Feebles, Fables and Ferns captures a rare one-time coming together of luminaries Mick Goodrick and Fred Hersch, both active in Boston at the time, recorded in Hersch’s studio in New York, in August 1988. Looking back at the session almost four decades later, Hersch notes how “the highlight to me is just the level of ensemble playing. There was a lot of profound listening ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
The “Paramount” in Joe Lovano’s new quartet can be interpreted as a statement of intent. “I feel like at this point I’m on the rise,” Joe says, seemingly unaware of the decades of experience and several dozens of leader-recordings under his belt. “We've arrived at this unique place with this quartet – It’s very special. It's a new thing. Recording this with Manfred [Eicher] in the studio, ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
“Few contemporary jazz-influenced singers manage to sound so intensely like themselves while drawing on such a variety of genres, languages, and cultural backstories as the Albania-born vocalist Elina Duni,” The Guardian has noted, and Reaching for the Moon once again casts a wide net. It’s Duni’s third recording with UK guitarist Rob Luft, and where Lost Ships and A Time To ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
Their last album with works by Robert Schumann, Edvard Grieg and Tõnu Kõrvits saw the Gazzana sisters Natascia and Raffaella “achieve the highest levels of instinctive expression”, according to the French daily paper Le Monde, and one could argue that this holds even more true for their new recording with music by Sergei Prokofiev, Arvo Pärt and Alfred ...
Composer: Serge Prokofieff (1891-1953), Arvo Pärt (1935), Alfred Schnittke (1934-1998)
Genre: Classical
Subgenre: Instrumental
Judith Berkson, mezzo-soprano, pianist, composer and improviser returns on ECM with a compelling new album. “I view the pieces on this recording as a natural extension of my solo work,” says Judith Berkson. “This idea of songs that are quite intimate and personal, informed by jazz with pockets of improvisation but also drawing from song ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Vocal
Mountain Call is a peak achievement in Miroslav Vitous’s music, presenting the masterful bassist in varying ensemble configurations that prominently include the late French clarinetist Michel Portal and American drummer Jack DeJohnette, among others. Persuasively bringing together several tendencies and streams in Vitous’s work, the album bears testimony to his multiple skills as dynamic improviser, jazz composer, arranger and creative sampling pioneer. ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
Memento, the first duo release from US pianist Marilyn Crispell and Swedish bassist Anders Jormin, is an album of lyrical and subtle music-making, with compositions and improvisations that circle around ideas of memory and loss. Crispell previously appeared on Jormin’s cycle of sacred songs, In Winds, In Light (2004), and has long credited the Swedish bassist as an influence on her own musical thinking. ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
Patternmaster captures Mark Turner’s quartet at its most adventurous, sophisticated and hard-hitting. In his review of the West Coast-based saxophonist’s last quartet effort for ECM, 2022’s Return From The Stars, the Swiss daily Weltwoche’s Peter Rüedi spoke of “the leanest, most concentrated, and most inspired improvised chamber music imaginable.” It’s a fitting description of the tenor saxophonist’s powerful quartet endeavours ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
The release of con slancio, with premier recordings of music written by Swiss composer and nonpareil oboist Heinz Holliger, marks 40 years of collaboration with ECM New Series. Threaded throughout the album are strongly contrasting pieces dedicated to Holliger over the years by fellow composers. A spirit of vigor and enthusiasm animates both new pieces and tributes. ...
Composer: Heinz Holliger (1939-), Toshio Hosokawa (1955-), Jürg Wyttenbach (1935), György Kurtág (1926), Heinrich Sutermeister (1910-1995)
Genre: Classical
Subgenre: Instrumental
One look at my other Keith Jarrett reviews is enough to confirm that I have been guilty of separating his skills as performer and improviser from those of his role as composer. After listening to an album such as In The Light, however, I begin to suspect that for him they are one and the same. ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Crossover Jazz
The Jewel In The Lotus (Remastered)
The Jewel in the Lotus is the debut album by jazz woodwind player Bennie Maupin, recorded in March 1974 and released on ECM later that year. The sextet's rhythm section consists of pianist Herbie Hancock, bassist Buster Williams and percussionists Billy Hart, Freddie Waits and Bill Summers, with guest appearances from trumpeter Charles Sullivan. ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Free Jazz
The upright bass is, of course, a fixture of many jazz ensembles, in which it often “solos” but only over or surrounded by other instruments. Strange, then, that the thought of it on its own should be such a difficult one to swallow (no pun intended). Where most musicians might have fallen back on the comfort of overdubbing and other postproduction trickery, Dave ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Avantgarde Jazz
Old And New Dreams (Remastered)
Don Cherry, Dewey Redman, Charlie Haden and Ed Blackwell came together to celebrate the work of mentor Ornette Coleman, but the repertoire of their Old and New Dreams quartet soon blossomed into a project of much wider scope, addressing also the musical experiences the players had made ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
Ruta and Daitya is jazz album by pianist Keith Jarrett and drummer Jack DeJohnette, recorded in May 1971 and released on ECM Records in 1973—one of Jarrett's rare performances on electric keyboard. Keith Jarrett and Jack DeJohnette, who continue their formidable partnership to this day, join forces for an early and unique collaboration. This being the tail end of Jarrett’s electric period with Miles Davis, ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
Collin Walcott defined a corner of improvisation all his own with his unique approach to the sitar and tabla. When the newly-formed Gateway trio of John Abercrombie, Dave Holland and Jack DeJohnette joined him for “Cloud Dance” the results were magical. ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
Codona is an album by the American sitarist and tabla player Collin Walcott, American jazz trumpeter Don Cherry and Brazilian jazz percussionist Naná Vasconcelos (collectively known by the acronym Codona). It was recorded in September 1978 and released on ECM the following year — the first of three self-titled albums by the trio. ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
After Chick Corea’s Piano Improvisations, and Keith Jarrett’s Facing You, Paul Bley’s Open, To Love was the third fabulous chapter in ECM’s quietly revolutionary solo piano manifesto, whose impact endures and continues to influence improvisers today. In the liner notes to this Luminessence vinyl edition, Bley biographer Greg Buium writes, ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
Sart is the third album by Norwegian saxophonist Jan Garbarek, recorded over two days in April 1971 and released on ECM later that year—his second release for the label. The quintet features pianist Bobo Stenson, guitarist Terje Rypdal, and Afric Pepperbird rhythm section Arild Andersen and Jon Christensen. ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Fusion
As well as being the great vibraphone innovator of the era, Gary Burton is known for his unparalleled intuition as a talent scout. In 1973, The New Quartet introduced Abraham Laboriel: this was the first recording of the bassist who would soon become one of the most in-demand session players across all ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
Three Day Moon is an album by American jazz bassist Barre Phillips recorded in March 1978 and released on ECM later that year. The quartet features guitarist Terje Rypdal, Dieter Feichtner on synthesizer and percussionist Trilok Gurtu. "I have said it before and I will say it again: Barre Phillips is one of ECM’s most underrecognized treasures. A maverick of the upright bass, his is a mind in which one revels getting lost. ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
