copies. High thickness cardboard with opaque laminated cover. Comes with a printed insert. * John Tchicai (1936 – 2012) was one of the most important free improvising saxophonists of the 20th Century: an artist of rare vision and aptitude whose lines soared and stood out even in the most hallowed company, and whose body of work as a leader / composer is among the most singular and distinct within the entire canon of that music. But Tchicai’s importance doesn’t end there. Born in…

On download, streaming and CD for the first time ever, the only Gyroscope album ‘One, Two, Three… Go!’ ever released, expanded with live and studio recordings from the archives plus a wealth of first-hand information about the band and many previously unseen images. Produced with the support of Gordon Beck’s sister Jude and the approval of the band members or their families. Compiled from studio, live and rehearsal session recordings, made in 1973 and 1974, from the tape archives of Ron Mathewso…

Biggest Tip Possible! Lars Göran Ulander Septet (1965) Lars Lystedt Quintet (1967) Per Henrik Wallin Trio (1977) Curated by saxophonist and improvisational musician Mats Gustafsson, Caprice Music continues the Öppet series, focusing on a relatively unexplored period of Swedish creative, experimental music from the 1960’s and 70’s. Öppet Två presents saxophonist Lars-Göran Ulander, who made a big impression on this series' curator in 1982, when he witnessed a solo concert at an art exhibition. Ma…

Skylla is the debut solo recording of Italian-born and London-based composer, bassist, and vocalist Ruth Goller. This album of otherworldly detuned bass harmonics and dense vocal arrangements was initially released in 2021 by longtime collaborator Bex Burch’s Vula Viel Records, and quickly went out of print. Since then Goller’s notoriety has only grown, and her follow-up record, Skyllumina, was released by International Anthem in early 2024 and met with high praise. Skylla is the genesis of her …

Free, Dancing . . . is the first release by a new trio with percussionist and producer Carlos Niño, luminary multi-instrumentalist Idris Ackamoor (of The Pyramids) and wizard guitarist, producer Nate Mercereau. They have been playing concerts together in California since June 2022, sharing a unique vibrant sound, findings and energetics. A remarkable environment for the ethereal reed artistry of the revered Idris Ackamoor, reinforced by the contemplative sounds of Carlos Nino, who utilize drummi…

For approximately 18 months (from the fall of 1961 to June 1963), Archie Shepp and Bill Dixon co-led a group that varied in size between a quartet, quintet and sextet, depending on the gig. They mostly played coffee houses and small theatres in Greenwich Village, and travelled to Scandinavia in July 1962 for a series of concerts at the first International Youth Festival in Helsinki. Already in his late 30s, Bill Dixon seems to have suddenly appeared in 1962, stretching jazz modernism in distinct…

*100 copies limited edition CD* Federico Ughi, New York drummer, improviser and producer releases a new studio recording to celebrate the 20 year anniversary of his very first album, recorded when he resided in London, UK. The theme of the album is Ughi’s experience of home, and how it has evolved, living between Brooklyn, New York, his native Rome, Italy and all the places in the world he has passed through while touring. It’s Ughi’s deeply personal meditation on all the incredible things he’s …

Tip!  *300 copies limited edition* ‘L’album vert’ is a compilation of asynchronous steps for an imaginary dance foor. A strange but amusing place were eyes listen in and ears peek around. Glass breaks, someone stumbles, something always happens. The dancers inevitably hop to moments of tension of which they free themselves again and again. Almost always there is some kind of beat. Not the kind of beat that makes the hips wiggle, but rather the pulse of a crooked factory or a quirky steam engine …

The saxophonist Sakina Abdou follows up her first solo album with this trio release, which has all the freshness of a very first encounter.The album is the fruit of an improvised, closed session of several days in her home, punctuated by two concerts, and offers an arc of 60 minutes that retraces a musical itinerary that is intimate and acoustic. We have previously heard Toma Gouband with Evan Parker and the pianist Marta Warelis with Dave Douglas and Andy Moor. Sakina Abdou first played with Go…

Avant-garde bassoonist Karen Borca's first proper leader record is a series of duos with drummer Paul Murphy who she first played with in Jimmy Lyons group.

Biggest Tip! 180 gram Vinyl Edition. Recorded in 1966 and released by Blue Note Records in August of 1967, Don Cherry's Symphony for Improvisers features Gato Barbieri, Henry Grimes, and Ed Blackwell, all of whom had appeared on Cherry's previous album Complete Communion. Also featured are Karl Berger, Jean-François Jenny- Clark, and Pharoah Sanders. The abum received a rating of ***** on AlMusic, with reviewer Steve Huey string that, "Even though the album is full of passionate fireworks, there…

Biggest Tip! 180 gram Vinyl Edition. Gatefold Cover. Recorded at A & R Studios in New York City on July 1, 1970, Pharoah Sanders' album Deaf Dumb Blind (in Arabic "Summun Bumun Umyun" was released on Impulse! Records that same year. It features the leader along with fellow stars Woody Shaw, Gary Bartz and Lonnie Liston Smith. The album received a **** rating on AllMusic, with reviewer Thom Jurek staring that this is a stunningly beautiful and contemplative work that showcases how intrinsic melod…

CD deluxe, gatefold mini LP replica with obi & Japanese insert. Pianist-composer Joachim Kühn has been a force on the international jazz scene for half a century. Trained as a classical pianist, Kühn migrated to jazz, playing fusion with Alphonse Mouzon, free jazz with Ornette Coleman, and modern jazz in his iconic group with bassist JF Jenny-Clarke and drummer Daniel Humair. Here he teams up with acclaimed German electric guitarist Toto Blanke, the eclectic Afro-American bassist John Lee, and L…