Albrecht Maurer | Norbert Rodenkirchen | Hidden Fresco | Nemu Records

Beauty is unearthed and unabashedly displayed throughout Hidden Fresco, the latest release from the German duo of Albrecht Maurer and Norbert Rodenkirchen. Their use of medieval instruments to explore contemporary sounds cultivates a fresh perspective on modern improvisation. The warm timbre of the instrumentation softens the edge of harsh dissonance while enhancing tonal resolve. There’s a sense of urgency that permeates the entire disc. Maurer (gothic fiddle) and Rodenkirchen (medieval flutes and harp) are not intent on wasting sonic space. From the frenzied opening notes of the title track to the passionate evocation of “Behind,” the duo is unwavering in their search for musical unification. … Maurer and Rodenkirchen are both technical masters; their incorporation of percussive effects, chords, and rapid lines portray sympathetic artists who are able to push the boundaries of archaic instrumentation to express a full range of emotion. — John Barron – Jazzreview.com / 2007 Continue reading

Bruce Eisenbeil | Klaus Kugel | Perry Robinson | Peter Evans | Hilliard Greene | Carnival Skin | Nemu Records

Passionately concocted free jazz played with a strong, but never stolid, consensus of purpose. / This is definitely a group were variance of experience and style work as core virtues. / sharp-toothed collective improvisation / dynamic shifts that stretch from passages of somber quiet to flareups of explosive jangling catharsis. — Derek Taylor , ALLABOUTJAZZ.COM Continue reading

Michel Edelin Quartet | Resurgence | RogueArt Jazz

Here is a group that is not mere circumstance a group that has a sense of durability! Eighteen years after an already accomplished first recording, the four musicians show in any case that the disorganized effects of commercial culture have no influence on an artistic desire newly reaffirmed in this gushing Resurgence, leaving eleven themes/sources drifting on its unique current linked in a distanced aesthetic which does not challenge the history of jazz but is known to be gaily unsubdued by current trends and to codes which guide a certain “European jazz”. — Bernard Aime (Translation Marie Alleyrat) Continue reading

Joshua Abrams Quartet | Unknown Known | RogueArt Jazz

RogueArt continues its Chicago jazz love affair with Unknown Known a quartet featuring Josh Abrams on bass, David Boykin on tenor sax, Jason Adasiewicz on vibes, and Frank Rosaly on drums. In many ways, Unknown Known sticks to those Chicago roots: even it its wilder flights, it always has a foot planted in composition and structure. It’s jazz that comes up under the tutelage of the AACM, which constantly pushed boundaries without ever entirely dispensing with them. Continue reading

Nicole Mitchell | Engraved in the Wind | RogueArt Jazz

This recording is a virtuosic tour-de-force. The technical achievement of this music stands on its own and defines Nicole Mitchell as an innovator and expressive artist with a depth of mastery that surpasses even that which we already know about her. Consider the exacting precision of every sound made here, the multi-phonics, the sustain and variation of pitch, the rhythmic phrasing, the sheer beauty of the intonation, the arch and fluid execution of every phrase regardless of the velocity or density of notes, and the. tremendous and complex variety of timbre, articulation, and variation of groove. All of these elements make Engraved in the Wind a masterful work of solo music, a great achievement for Nicole Mitchell and a deeply rewarding listening experience for the rest of us. — Joe Morris, November 2012 Continue reading

Jeff Albert’s Instigation Quartet | The Tree On The Mound | RogueArt Jazz

The art of throwing spinning-tops It’s on. It’s overflowing with energy.The music tosses the spinning-top of reality, since playing is spinning around what is, where hides what is not, what once was, and what one day will be. To play is to drill. And to improvise is to recover and develop “the faculty and the ability to ceaselessly birth sensations.” (Novalis) To improvise is to make the world flow, or to let oneself go as it flows. Sounds visit us and their levels rise within us like the waters of a flooding river – closeness of the Nile and the Mississippi. (Edward “Kidd” Jordan is the instigator of River Niger, a composition sometimes played by this quartet, which is at Jeff Albert’s instigation). When he is playing, Jeff Albert, proud heir of the tailgaters, has all the dykes and seawalls at his disposition. When he is playing, “Kidd” Jordan accumulates cataracts and deltas. There are at least two types of accumulation: the methodical accumulation of the merchant economy, the one which compiles and compacts, which amasses objects, signs, bits and pieces, which amasses time-frames also, in order to confirm them in their conformity and isolation. There is the poetic accumulation: it is spasmodic, disparate, thought-provoking -while it gathers, it squanders; while is uses, it rejuvenates. Lucid silt. — Alexandre Pierrepont (Translation: Romain Tesler) Continue reading

Dissoi Logoi | Nyx | Amirani Records

tHe nyX ProJect The title we chose for this project is the name given by the Greeks to the NIGHT, which was not only a moment of the day but most of all a primordial goddess. NYX is mother to good-natured children like Hypnos (Sleep), Oneiroi (Dream), Hesperides (sunset Nymphs associated with dance and chant) and Philotes (Pleasure of love, Friendship, Tenderness) … but NYX generated also terribly ill-natured children among which Thànatos (Death), Moros (Doom), the Keres (goddesses of violent death), the Moirae (the”Fates”, the three crones who control destiny, in Rome known as “le Parche”) Continue reading

Herb Robertson | Dave Kaczorowski | Adrian Valosin | Party Enders | Not Two Records

Trumpeter Herb Robertson is one of these underrated and underrecorded musicians and each time a new CD is released, it is a pleasure to hear him play, whether as a sideman or here, as the leader of a trio with Dave Kaczorowski on double bass and Adrian Valosin on drums. Next to trumpet, Robertson also plays cornet, fluegelhorn, english hunting horn, penny-whistles, Romanian reed flute, mutes, electronic mutes, bells, castanets and vocals on the first track. — Stef Continue reading

Kirk Knuffke | Mike Pride | The Exterminating Angel | Not Two Records

I have always been involved in a lot of duo projects with all types of improvisors, from all types of musical backgrounds. This has a little to do with economics, and a lot to do with a search for deeper friendships -and/or mentorships. There are new, organic worlds-of-sound that two connected people can create when given the chance to develop intimately, over time, with honest reflection. Generally speaking, there tends to be a specific musical aesthetic at play in my duo projects, sometimes with very strict rules or a very defined direction – my duets with Jon Irabagon, Charlie Looker (Period) & Jamie Saft (Kalashnikov) immediately come to mind. The playing with Kirk is altogether different. Kirk and I just play. Kirk swings, kirk sings, kirk explores extreme registers of the cornet, and I just play, moment-to-moment. A truly pleasurable improvised music. – Mike Pride Continue reading