S&D - Contemporary Jazz

Search Morris, yeah, plus Joe+Mat Maneri, Ken Vandermark, Susie Ibarra, Paul Flaherty, Joe McPhee, Gold Sparkle Band, Fred Anderson, Cosmosomatics, Marilyn Crispell, Daniel Carter, Hamid Drake, Test, etc. etc. etc.... and that's just on the free side.

You thought so? I was really disappointed. Does Cooper-Moore often play the makeshift thing he was using Saturday? What he was playing was wonderful, but the sounds were awful. Also, I wanted Parker to stop playing walking lines so much. I wanted him to play arco more, let the music breathe a bit.

(I still haven't found a shop in BXL selling any of these yet grrr)

Sonny Sharrock put out an album titled "Ask the Ages" in 91with Pharoah Sanders on sax, Elvin Jones on drums, Charnett Moffett on bass and Bill Laswell on production and it's *wonderful*. doesn't get stuck in any of the trappings of a foul laswell production.

John Zorn's group Masada (with Joey Baron [dr], Dave Douglas [tr], and Greg Cohen [b]) has released millions of wonderful albums that mix Jewish Klezmer melodies and the firey playing of Ornette Coleman. good stuff.

Jazzmatazz is updated regularly and useful resource for keeping upto date with releases.

BBCi Music Jazz Reviews is worth a browse through.

Updates @ BBCi Jazz

and the mention of Raoul Bjorkenheim and his band Krakatau. great stuff by an amazing guitarist on ECM that you can usually find for really cheap used. Bjorkenheim just released an album called Scorch Trio on RuneGrammophon (amazing label) that is one of my new favorite albums of any genre. it's guitar, bass and drums and i like to call it "Heavy Modal". so fitting.

In fact a good part of the jazz I like has come form the last decade mostly surrounding the NYC improvisational scene, and most of the recent releases (2001,2002) have been excellent, and still have to get around to listening to a bunch of them.

ha ha ha..."millions"...LOL!

I too love James Carter, there's one song of his that he plays primarily on baritone, and he conjures some monstrous Rahsaan Roland Kirk meets Godzilla squonks that are disgustingly soul-shattering. I wish I knew the name!

As for other modern jazz stuff that's really good, I'd suggest anything Bela Fleck has done...the Flecktones stuff is of course awesome, but also check out the Bela Fleck/Edgar Meyer classical/jazz/grass stuff, it's quite stunning.

General comment: those people mentioning only musicians - please suggest recordings they've made to check out too. Thanks.

OK maybe its a strange thing to do. I think it would have been interesting if they had taken these comnpositions and used diff instrumentation. and did they do an anthony braxton cover?

I guess my point was that some people who might buy a Vandermark 5 record otherwise might not think to buy an Ornette Coleman record. Maybe not, though.