What's New?

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A new release                                                                     U.S. release date: February 24, 2015

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IkGM0BR9KYI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tzPFTygvaxA

http://player.ecmrecords.com/brahem-2423-24

http://www.amazon.com/Souvenance-Anouar-Brahem/dp/B00NZ1E9GC

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A new release                                                  U.S. release date: March 10, 2015



   

With Made in Chicago, an exhilarating live album, Jack DeJohnette celebrates a
reunion with old friends. In 1962, DeJohnette, Roscoe Mitchell and Henry
Threadgill were all classmates at Wilson Junior College on Chicago's Southside,
pooling energies and enthusiasms in jam sessions. Shortly thereafter Jack joined
Muhal Richard Abrams' Experimental Band, and Roscoe and Henry soon followed him.
When Abrams cofounded the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians
in 1965, DeJohnette, Mitchell and Threadgill were all deeply involved from the
outset, presenting concerts and contributing to each other's work under the AACM
umbrella. Jack brought them together again for a very special concert at
Chicago's Millennium Park in August 2013, completing the group with the addition
of bassist/cellist Larry Gray. The concert recording — featuring compositions by
Roscoe, Henry, Muhal and Jack, plus group improvising — was mixed by Manfred
Eicher and Jack DeJohnette at New York's Avatar Studios. Made in Chicago is
issued as the AACM begins its 50th anniversary year.

Well, this certainly looks and sounds interesting.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=edLWmyTegvk

http://player.ecmrecords.com/dejohnette-2392

http://www.amazon.com/Made-Chicago-Jack-DeJohnette/dp/B00PX8DGC8
 

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Two new releases                              U.S. release date: March 17, 2015





Gefion is Danish guitarist Jakob Bro's first ECM album as leader, following recordings for the label as sideman with Paul Motian and
Tomasz Stanko. Like the work of those masters, Bro's balladeering distills a sense of jazz history in its specific and highly personal
atmospheres. The open forms of Bro's compositions leave plenty of space for his companions — drum legend Jon Christensen and
creative bassist-of-the-moment Thomas Morgan — to make their statements, interactively and in parallel. And there is space too for
the listener's imagination to follow the flow and the delicate melodic tracery of Bro's electric guitar in this thoughtful and poetic album.
Gefion was recorded in Oslo's Rainbow Studio in November 2013 and produced by Manfred Eicher.

http://player.ecmrecords.com/bro-2381

http://www.amazon.com/Gefion-Jakob-Bro-Trio/dp/B00R8PY26I/






Encore is a companion volume to Résumé, the widely praised solo album issued in 2011. Eberhard Weber returns once more to the
many live recordings of his tenure with the Jan Garbarek Group, isolating his bass solos and reworking them into new pieces with the
addition of his own keyboard parts. "I became what you might call a composer of New Music," says Weber, "with the proviso that I
make use of old things." This season's special guest is veteran Dutch flugelhorn player Ack van Rooyen. Van Rooyen, who played on
Weber's ECM leader date, The Colours of Chloë, more than 40 years ago, now adds his own subtle colours to Weber's contemporary
sound-montages. The bass solos were recorded between 1990 and 2007, in thirteen European cities, from Edinburgh to Seville, and
the music was mixed and edited at Studios La Buissonne in the South of France in November 2014.

http://player.ecmrecords.com/weber-2439

http://www.amazon.com/Encore-Eberhard-Weber/dp/B00QB8OMS6/

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An upcoming release                                 U.S. release date: April 14, 2015



ECM 2443


Tim Berne’s third ECM album, You’ve Been Watching Me, sees the saxophonist-composer again leading his ultra-dynamic New York band Snakeoil, but with the quartet
now a quintet due to the arrival of guitarist Ryan Ferreira, whose sound adds textural allure. The group’s 2013 release, Shadow Man, garnered Berne some of the highest
praise of his career as a composer and bandleader. The four-star DownBeat review said: “This music rocks and thinks, explores, deconstructs and, yes, it swings, in its
own identifiably angular, Berne-ian way.” Just as Berne has hit a new peak with his writing on You’ve Been Watching Me, his band has reached a heightened state of
collective interaction, realizing the compositions to a T. Snakeoil—with the leader on alto sax alongside pianist Matt Mitchell, clarinetist Oscar Noriega, percussionist Ches
Smith and Ferreira on electric and acoustic guitars—can still be bracingly kinetic. But there is new space in these compositions and more lyrical focus to the improvisations,
leading to a dramatic, even cinematic experience in such tracks as “Embraceable Me.” Put simply, Berne’s music has never been richer or more arresting.

Recorded December 2014 at The Clubhouse in Brooklyn, NY


http://www.amazon.com/Youve-Been-Watching-Bernes-Snakeoil/dp/B00TQESBZC

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An upcoming release                                                         U.S. release date: May 12, 2015


ECM 2450



Creation features music selected by Keith Jarrett from his improvised solo concerts recorded in 2014 in Japan,
Canada, and Europe. Where in the past the solo documentation has shown the improvisational process unfolding
over the course of a single evening, this time Jarrett zeroes in on the most revelatory moments from six concerts
in Tokyo, Toronto, Paris and Rome. With this departure, Jarrett gives us here the most up-to-the minute account
of his spontaneously created music.

Keith Jarrett — piano
Produced by Keith Jarrett
Executive Producer: Manfred Eicher


The tracklist above is per various sellers' websites. I'll edit and add to this post if track previews, etc.
become available.

Edit:  ECM Player  (in the menu at the top, click Music)


http://www.amazon.com/Creation-Keith-Jarrett/dp/B00V435UG6

Mr. Jarrett turns 70 in May. To mark the occasion, ECM has scheduled two releases: a classical album and
an album of solo inventions.

Creation is Jarrett's album of solo inventions. For information about his classical album, see this page at Amazon.

[Ron Thorne]

This celebration of Keith's music and 70th birthday via Creation should be wonderful. Glad to see this coming our way.

[Ron Thorne]

ECM Newsletter

Dear ECM Newsletter Subscriber,

In celebration of Keith Jarrett’s 70th birthday on May 8th, ECM Records releases two new albums by the great pianist: Creation and Barber/Bartók.

Happy Birthday, Keith!

Best wishes,
ECM Records




For much of the 1980s, Keith Jarrett balanced his improvisational activities with performances of classical music and contemporary composition. On this disc, with concert recordings from 1984 and 1985, he is heard playing Samuel Barber’s Piano Concerto op. 38 and Béla Bartók’s Piano Concerto No. 3, and rising to the challenges of these major works. The New York Times praised Jarrett’s playing of the Barber with Dennis Russell Davies in this period (“a sinewy, vigorously lyrical performance … both sensitive and strong”), and the Bartók with Kazuyoshi Akiyama was most enthusiastically received in Japan. After the Tokyo Bartók performance Jarrett returned alone to the stage of the Kan-i Hoken Hall to play a touching improvised encore, also documented on this recording. The album includes liner notes by Keith Jarrett and Paul Griffiths.

ECM Player

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A May 2015 release is reviewed  in JT's Record Reviews forum, here.

At Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Only-Sky-David-Torn/dp/B00UBZLIBY               ECM Player ("Music" heading)

[Ron Thorne]

In September, ECM will release another outstanding highlight: 'Hommage à Eberhard Weber'

In January 2015 musicians and listeners converged upon Stuttgart’s Theaterhaus for two consecutive nights to celebrate the 75th birthday of Eberhard Weber. The concerts centered around a specially commissioned 35-minute suite by Pat Metheny, with whom Weber had played and recorded back in the 1970s. Featuring Metheny, the SWR BigBand Band conducted by Helge Sunde, Gary Burton, bassist Scott Colley and Danny Gottlieb on drums, the composition was arranged around recordings of solos by Weber. Other performers during the two nights playing selections from Weber’s vast body of work were Weber’s longtime companions Jan Garbarek, Paul McCandless, and arranger Michael Gibbs, all drawing ovations from the packed house. - ECM Records

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In September, ECM will release another outstanding highlight: 'Hommage à Eberhard Weber'

More about that
upcoming release:

                                                                    ECM Player ("Music" heading)
The CD at Amazon (which will eventually list it as an upcoming U.S. release):
http://www.amazon.com/Hommage-Eberhard-Weber-Pat-Metheny/dp/B012DCFVUG/

The digital version at Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/Hommage-à-Eberhard-Weber-Live/dp/B013A6YYTS/

The digital version at iTunes:
https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/hommage-a-eberhard-weber-live/id1027500498?app=itunes/

In January 2015 musicians and listeners converged upon Stuttgart’s Theaterhaus for two consecutive nights to celebrate the 75th birthday of Eberhard Weber.

The two nights of concerts have also been the subject of some previous posts in JT's ECM Records forum, in both What's New? and Upcoming Gigs for ECM Recording Artists.

Re the first night's concert:

Today (23rd) at 20:00 MEZ (6 pm in Central Europe = noon in New York) there will be a live video stream from the first concert via internet: . . .

Has the concert been archived?

Certainly, German public television archives everything. But it is not accessible by the public, not by internet.

It is now, here: Edit: I removed a link to the source because the video was indeed available only until September 2, 2015.

But according to Google's translation of some info. below the video, it will be available only until September 2, 2015:

8/2/2015 | 59:22 minutes | Available until 9/2/2015 | Source: SWR

(A different video of the concert has been posted on YouTube, but it's almost inaudible.)

   Edit: Justin (jtx) posted a video player in the next post, but the video is no longer available—

 

[jtx]

Video is available now for viewing directly from JT:


Original is here: http://www.ardmediathek.de/goto/tv/29820094

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A new release


                             ECM Player ("Music" heading)
The CD at Amazon (which will eventually list it as an Aug. 28 release):               
http://www.amazon.com/Wild-Dance-Enrico-Rava-Quartet/dp/B00ZVJ95X8/
 

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A new release                                             U.S. release date: October 30, 2015



ECM Player ("Music" heading)


The CD at Amazon (which will eventually price it appropriately for a U.S. release):
http://www.amazon.com/Time-Blind-Guide-Thomas-Stronen/dp/B014QC8BXA/
 

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Ben Monder: electric guitar, electric baritone guitar
Pete Rende: synthesizer
Andrew Cyrille: drums, percussion
Paul Motian: drums

Guitarist Ben Monder first recorded for ECM as a member of the Paul Motian Band on Garden of Eden in 2004, and Amorphae was originally conceived as a series of duets for Ben and Paul. A first exploratory duo session was recorded in 2010. After Motian's death the following year it was decided to expand and complete the project with another highly influential and innovative drummer, Andrew Cyrille, adding also Pete Rende on synthesizer on two pieces.

So here we hear Monder solo, in duo with Motian, in duo with Cyrille, and in trio with Cyrille and Rende.

Tracks 2, 6, 8 recorded October 2010 at Sear Sound by James A. Farber
Tracks 1, 3, 4, 5, 7 recorded December 2013 at Brooklyn Recording by Rick Kwan

Produced by Sun Chung


Although the material in this post originated with ECM as usual, it's not on ECM's website or FB page yet (I compiled it from various other sources). That may be because this time the U.S. release date is apparently the earliest, in some cases by quite a few weeks.

At Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Amorphae-Ben-Monder/dp/B0142XHVX4
 

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At Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/The-First-Quartet-3-CD/dp/B015RK8TZA

Edit: And now, at ECM's revamped website: https://www.ecmrecords.com/catalogue/1443703901
 

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  Recorded June 14–16, 2015 at Avatar Studios, NY
  Recording Engineer: James Farber
  Producer: Manfred Eicher



Although the material in this post originated with ECM as usual, it's not on ECM's website or FB page yet (I compiled it from various other sources).

The Bell at Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/The-Bell-Ches-Smith/dp/B0185YNE8M
 

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A thread in JT's forum Jazz News/R.I.P.:

Paul Bley: November 10, 1932 – January 3, 2016 — R.I.P.



R.I.P.
 

 

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At Amazon:
       Avishai Cohen—Into The Silence
       Michael Formanek Ensemble Kolossus—The Distance
 

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Trumpeter Ralph Alessi’s ECM leader debut — 2013’s Baida — was the album where “everything came together for him,” according to Nate Chinen in a JazzTimes profile. “Without abandoning his yen for oppositional energies, it’s a beautifully coherent statement, not just his most accomplished album but a contender for one of [the] year’s best.” Baida indeed went on to become the most lauded release of Alessi’s career, with the New York Times praising the music for its balance of “elegant precision and power.”

With Quiver, Alessi teams with pianist Gary Versace and the trumpeter's longtime rhythm section of choice, bassist Drew Gress and drummer Nasheet Waits, to create a follow-up of quicksilver melodicism and subtly energized rhythm. . . .

Recorded September 29–30, 2014 at Rainbow Studio, Oslo
Recording Engineer: Jan Erik Kongshaug
Producer: Manfred Eicher

At Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Quiver-Ralph-Alessi-Quartet/dp/B019ITS7YY
 

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A cosmic rhythm with each stroke features pianist Vijay Iyer and the musician he has described as his “hero, friend and teacher,” trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith.

Vijay has previously played extensively with Wadada in Smith’s Golden Quartet, but the present album, produced by Manfred Eicher at New York’s Avatar Studios in October 2015, is the first documentation of their duo work.

The centerpiece of the album is the spellbinding title suite, dedicated to Nasreen Mohamedi (1937–1990), the innovative Indian artist whose improvisatory imagery evokes abstracted rhythms. Trumpet and piano interact here with creative sensitivity to tone, texture and space.

Vijay Iyer and Wadada Leo Smith will be premiering A cosmic rhythm with each stroke at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art in March 2016 in the context of a major exhibition dedicated to Nasreen Mohamedi’s art and writings.

The “suite for Nasreen” is framed on the album by Iyer’s composition “Passage” and Smith’s concluding piece, “Marian Anderson,” inspired by the great U.S. contralto.


At Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Cosmic-Rhythm-Each-Stroke/dp/B01AK5SKP6

 

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A thread in JT's forum Jazz News / R.I.P.:

Naná Vasconcelos — R.I.P.


Edit: My post dated Sun Mar 27, 2016 contains a memorial tribute that ECM wrote earlier in March.

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For Birdwatching, her third ECM album, Israeli pianist Anat Fort augments her long-established trio with bassist Gary Wang and drummer Roland Schneider with a special guest: Italian reedman Gianluigi Trovesi.

Fort and Trovesi have made a number of appearances together in recent years (from Italy's Novara Jazz Festival to the Tel Aviv Opera House), to critical acclaim, and Birdwatching, with its lively, bright music, takes their rapport to the next level.

There is an alert sense of joy in the playing. Of her album's title, Anat Fort says, "Many of my songs are inspired by movements of things in nature: animals, clouds, winds, water. . . . I didn't know what this record would be called, but when I listened to the finished master, I knew it had to do with the movement of birds, and with watching, listening, waiting. It is as much about bird-watching outside as about watching that inner bird, the soul."

Quartet music is interspersed with improvised solo piano as the story unfolds in a series of vignettes.

Birdwatching was recorded at the Auditorio Stelio Molo RSI, Lugano, and produced by Manfred Eicher.


https://www.ecmrecords.com/catalogue/1452784619

At Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Birdwatching-Anat-Fort/dp/B01A7VVLYK
 

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There is a lot of history concentrated in Jack DeJohnette’s adventurous new trio. Fifty years ago, as a guest with John Coltrane’s group, Jack DeJohnette played with the fathers of Ravi Coltrane and Matthew Garrison, and the program of In Movement opens with Coltrane’s harrowing and still pertinent elegy “Alabama.”

Other covers include the classic “Blue In Green” by Miles Davis and Bill Evans (Jack is one of the few musicians to have played in the bands of both men) and “Serpentine Fire,” from the songbook of Earth, Wind & Fire, a tribute to Maurice White — who also collaborated with Jack in the early years.

“The Two Jimmys” is an hommage to Jimi Hendrix and Jimmy Garrison, innovators both, and “Rashied” salutes the late Rashied Ali, another great drummer from Coltrane’s cosmos.

For all the wealth of references, this is indeed a band in movement, taking the music forward. Ravi Coltrane and Matt Garrison, in their ECM debuts, both respond magnificently to DeJohnette’s driving drumming, Ravi with superb solos, Garrison with lean bass lines and imaginative looping electronics.

Jack DeJohnette: “We are connected at a very high and extremely personal level that I believe comes through in the music.”

In Movement was recorded at New York’s Avatar Studios in October 2015 and produced by Manfred Eicher.


At Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/In-Movement-Jack-DeJohnette/dp/B01CP7WXDW
 

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Andando el Tiempo features new music of wide emotional compass by Carla Bley, and underlines her originality and resourcefulness as a jazz composer.

“Saints Alive!” sets up animated conversations between the three musical participants with striking statements from Steve Swallow’s bass guitar and Andy Sheppard’s soprano sax. The stately “Naked Bridges / Diving Brides” draws inspiration from Mendelssohn and the poetry of Paul Haines. And the powerful three-part title composition — which addresses the trials and tribulations of recovery from addiction — moves through sorrow to hopefulness and joy.

The trio with Sheppard and Swallow has been an ideal vehicle for Carla’s writing for more than 20 years and also provides one of the best contexts for her unique piano playing.

Like the critically lauded ECM album Trios (2012), Andando el Tiempo was recorded at Lugano’s RSI Studio and produced by Manfred Eicher.


At Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Andando-El-Tiempo-Carla-Bley/dp/B01CP7WWYM
 

[Ron Thorne]

Miroslav Vitous double bass, keyboards Gary Campbell soprano & tenor saxophone Roberto Bonisolo soprano & tenor saxophone
Aydin Esen keyboards Gerald Cleaver drums Nasheet Waits drums

The great Czech bassist returns once more to the music of Weather Report, the group he co-founded with Joe Zawinul and Wayne
Shorter in 1970. It’s the improvisational freedom of the early Weather Report that most interests Vitous, and he abides by their old
rallying call “everyone solos and no one solos”. Some well-known Report repertoire is re-explored interspersed along the way with
three new blues tunes from Vitous’s pen.