Jazz & Improvisation / Free Improvisation

*2022 stock.* Italian piano player Giovanni di Domenico and  Catalan drummer Oriol Roca, have been musical partners for fifteen years. They started playing in duo in 2010 to explore the sound possibilities of their instruments, focusing on silence, density and space in music, through improvised fragments and some original compositions. Their first studio album is now released on Belgian label Spocus Records.

Since their meeting in the Hague in the Netherlands in 2002, Alexandra Grimal and Giovanni di Domenico have been playing together regularly. Since 2011 they have been offering several subtle and inspired tête-à-têtes: Ghibli, Chergui and Down the Hill, which was released on January 19th, 2020. Ghibli, around a repertoire composed by the Italian pianist, released on the Sans Bruit label in 2011, the music navigates on the mineral lines of Alexandra Grimal's saxophones that come to rest and intert…

*2022 stock.* Alexandra Grimal goes in her own way, elegant but robust, through the territories of jazz and improvised music over recent years. It was only natural she would meet and regularly play in duet settings with Giovanni di Domenico, as versatile an adventurer as Alexandra is, both in his musical choices and collaborations. Three years after their first recording together (2011's Ghibli on the Sans Bruit label), Chergui was recorded over two nights at the Théâtre du Châtelet (Paris, Fran…

"Alexandra Grimal goes in her own way, elegant but robust, through the territories of jazz and improvised music over recent years. It was only natural she would meet Giovanni di Domenico over the Alps, who has woven her a series of compositions where they locate/find the ironic meander of their dialogues. A sophisticated "chamber" jazz music that yet seems to flow so naturally... One forgets the music writing to only catch the emotion of the moment."Alexandra Grimal: soprano saxophoneGiovanni di…

**300 copies, heavy gatefold cover** LP with swedish Free jazz trio Dog Life Anna Högberg: Saxophones, Finn Loxbo: Electric Bass and Mårten Magnefors: Drums. Dog Life explores free improvised music on a high-energetic plateau, descending from the outskirts of free jazz, and further towards a harder, darker and undefined terrain. "Mats Gustafsson’s Fire! Orchestra featured some of the promising, young musicians in the Swedish left-of-center scene. Sax player Anna Högberg was one of them, blowing …

**300 copies** The Kollektiv für Kommunikative und Ästhetische Forschung was an artist commune that existed for about two years around 1970 in a former monastery in Mariental (Lower Saxony), West Germany, close to the then inner-German border. It was founded by members of the West Berlin free art and music scene, many of them having been part of the scene based around the short-lived Zodiak Free Arts Lab. Among the residents were drummer Sven-Åke Johansson, guitarist Norbert Eisbrenner and bassi…

**CD version** Finding Ourselves In All Things features two lengthy tracks, standing in stark contrast to each other: Melting With Butterflies is brimming with life: chaotic, hysterical and joyous - celebrating the viewpoint of all small things and their seemingly frantic nature. The Way Mountains Make Love is equally intense, but with a quite different energy – a slow moving organic unity vibrating with the frequencies of everything big and ancient.Both tracks explore and elaborate on its respe…

**CD version** Hungry Ghosts are beings who are driven by intense emotional needs, periodically roaming the earth’s surface in search for anything that can satisfy their cravings. Now they are here for you! The omnipotent living legend Paal-Nilssen Love clashes head to head with bass prodigy Christian Meaas Svendsen on bass, playing with 2-3 bows, cheek, voice, hands and feet. In the midst of the battle we find Yong Yandsen, a high-octane Malaysian sax virtuoso who virtually explodes on stage co…

**CD version** Kasper Skullerud Værnes and Andreas Wildhagen has played together for ten years as of 2018. They formed a duo shortly after meeting, and quickly realized that the power and subtleness of the sax and drums duo format was worth further explorations. Through the years and in various ensembles and projects such as KNYST! (trio with bassist and Nakama founder Christian Meaas Svendsen,) and Paal Nilssen-Love Large Unit, the duo has grown and developed a highly flexible and telepathic in…

**CD version** Gibberish, Balderdash and Drivel consists of three nonsensical musical conversations between Malaysian nylon guitar player Goh Lee Kwang and Norwegian bass player Christian Meeas Svendsen. The album was recorded in an independent art gallery close to Kuala Lumpur with a handheld device. It tells us the story of the first encounter between two different mindsets, nationalities and generations trying - and totally failing at - making any sensible dialogue with their respective music…

"Worst Generation" is Nakama’s first fully improvised album, and was recorded as part of a live concert in studio during their first European tour. The LP version is in lenticular – the motif changes when viewed from a different angle. The CD is in English on one side and Japanese on the other with the imprint in beautiful gloss. One thing is always something different and at the same time two sides of the same coin...

**CD version** Neptune, a  planet invisible to the naked eye, it was originally discovered through mathematical deduction after scientists noticed unexpected changes in the course of Uranus. It was named after the Roman god of the sea. In addition to being ruler of the liquid element, he was said to have tremendous power over our subconsciousness and emotions, which we ourselves still today have little understanding of. The title represents the unknown, ranging from the depths of the human mind …

**CD version** 3 Pianos is an album made by a unique piano ensemble consisting of three musicians with different backgrounds and experience. The curiosity for the piano and its countless possibilities was the outset whereas the wish to bend the common boundaries for piano music was the background for this project. The ensemble makes music with clear connections to the music and the ideas of the twentieth century. The musicians develop the material in their own way by focusing on elements like tu…

**CD version** No Right No Left is the first solo album of drummer Andreas Wildhagen. Recorded in Wildhagen's practice room in late July 2016, it explores different expressions and levels of energy. The music is improvised, still certain ideas can be traced throughout the record. In order to eliminate right and left, one has to imagine a view which is not rooted in a subject or object. If we lack a reference point, right and left disappears. Right and left, good and bad permeate society, but mus…

**CD version** This album is a free exploration of sound within the boundaries of two violins and the musicians playing them. Close interplay and together-ness permeates the 36 minutes of eclectic but cohesive music, ranging in expression from reductionist and sparse textures, to filmscore-like tonal landscapes with clear dramatic outlines. The record reflects both the duo's dionysic and apollinian sides, and  the balance between the two creates something universal which the listener can relate …

**CD version** Improvisation, truth, joy, jazz and doubt. These are but a few of the elements that frequently emerge in the universe of Filosofer, and on their debut Landet Er Gitt Oss. Using the Norwegian version of a term used for people who spend most of their time pondering over life's big mysteries, one is lead to believe that their music is rooted in complex concepts and theoretic academia. So it is not. Filosofer focuses more on guts and feel rather than analyzing and thinking. Their basi…

**CD version** Forms & Poses is Norwegian bass player Christian Meaas Svendsen’s second solo album, and features four compositions / improvisations which explore the physical connection between the human body and the double bass. Although recorded in two entirely different settings, it is clear that Svendsen’s mind-set on all these tracks are one and the same, and the release shines as a condensed representation of his creative diversity. The CD version comes with a 24-page long booklet with lin…

"Cepi is a solid reality located in the south of France. It’s Barre Phillips’ vision about improvisation. It can be flexible about the team but not about the idea above it all. Hic stands for Hidden Improvisers Consort; it’s a study group under the guide of Claudio Lugo. This meeting has been organized and strongly desired by Barre Phillips and Tommaso Rolando. We made a big circle, we played with the fire."The Cepi Nomads: Barre Phillips - Contrabass / György Kurtag - Electronics / Laurent Char…

"Argentinian pianist Fernando Gelbard's killer debut (and only) '74 LP. Didi is a potent mix of Fender Rhodes & Moog with scatting percussionists and fierce tenor sax -- Coltrane meets candombe!" Gatefold sleeve. "If I was asked to name some great Argentinian jazz musicians, I'd probably draw a blank after Gato Barbieri, but this rather nice slab of vinyl has added a couple more to the list. Fernando Gelbard played piano with tenorist Horacio Borraro, whose quartet peddled a fiery if unoriginal…

"A synchrotron is a particular type of cyclic particle accelerator, descended from the cyclotron, in which the accelerating particle beam travels around a fixed closed-loop path. The magnetic field which bends the particle beam into its closed path increases with time during the accelerating process, being synchronized to the increasing kinetic energy of the particles.Synchrotrony are a trio who take their inspiration from free improvisation, sound search and simple folk melodies. The band consi…

First released on digital formats back in 2016, and here now given a richly deserved full vinyl release, "Holy Science", the debut outing from Amirtha Kidambi and her New York based quartet The Elder Ones, is a work of dazzling singularity. Delicately yet unashamedly divulging its complex network of influences at every turn, "Holy Science" simultaneously disperses of boundary and limitation, emerging as an album steeped in tradition yet located firmly in the futuristic present.

These live recordings capture a series of performances throughout Europe in 1975. These gigs reflect Howard’s peculiar musical identity on the Free Jazz scene of that era. An uncanny and heavy atmosphere unifies the different compositions which are constructed with improvisations on disturbing repetitions.

**75 copies** Long Day documents a live performance by Daniel Wyche (guitars), Patrick Shiroishi (saxophones) and Ted Byrnes (percussion). The performance took place in Los Angeles in August 2019 and was recorded by Jared Rodriguez. The album was mixed by Daniel Wyche and mastered by Brian J. Sulpizio in Chicago, IL.

On May 13, 2000 the Chicago Underground Quartet played one of the most searing and transcendent sets of music I’ve ever witnessed, as part of the Empty Bottle Festival of Jazz & Improvised Music. Cornetist Rob Mazurek, guitarist Jeff Parker, drummer Chad Taylor, and bassist Noel Kupersmith performed with a fiery singularity of purpose, ripping through its set like a bulldozer, albeit a machine marked by nuance and soulfulness. The following year the same line-up—which had previously made two alb…

**400 copies** "A sublime trio set from drummer Charles Rumback – a record that has us really appreciating the special touch the leader can bring to a date, as this album may also be one of the best that we've heard from pianist Jim Baker in years! Baker has this great way of sounding soulful and lyrical, yet also moving towards the freer side of his spectrum too – working with the subtle drums of Rumback and the careful bass of John Tate, all with energy that almost takes us back to the groundb…

**2009 release** This double vinyl is the most welcome album of the series, with Ken Vandermark playing duets with Tim Daisy on drums on the first disk. The performance was recorded exactly two years ago in Poznań, Poland. The album starts with "Autostrada", slowly picking up speed with Vandermark on clarinet, then Daisy pushes up a kind of tribal rhythm, bringing the clarinet to full intensity, then slowing down for a nice melodious moment. "The Empty Chair" is the ideal Vandermark + percussion…

"Broadcast from SWR and recorded at the legendary 1967 Free Jazz Meeting in Baden-Baden, Germany this is a collection of four different performances by different line-ups, featuring big names in the European free jazz '60s scene of the time along such top players as Don Cherry, Marion Brown, Evan Parker, and John Stevens."

A monument of post-free solo reeds playing and a stunning album in Peter Brötzmann's discography

In February 2020, Sven-Åke Johansson and Thomas Kapielski released the vinyl LP Recovered under their project name Das Moabiter Duo at Fantôme Verlag. It was published on the occasion of a joint exhibition by Johansson and Kapielski at the Laura Mars Gallery, Berlin.Recovered, mixed and mastered by Frieder Butzmann, features a previously unreleased concert recording from 1983. Joint performances by Kapielski and Johansson took place in clubs like the Korrekt (Alt-Moabit, Berlin) or ‒ as part o…

**Edition of 200** Texts by Joshua Abrams, Paal Nilssen-Love, Jim Sauter, Mike Watt, Guy Peters, Mette Rasmussen, Dave Rempis, Bruce Ackley, Sandrine Verstraete, Laurens Smet, Ken Vandermark, Koen Vandenhoudt. The idea for this publication started with a request made by photographer, reviewer and overall music enthusiast Hans van der Linden to document the Oorstof series behind the scenes for a whole year. In addition to his unique photographic impressions, we asked graphic designer Marijke Looz…

"This is a reissue of a now out-of-print album from live trio date by the legendary LA-based pianist, composer and multi-bandleader, Horace Tapscott. Pianist Horace Tapscott is always at his best when he is leading a trio. Sketches of Drunken Mary features some sparkling piano revolving around a most lyrical bass part that is absolutely touching. The piece ends with a long, monstrous drum solo has to be heard to be believed. I recall hearing/seeing the mighty Sonship with John McLaughlin's One T…

An exciting new international trio initiated by Scandinavian saxophonist Torben Snekkestad, accompanied by two esteemed international players in the field of improvised music – the Spanish pianist Agusti Fernández and the British double bass player Barry Guy. The music they create together is situated somewhere between free improvisation, free jazz, and contemporary classical music and executed with lightning fast interaction and explorative, innovative sounds and textures. Recorded by Stefan De…

The Last Dream of the Morning is the new band from three UK masters of contemporary improvised music – they released a trio CD under this title on Relativ Pitch (NYC) in 2017, now choosing it for their bandname for continuing activities. Recorded by Shaun Crook at Cafe Oto, London on 8 August 2018. Mixed and Mastered by John Butcher.Line-up:John Butcher: tenor & soprano saxophonesJohn Edwards: double bassMark Sanders: percussion

Massive industrial noise and free jazz blasts from the past,16-17 returning with new material after 25 years. Founded 1983 in Basel by saxophonist Alex Buess and former drummer Knut Remond, they have been shaping the forefront of a new sound area. Playing an abrasive distorted mix of dub, hardcore and free jazz that lead to a meeting of likeminded heavy heads that temporally took part in the band e.g. Kevin Martin (The Bug, Techno Animal) or G.C. Green (Godflesh). After marking their presence an…

Gowanus Session II was seven years in the planning. Thollem McDonas, Nels Cline, and William Parker convened at Peter Karl Studios in Brooklyn on January 3rd, 2012 and recorded two complete albums. The first was Gowanus Session I, released by Porter Records in April of 2012. GS II was put aside to eventually complete the five-album palindromic cycle of trio albums Nels and Thollem ambitiously set out to realize. The albums in between include Radical Empathy with Michael Wimberly (Relative Pitch,…

This trio is on to something extraordinary; full on furor brushed w thin melodic lines or rage contained in a certain kind of drunken beauty and bliss - all stumbling on towards the heard and the unheard - in a whisper, in a shriek, forces joined and disjoined....This trio is the whole in the never ending audible crack Johan Berthling: double bass; Martin Küchen: tenor and soprano saxophones, retardophone, flute; Steve Noble: drums and percussion. Recorded by David Carlsson at Gula Studion, Malm…

Wonderful, previously unreleased recordings by Derek Bailey and his guests at Company Week in 1983. What's remarkable throughout this album is the respect and affection the musicians show for each other, exemplifying the dictionary definition of "company" as "the fact or condition of being with another or others, especially in a way that provides friendship and enjoyment." It starts with "Landslide", a brilliant, spiky, spluttering, twanging reunion of Music Improvisation Company members Evan Pa…

On Air Time, Air - Henry Threadgill, Fred Hopkins and Steve McCall - hit their 1977 stride, stretching from tightly coiled themes to wide-open improvisation, turning the sax-bass-drums trio into a restless, three-way imagination engine.

On Signaling, Nick Mazzarella and Tomeka Reid compress a wide slice of Chicago’s creative music history into intimate alto–cello dialogues, tracing a clear line from Hemphill/Wadud’s 1970s duets to a present tense that feels urgent and newly carved.

On All the Numbers, Lester Bowie’s first sessions as a leader catch the future Art Ensemble core in 1967 workshop mode, running multiple takes of two pieces that keep splintering into different shapes, energies and internal logics.