Jazz /
Eje Thelin At The German Jazz Festival
An amazing set from Swedish trombonist Eje Thelin – a live date, but a totally excellent session that stands as one of the best demonstration of his talents in the 60s! On the European scene at the time, Thelin was easily one of the most inventive players on the trombone – one of the few who could hit the soulful swing of American musicians like Curtis Fuller or JJ Johnson, but also an artist who was starting to stretch out into new realms too – just a touch of Grachan Moncur and Roswell Rudd, w…
The Snake Decides
Milestone reissue, one of the greatest singular sonic gestures of the 20th century.. Soprano saxophone solos recorded in 1986 in St. Paul's Church, Oxford by the late Michael Gerzon. One of the final Incus releases and one that was written up in The Penguin Guide to Jazz as ‘an essential document of modern music’. Otoroku is proud to release the first ever vinyl re-issue of Evan Parker’s legendary recording The Snake Decides. Featuring 4 solos recorded in 1986 in St. Paul's Church, Oxford by th…
The Art Ensemble of Chicago and Associated Ensembles
The Art Ensemble of Chicago and Associated Ensembles is a 21-CD limited and numbered edition issued as the standard-bearers of Great Black Music prepare to celebrate their 50th anniversary. Both the Art Ensemble of Chicago and ECM Records were founded in 1969, and there have been many shared experiences. As Roscoe Mitchell says, “It has been amazing to have taken this journey together.”With their first ECM album, the widely-acclaimed Nice Guys, the Art Ensemble’s revolutionary and polystylistic …
Katonah
The American tenor saxophonist Steve Grossman flew to Japan to record this studio session that features an incredible line up of four local musicians: Takehiro Honda is on the piano with a rhythm section of Hideo Kawahara, Yasushi Yoneki, and Masahiro Yoshida, all working together with a tremendous energy. The recordings are dated February 1986, and include the eponymous Katonah, Afternoon in Paris(J. Lewis), and Friday the 13th (T. Monk).It is worth remembering that Grossman started his journey…
Banka
Edition of 300 copies. Japanese free/jazz sax legend, Kaoru Abe, dies at the age of only 29 in 1978, living a fast and crazy life and dieing of a drug overdose. His entire music career was only 10 years, from 1968 to 1978. In that short period, he was well recorded with around 30 releases, ten of which are solo sax efforts, duos with guitarist Masayuki Takayanagi, bassist Motoharu Yoshizawa and drummer Sabu Toyozumi. Mr. Abe also toured and recorded with Milford Graves, Derek Bailey and Toshinor…
Arirang Fantasy
Edition of 300. Recorder live in 1995. Creative musicians from Korea are a rare breed. According to the liner notes, when the Kang Tae-HwanSaxist Trio came to Japan to play at Tokyo Meeting in 1985, they were a shock to those who knew about the Japanese Free/Jazz scene & history. The Kang Tae-Hwan Trio consisted of Mr. Hwan on alto sax, Choi Sun-Bae on trumpet and Kim Dae-Hwan on drums & percussion. The members of Mr. Hwan’s Trio began collaborating with established Japanese musicians like Masah…
International New Jazz Meeting Burg Altena 1972-1973
Box Set with 8 CDs of exciting and adventurous New Jazz recorded live at the Altena New Jazz Meetings from 1972 and 1973. More than 8 hours of music recorded live at the Altena Castle, West Germany. Two 28-page booklets with concert pictures, flyers and newspaper clippings (in German and English). Includes complete performances and improvisations by Chris McGregor’s Brotherhood Of Breath, Michal Urbaniak Group, Phil Woods, Wolfgang Dauner’s Et Cetera and many more! Read more at: https://www.bear…
On The Way
The jazz violin tradition in Poland is dominated by two Giants: Michał Urbaniak, who pioneered highly non-trivial use of electric violin in fusion music of 1970s and Zbigniew Seifert, who combined free and modal jazz à la Coltrane with fusion. Amazingly, this tradition is present even today, listen to the winners of the first two Seifert Competitions: Bartosz Dworak or Mateusz Smoczyński. An exception that support this rule is Adam Bałdych, who records for the ACT label and whose music has a Sca…
Without Borders
Note from Barry Guy: Zlatko Kaučič invited Maya Homburger and myself to perform a concert in Ljubljana. This meeting (2016) proved to be convivial and communicative on many levels. Other than making music we discussed our individual situations and general views including the many pressing events that continue to accumulate in the world. Zlatko himself lives close to one of the “corridors” where displaced refugees make their agonisingly slow walk to a more hopeful future. It is to these people t…
Agustí Fernández Celebration Ensemble
The concert and Agustí Fernández’s 60th birthday, celebrated in a quite extraordinary way, was possible due the generous support of the 2015 GREC Festival de Barcelona. The personnel is completely different from the Polish recording, and so is the music. Despite the presence of the explosive Mats and super-abstract Joe, Agustí’s music carries certain "kindness", lyricism and melancholy in the freely improvised parts. Despite the truly abstract nature, there are also certain similarities (in the …
Live@Alchemia
"On June 15th 2016 the website jazzarium.pl celebrated its fifth anniversary. It wasn't turning 18, but in the virtual reality time flows a bit differently, you count it not the same way as outside the Internet. On such occasion we wanted to hear music that was unheard before. Music, that gives you no chance to prepare for or to anticipate its perception; music that is full of risk on one hand, and that can open new horizons for both listeners and musicians on the other.Therefore, we decided to …
Live In Tel Aviv
"If ever a group deserved the title of “free jazz power trio”, it would be this one. Legendary reedist Brötzmann, American trombonist Steve Swell and the mighty Nilssen-Love have been playing together since early 2015, and have two masterful live sets under their belt, Krakow Nights and Live in Copenhagen.Live in Tel Aviv, which documents an October ‘16 performance by the trio, is the perfect entry-point for those who might be intimidated by the relatively long lengths of those prior albums - at…
The Liquid Trio Plays Bernoulli
"The Liquid Trio Plays Bernoulli is the new album which was released on October 23 by Fundacja Sluchaj. The album was recorded by Liquid Trio – it’s Agusti Fernandez (piano), Albert Cirera (saxophones) and Ramon Prats (drums). The musicians iquid Trio are playing together for a long time now. Through the years of their musical career they had formed, created and masterfully improved their own playing style and manner. Energetic and active collective improvisations are full of strong, powerful an…
Sundogs
Sundogs are the international improvising trio of Mateusz Rybicki, Samuel Hall and Zbigniew Kozera. The group explores a deep sonic universe through interactive music making that draws from the collective life of its three members. With Influences ranging from Free Jazz, Minimalism and the Berlin Echtzeitmusik Scene, Sundogs approach their music with open ears and a search for deeply connected music.Since 2015 Sundogs have been collaborating and performing their music. A regular feature of the J…
Catapulta De Pols D'estrelles
Vasco Trilla is a Catalan citizen of the world. He performs and records on every continent: in the course of almost three weeks between September and October 2016, Vasco Trilla toured in Poland, in Hungary, he appeared on several concerts in Serbia, followed by Bulgaria. In fact, in each of these concerts Vasco performed with different musicians. If the imagination of the improvising musician – undeniable in the case of Trilla – is a derivative of musical experiences of a nearly 40-year-old mus…
Dialogues With Strings
"The title for the CD and compositions were inspired by a desire that Veryan Weston & I had, which was to open up our regular duo's musical improvisational interactions and incorporate other musicians within them, and thereby expand the scope of what we do after many years of playing together. We'd already done a performance with the addition of Violinist and well known Folk Musician Peter Knight at Café Oto which was filmed by Mark French. Alison had recently asked me to play with her and Hanna…
Full Circle - Live In Lódz
Two great musicians. Two musical Words. First time on CD. Full Circle –
new live CD from legendary drummer Hamid Drake and one of the most
important American improviser Ned Rothengerg.
Flauto Dolphy
"The very first idea that came to my mind was, obviously, to record an album with my own music only. Soon enough I abandoned this idea having realized that a wider context, some clash, would work better. Even more importantly, it should be emphasized that the place of this instrument is here, amongst others. Alone, but simultaneously surrounded by a full orchestra of references and contexts.Therefore, it was my intention to turn to an artist who combines the two fascinations - different varietie…
CSW 14_03_2015
Established in 2013 and currently having over 50 floating members, the Warsaw Improvisers Orchestra acts as a resource for musicians to meet and work in a large improvising ensemble, or in smaller units within a larger context. Spontaneous music making is our remit, but on occasion, scores both regular and graphic may be used as well as visual cues presented by visual artists. The orchestra is a chance for people to develop a deeper understanding of the relationship of sound and how it functions…
African Bass, Solo Concert: Willisau Jazz Festival 1978
Lifeblood of the cultural diaspora of Apartheid, Dyani left South Africa with the Blue Notes in 1964. His amazing discography includes crucial collaborations with Don Cherry, Steve Lacy, Dollar Brand, the Brotherhood Of Breath and Derek Bailey.Here he is performing solo at a jazz festival in Switzerland in 1978, testing the compositions which would comprise his monumental LP African Bass, out two years later. Double bass, gongs, piano and singing. Knockabout, mystical roots — spell-binding and e…