Jazz /
Opus One
'The initial idea behind Ensemble E was to combine traditions of Contemporary Music, Noise, Improvised music, Free Jazz and other experimental music fields and traditions with the deeper music traditions. This is deeper research of traditional and non-traditional ways of expressing folk music of Scandinavia, Portugal, Poland, Ukraine and more. Much more. By putting them next to each other/ on top of each other/ inside of each other. Creating new ways. The instrumentation of Ensemble E is spectac…
Wednesday Weld
Musician Paul Flaherty believes that the difference between pre-composed music and free-form improvisational music is a bifurcation of the mind, “The logical mind is reduced to a witness during free playing and the emotional mind is fully released.” Free from concept, outline or even leadership, the music is a free-form experience. This is realized on the newest release from Paul Flaherty (Tenor sax, alto sax) and his long-time collaborators Jim Matus (Electric guitar, Baritone guitar) and Larry…
World Without
Abstraction, with feeling. Saxophonist Paul Dunmall, a veteran experimental jazz musician, was feeling drawn to vitality. He wanted to organize a group of musicians that were driven by an underlying pulse and a central energy, beyond the abstract improvisations he had been familiar with for years. He had always appreciated jazz that had a driving, uplifting energy, and organized this quartet, inspired by these musicians’ previous improvisational performances. Alongside guitarist Steven Saunders,…
Mysteries:Untitled
*2023 stock* 'The chief attraction of this album is an almost 50 minute, previously unreleased solo performance by Taylor given at New York University in November 1976 as part of the Bösendorfer Festival, a benefit series for the Kitchen performance centre. His previous solo recital that year had been in August at Moosham Castle in the Lungau region of Salzburg during an open-air festival, subsequently released as Air Above Mountains (Buildings Within) (Enja, 1977). Taylor had come across a Böse…
Indent
*2023 stock* In 1973, Indent marked a new direction for one of the founders and masters of what was to be called »free jazz«; yet it turned out to have defined styles and highly sophisticated rules of its own. It was radically new and initially difficult to tune into for some. Cecil Taylor was composing in fractions of seconds. He was free to decide what to compose but in the end intelligent structures can be perceived with a multitude of »cells« being introduced, developed and layered one upon …
Silent Tongues
*2023 stock* 'If you had to pick three architects of modern jazz piano, you could just about cover everything with Bill Evans, McCoy Tyner and Cecil Taylor. Despite his phenomenal talent, Taylor may have seemed like the lesser influence at first, as most of his followers were relegated to the avant-garde end of things, but over the years his influence has grown and these days you are liable to hear Taylor type assaults on the piano from guys like Craig Taborn, Jason Moran or others, while they p…
Poschiavo
*2023 stock* In the life of every artist comes the time when toward the end of his existence, he will create a monument to his ever-lasting artistic efforts. It is the Swan-Song for which he wishes to remain being known; for centuries, this has crossed the borderlines between cultures and arts. Poschiavo was recorded when Cecil Taylor was sixty-nine years old, very much at the height of his musical and poetic powers. Recorded in Europe on a fine Bösendorfer grand piano in perfect digital clarity…
Free Form
Reissue, originally released in 1961. The West Indian-born alto saxophonist Joe Harriott was one of the most convincing boppers outside of the USA, though by the end of the 1950s he was exploring freer musical pastures, and the quintet with which he undertook the exploration was an outgrowth of the hard bop band with which he'd made a name on the British scene. Often in the past the group's music, in which trumpet and flugelhorn player Shake Keane figured alongside Harriott in the front line, ha…
Duo Live 1984
Celebrating the 10th anniversary of Studio Songs! Popular titles that have been out of stock for a long time are being reissued at mid-price. The first title is the miraculous duo of Togashi and Takayanagi. Although the album is only 35 minutes and 50 seconds long, the tense improvisation on this masterpiece has captivated many free jazz fans. Masahiko Togashi/percussion, Masayuki Takayanagi/guitar Recorded: September 29, 1984 at Nagoya Far Out
明日 アルファベットが、消えてしまいますように
2023 Stock. The second live recording of the duo by Keiji Haino and Masataka Fujikake released just five years after the previous work "Tomorrow, the alphabet will disappear." While retaining the steel-like strength of the previous album, this is a rock album that pursues his core expression only with guitar, vocals and drums . Keiji Haino – guitar, vocals Masataka Fujikake – drums. If HARD is raised to the power of several tens, will the grains of light pour down? Recorded at Stormy Monday Yoko…
チョット！(I'm Here !)
This is a "passing soundscape" that will be the same as nothing if you don't pay attention to it - Akira Sakata
Akira Sakata x Triple Edge "Live At Pit Inn"
“A large tree thousands of years old, like Akira Sakata, seems to sway a variety of creatures as if they were being drawn to it. Is it a festival with Ming as a Shinto priest? Takeharu Hayakawa, who has a strong thud, changes his behavior like a ninja, and Masataka Fujikake wraps everything up and makes a deep rumbling of the earth. As for me, I'm on the same level as the piano and electronic sounds. Let's just say that it organically connects the past and the present. A rare improvised world th…
Sakata Akira x Triple Edge
A live recording by Akira Sakata (alto sax, clarinet, voice), Masayasu Tsuboguchi (piano, synthesizer), Takeharu Hayakawa (bass), and Masataka Fujikake (drums). An improvisational giant, Akira Sakata, is a direct hit to the brain.
Afiadacampos
"Our emphasis on composition, and specifically composition for the relatively narrow dynamic range and timbral pallet of paired steel-string, acoustic guitars, directs us away from dependence on muscle memory and set phrases. These structures focus us on interactions that grow out of our immediate reactions to how each of us is, in the moment, interpreting the material." -- Scott Fields. "With Afiadacampos, I feel that Scott and I have deepened our ability to improvise together and to orchestrat…
A Fothermass Abominesque
This is the first collaboration by the two Nurse With Wound collaborators - Paris-based Quentin Rollet and Melbourne-based James Worse. Quentin has played with many musicians including the Red Krayola, the Legendary Pink Dots, and Nurse With Wound. He plays the alto sax and the sopranino, the smallest saxophone in the original saxophone family. James Worse has also worked with Nurse With Wound, Andrew Liles, Expose Your Eyes, and more. He plays percussion and spoken word on some of the tracks he…
With Archie Shepp, 7-Tette & Orchestra - Revisited
While his recordings with Archie Shepp and 7-Tette established Bill Dixon as a distinctive jazz modernist, ahead of the curve, creating a niche within a crowded field of emerging artists, it is Intents and Purposes (Orchestra) that established his singularity. Together, they constitute the first chapter of a recorded legacy that continues to grow in status and influence. – Bill Shoemaker
Live '71: The Kenny Wheeler Big Band & Friends
A soaringly joyous album from British trumpeter Kenny Wheeler – one that has him leading a larger group in a style that resonates with similar projects of the time from artists like Mike Westbrook or Michael Gibbs! Wheeler delivers some magnificent trumpet and flugelhorn solos – very much at the more straightforward, soulful side of his range – and the ensemble is overflowing with work from top-shelf contemporaries – including Mike Taylor on some key electric piano lines, next to Mike Osborne on…
Starting Fires: Live at The 100 Club, 1970
A sensational, previously unheard session by legendary British free jazz saxophonist Mike Osborne, recorded in December 1970 at London's famous 100 Club. From Osborne's personal tape collection. Feautures two compositions currently thought to be unrecorded in any other setting. Lineup: Mike Osborne - alto saxm Alan Skidmore - tenor sax, Harry Miller - double bass, Louis Moholo - drums. Original mastering by Mike King. Additional mastering by Matt Parker for British Progressive Jazz in associati…
A Jackson in Your House
Tip! *2023 repress* 'A Jackson in Your House' is the first of the Art Ensemble of Chicago’s renowned trio of albums for BYG's Actuel series. This album is The Art Ensemble’s most celebrated release and finds the American avant-garde jazz collective at their most sensational, mocking and startling original best in a session from June 1969, at Studio Saravah. Recorded in Paris during the aftermath of widespread anti-government protests and student riots, it demonstrates what can happen when four h…
Omnileliomatic
"It's a great honor to work with this incredible orchestra and in support of Lelio's legacy. Over the years I had the pleasure to work with Lelio within his community of Palermo and greater Sicilia. The last time was a little over a year before his passing when we toured Sicily together for a week culminating in a recording session with Eva Geraci and Alessandro Librio. This album was published on Astral Spirits as part of my Astral Traveling Series a month before Lelio died. In December, 2021, …