Norway’s Jon Balke proposes a new sonic dimension with Skrifum, continuing a line of inquiry begun with Warp (2016) and Discourses (2020), solo piano albums which also processed the acoustic environment in which the music was heard. Skrifum, however, takes things a step further, as is apparent from the outset. ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
After twenty-plus years of shared activity, the Billy Hart Quartet – with Mark Turner, Ethan Iverson and Ben Street – is still distinguished by its stylistic openness, a consequence of setting out to embrace all the things that drummer-leader Hart likes to play. “If ever there was an example of contemporary jazz that draws extensively on all ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
THE KÖLN CONCERT, the most successful solo jazz album of all time, is an awe-inspiring work of improvisation and invention. There is a consensus among critics, listeners and musicians alike that this, Keith Jarrett’s second solo piano concert recording (after Solo-Concerts Bremen/Lausanne), is a milestone not only of Keith Jarrett’s work, but of ...
Composer: Keith Jarrett (1945)
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
For Lullaby, Norwegian trumpeter Mathias Eick draws on the quartet formation in a programme that includes some of his most exploratory and improvisatory qualities to date, with a cast of ECM familiars Kristjan Randalu and Ole Morten Vågan on piano and bass, and new arrival Hans Hulbækmo on drums. ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
Soprano saxophonist Yuval Cohen’s debut for the label is a thrilling offering that captures the brother of long-time ECM traveller Avishai Cohen charting innovative paths through eight originals in graceful interplay with his quartet. Pianist Tom Oren, bassist Alon Near and Alon Benjamini on drums are longtime acquaintances of Yuval’s who are not only outstanding ...
Composer: Yuval Cohen (1973)
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
“I've found the rarest score in the world. A year before his famous Köln Concert in 1975, Keith Jarrett composed a work for solo piano that he never played. It's called Ritual. After a quest lasting several years, it is finally on my music stand. Only four of us in the world have it! Alongside this masterpiece, I offer four other works by Jarrett. ...
Composer: Keith Jarrett (1945)
Genre: Classical
Subgenre: Instrumental
Julia Hülsmann’s quartet resurfaces with a fresh Norwegian voice on horn in tow and presents an attractive batch of originals that finds the group thoughtfully exploring common ground with a knack for adventure. When saxophonist Uli Kempendorff first joined Julia’s trio on 2019’s Not Far From Here, a new sense of expressionist urgency was ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
François Couturier and Dominique Pifarély, defining figures in creative music in France, renew their special connection on Preludes and Songs, an album of sensitive interaction, improvisational flair, and wide ranging artistic reference. Almost three decades have elapsed since the last ECM album by the pianist and violinist ...
Composer: Francois Couturier (1950)
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
Back with a newly formed quintet, gathered together for a particularly fruitful 2024 session in Southern France, the German-American pianist Benjamin Lackner now presents a different side of his composer-approach that should go a step further in exposing Lackner as a force to be reckoned with in the contemporary jazz world. Trumpeter Mathias Eick is the sole returnee from Lackner’s debut ...
Composer: Benjamin Lackner (1976)
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
A strikingly unorthodox album, with a unique sense of flow, Relations brings together kindred spirits from scattered compass points and traditions, and tells us something new about each of them. Conceived and realized over a four year period, the album is both a thoughtful collection of duos and solos and ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
Norwegian bassist Arild Andersen, an ECM recording artist since 1970, presents his first-ever solo album. Characteristically broad in its musical scope and creative range, Landloper was recorded primarily at Oslo’s Victoria Nasjonal Jazzscene. Choice of repertoire in this recital reflects on Arild’s musical journey, and, alongside original ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
Recorded ten years ago in New York, and released now for the first time, Taking Turns is a snapshot of Jakob Bro’s music in a period of transition. In a chronological discography of Bro’s sessions, it would follow Gefion, the Danish guitarist’s leader debut for ECM, by a few months. ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
Departing the Wasteland, the new album by Finnish pianist and composer Alexi Tuomarila, marks the beginning of a new creative flowering for him and also 20 years of playing with the trio that’s at the heart of the album: Mats Eilertsen on bass and Olavi Louhivuori on drums. Portuguese guitarist Andre Fernandes and guest players add richness and texture to the trio sound ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Modern Jazz
The Colin Vallon Trio has found its own space in the crowded world of the piano trio by quietly challenging its conventions. On its third ECM album Vallon again leads the group not with virtuosic solo display but by patient outlining of melody and establishing of frameworks in which layered group improvising can take place. Reviewing the group’s 2014 release Le Vent, ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
To the Rising Moon is Stephan Micus’ 26th solo album for ECM. It features instruments from Colombia, India, Xinjiang (China), Bavaria, Cambodia, Egypt and Borneo, which have never before been combined in one composition. People often call themselves a multi-instrumentalist when they play three or four instruments, ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Crossover Jazz
It must be considered a stroke of good fortune that these three musicians have come together: On double bass, the Swede Anders Jornim, one of the most essential bass players on the European jazz scene with eight albums as bandleader for ECM and a packed artistic CV with tours and recordings alongside legends ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
Beethoven: The Piano Concertos
Alexander Lonquich, one of the foremost performers in chamber music and as a soloist, has said that “every encounter with a work of art is at the same time an exploration of one's own existential position. This is the only way to make music today.” The New York Times has called him “an original at the piano who features both orderliness and suppleness”, ...
Composer: Ludwig van Beethoven (1770–1827)
Genre: Classical
Subgenre: Concertos
The Old Country (Live at the Deer Head Inn)
Keith Jarrett’s recordings from the Deer Head Inn have a special place among his recordings devoted to explorations of jazz standards and the American songbook. And The Old Country is a document of particular historical significance, from several perspectives. ...
Composer: Keith Jarrett (1945)
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
For her first solo-violoncello album on ECM’s New Series, Anja Lechner devotes herself to a particularly unique convergence of three composers from vastly different contexts: JS Bach, Carl Friedrich Abel and Tobias Hume. In the past, her extensive discography has captured the cellist as part of the renowned Rosamunde Quartett, as well as ...
Composer: Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750), Carl Friedrich Abel (1723-1787), Tobias Hume (1569-1645)
Genre: Classical
Subgenre: Instrumental
"Little Big III", the third studio album from his band Little Big featuring guitarist Greg Tuohey, bassist David Ginyard Jr., and drummer Jongkuk Kim. Little Big III is the second album that Parks has recorded on Blue Note as a bandleader, following 2008’s Invisible Cinema, a powerfully modern, post-genre concept for improvised music in the 21st century that recently ...
Genre: Jazz
Subgenre: Contemporary Jazz
