Avant Garde 2023

Ground, primitive energy, sensitivity and beauty and the Nordic Nature with it’s rhythms. A small ensemble plays compositions by the late great Finnish composer/drummer/bandleader, Edward Vesala (1945-1999).

On their first stand-alone record as a duo, Ken Vandermark and Hamid Drake celebrate their 30+ year playing relationship with an electrifying live set of pieces, all featuring music composed by legendary free jazz musician Don Cherry. Restricting himself here to tenor saxophone, Vandermark has developed an almost telepathic understanding with Drake, whose masterful work on the drum kit has rarely been more focused and relaxed.

The Zentaur-Quartett, founded in 2017, is dedicated exclusively to contemporary music. The double album String Quartets by aDevantgarde Composers is the debut release of the young ensemble, whose members are graduates of the Munich University of Music and Theatre. The works collected on this album from the years 1997-2019 are a passionate plea for the string quartet genre and open up 13 very different musical worlds. The stylistic spectrum ranges from microtonal sound pieces to compositions with late Romantic echoes.

Written in December of 2020, Multiplicities: A Repository of Non-Existent Objects is a collection of twenty musical aphorisms inspired by the writings and thought of Gilles Deleuze. Volume One, released in 2022, featured the first set of ten compositions performed by the powerful electric ensemble Chaos Magick.

For this fourth collaboration between saxophonists Ron Caines and Martin Archer, they've concentrated on the pure, raw jazz feel of Ron's playing - a rawness which reflects Charles Parker filtered through the prism of British jazz from the 70s or thru AACM music, rather than then more polished sound of many of today's players.

Jazz trumpet virtuoso Ambrose Akinmusire is known for his "unfurling lines that confound expectation" (Chicago Tribune) and the "strong aesthetic compass" (The New York Times) that guides his compositions.

The promising Swiss pianist and the legendary Danish saxophonist share a special bond with music: united by a common ideal of beauty, they venture into the world of free improvisation. The duo's impressive concerts, in which Zeuthen's melodic fragments are enveloped by Oswald's resonant blocks of sound, have generated enthusiasm among lovers of improvised music.

The music of Camilo Méndez is a melting pot where a seeming gallimaufry of disparate influences coalesces into harmonious, cohesive works of monumental proportions. It draws inspiration from literature and the visual arts, from geography and philosophy, and from experiences lived on multiple continents. While Méndez’s soundworld has an unquestionable affinity with that of European composers like Helmut Lachenmann and his mentors Pierluigi Billone and Rebecca Saunders, the conceptual underpinning of his works is filled with allusions to composers, writers, and visual artists from his native Latin America, and with subtle references to his own professional pursuits and artistic collaborations in North America and Southeast Asia.

Marek Pospieszalski continues the project dedicated to the twentieth-century Polish school of composition, this time focusing on the works of women. Starting from the String Quartet No. 1 by Grażyna Bacewicz, to the first compositions by Agata Zubel.

3xCD set of Anthropology Band live in 2022 at the Newcastle Festival Of Jazz And Improvised Music and at Cafe Oto, London.