Enrico Rava’s Fearless Five Join Forces With Joe Lovano on Corners

Italian trumpet legend Enrico Rava embraces a new generation of musicians on Corners, the first ECM recording by his Fearless Five, with acclaimed American saxophonist Joe Lovano joining the ensemble for an adventurous collection of all-original music.

The Fearless Five were born almost spontaneously at an impromptu concert outside Rome in 2022. Rava recalls being so impressed by the chemistry among the musicians that he decided on the spot that they should become his new band. The group takes its name from Rava’s composition “Fearless Five,” first recorded on his 1978 Enrico Rava Quartet album.

That spirit of spontaneity is central to Corners. The album combines Rava’s unmistakably lyrical trumpet voice with the individual personalities of trombonist Matteo Paggi, guitarist Francesco Diodati, bassist Ponticello and drummer Evita Polidoro. Lovano adds another dimension, bringing his expansive knowledge of jazz history while responding instinctively to the younger players.

Rava and Lovano are longtime collaborators, having previously worked together on the acclaimed 2019 album Roma. Their musical relationship gives Corners an especially compelling Italo-American character, with the two veteran improvisers interacting with a younger generation whose approach is equally comfortable with melody, abstraction and free-form exploration.

“Certo Angeli Segreti,” an original by Rava, opens the album with a cool, spacious atmosphere. The horns move in and out of the arrangement, with Rava offering melodic clarity, Paggi supplying a strong lower-register presence and Lovano ranging freely across the musical landscape.

The album's repertoire is deliberately democratic. Rava, Lovano and every member of the Fearless Five contribute original compositions, reflecting the fact that each musician is also a bandleader and composer in their own right. Rava says the approach makes Corners notably different from his other albums, allowing each member to bring a distinctive musical perspective to the group.

The result is a program in which deeply melodic passages coexist naturally with free improvisation. Guitarist Diodati and bassist Ponticello contribute ballads, while Polidoro steps forward as a vocalist on her evocative composition “Le Mie Gamb.”

Lovano’s “Sun Rava” begins as an abstract blues before gradually moving into less predictable territory, with the band continually shifting the momentum. Rava’s “Hitchcock at the Beach” carries a nostalgic quality and provides Lovano with an opportunity for an extended solo, while “Tone, Shape and Colours” is a free improvisation built around a motif from Lovano that creates an animated conversation among the three horn players.

“Bowery Dance” reaches back into Rava’s own history. The earthy groove comes from an older composition inspired by his experiences during his years in New York, giving the album another connection between his Italian roots and American jazz influences.

The closing track, Paggi’s “Mamma,” brings Corners to a tender conclusion, offering a final contrast to the album’s more exploratory moments.

Throughout the recording, Rava gives his musicians considerable freedom, trusting their instincts rather than tightly directing the music. That confidence is perhaps the defining characteristic of Corners: a veteran artist creating space for younger players to challenge, reshape and expand his musical language.

Recorded July 21–23, 2025 at Auditorium Parco della Musica in Rome and produced by Manfred Eicher, Corners arrives October 16, 2026 on ECM. It captures Enrico Rava not looking backward, but continuing to explore what can happen when experience, youthful energy and improvisational freedom meet in the same room.

Keith Jarrett’s Roma Completes His Extraordinary 2016 European Solo Concert Series

ECM will release Roma on November 6, 2026, the fifth and final concert recording from Keith Jarrett’s acclaimed 2016 European solo tour. Recorded at Santa Cecilia Hall in Rome on July 12, 2016, the album brings the remarkable series to a close with a performance that has a character and identity all its own.

Jarrett’s 2016 tour produced five extraordinary solo concerts, each revealing a different side of his approach to spontaneous composition. Budapest Concert, Munich 2016, Bordeaux Concert, New Vienna and now Roma collectively document an artist at the height of his improvisational powers, creating complete musical structures in real time.

The Rome performance unfolds as a continuous journey through ten improvised parts, followed by two familiar encores. Jarrett begins by essentially clearing the musical canvas in “Part I,” gradually building momentum through dense chromatic lines and sharply articulated figures before allowing recognizable themes and sustained tones to emerge.

“Part II” continues in a darker, more organized vein, while the subsequent sections move through contrasting textures, unexpected counterpoint and passages of intense rhythmic concentration. Rather than sounding like a collection of unrelated improvisations, the performance develops into a large-scale architectural work, with each section contributing to the overall shape.

There are moments throughout Roma that demonstrate just how wide Jarrett’s musical vocabulary remained. In “Part V,” he seemingly pulls a swinging gospel performance out of thin air. “Part VI” is marked by expansive, arpeggiated harmonic structures, while “Part IX” digs into a gritty blues vocabulary. Elsewhere, Jarrett's lifelong affection for the songcraft of the first half of the 20th century emerges through melodies that sound almost like standards, even though they are being invented on the spot.

By “Part X,” Jarrett returns the music to something resembling the blank canvas with which he began. The concert then concludes with two of his most beloved encores, “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” and “It’s A Lonesome Old Town.” Both pieces are familiar territory for Jarrett, but his performances are anything but routine, with fresh phrasing and renewed emotional weight.

At the time of the Rome concert, La Repubblica captured the essence of Jarrett’s solo performances, describing him as celebrating a timeless ritual and paying tribute to “the act of creation” through spontaneous composition before an audience. That description seems particularly appropriate when looking back at the entire 2016 tour.

The five concerts were performed over just 13 days, yet each became its own musical world. Budapest ranged from abstract, polyrhythmic improvisation to blues and bebop-inspired passages. Munich was notable for its extraordinary intensity. Bordeaux moved between atonality, hymn-like lyricism, blues and deeply affecting melodic passages. New Vienna presented a more concise, suite-like approach, with nine distinct sections and Jarrett’s characteristic command of melody, space and dynamics.

Roma completes that sequence without simply looking backward. There is a sense of summation, but not retrospection. Jarrett remains focused on the moment, responding to the piano, the room and his own musical instincts as the performance develops.

The album also arrives as part of a continuing series of archival and reissue projects surrounding Jarrett's extraordinary recorded legacy. ECM will also reissue Jasmine, Jarrett’s intimate 2010 collaboration with bassist Charlie Haden, on vinyl November 20, 2026, as part of the label’s Luminessence audiophile series.

Originally recorded at Jarrett’s home studio in New Jersey, Jasmine reunited the pianist and Haden more than three decades after their earlier recordings together. The duo explores a selection of classic standards including “Body and Soul,” “For All We Know,” “Where Can I Go Without You” and “Don’t Ever Leave Me.” The album's understated intimacy stands in striking contrast to the expansive solo improvisation heard on Roma, but both recordings reveal the same fundamental quality: Jarrett's extraordinary ability to listen, respond and create in the moment.

With Roma, ECM completes one of the most significant archival chapters in Keith Jarrett’s solo career. The album doesn't merely document another concert from 2016. It preserves another singular musical event from an artist whose entire career was built around the idea that the most compelling performance might be the one that could never be repeated.

Charlotte Greve’s WATERBODIES Embraces Musical Possibility, Intimacy and the Unexpected

For Charlotte Greve, WATERBODIES is less a statement of stylistic identity than an invitation into the full breadth of her musical world. Produced by Grammy-nominated Shahzad Ismaily, the forthcoming album brings together an expansive cast of collaborators, including the New York-based vocal ensemble KHORIKOS and the Bratislava Symphony Orchestra, while reflecting Greve’s own history as a sought-after sidewoman for artists such as Chris Morrissey, Laura Veirs, Cass McCombs, Cassandra Jenkins and Matt Pavolka.

Rather than pursuing a single sound, WATERBODIES deliberately moves in multiple directions. Spoken word sits alongside full orchestral arrangements, improvised jazz gives way to synth-pop, intimate ballads coexist with expansive compositions, and the record eventually settles into a serene, arpeggiated closing track. The result is an album unified not by genre, but by Greve’s instinct to follow her curiosity wherever it leads.

That openness also makes the record deeply personal. Greve wrote WATERBODIES while pregnant with her daughter and first child, capturing a particularly transformative period in her life. Not long after discovering she was pregnant, a friend encouraged her to record the music before the baby arrived. The suggestion became the spark for a project that might otherwise have remained unrealized.

The circumstances surrounding the album were anything but conventional. Greve was preparing for motherhood while investing her own money into a record she knew was unlikely to fit neatly into a commercial mold. Yet that tension became part of the album’s purpose. Rather than shaping the music around a marketable identity, she chose to make something guided by personal necessity.

“This is the most holistic representation of my musical interests,” Greve says. “I wanted it to feel like a playground — the opposite of an easy-to-sell, career-minded, one-kind-of-thing record.”

That sense of play is central to WATERBODIES. Its songs function as distinct pieces while belonging to the same larger world, allowing contrasting musical languages to sit beside one another without being forced into uniformity. For Greve, the connection comes naturally because each influence passes through the same creative perspective.

“It captures the full range of what I’ve been drawn to musically,” she explains. “Rather than narrowing things down, I wanted to open them up, placing these disparate influences side by side and trusting their connection would come through because they’re all channeled through me.”

The album’s first glimpse comes with “Lighter Blue,” offering an introduction to a project that embraces contrast as a strength rather than a problem to solve. Across WATERBODIES, Greve allows each musical idea room to exist on its own terms, creating a record that feels exploratory, intimate and unrestrained.

To mark the release, Greve will take the album to New York’s Public Records on October 14 for a special joint album release show featuring a performance by Kaoru Watanabe. WATERBODIES arrives October 2 via New Amsterdam, marking the release of a project that Greve describes not as a calculated career move, but as something she simply felt compelled to make.

In that sense, WATERBODIES feels like a document of creative freedom: a record born from a moment of profound personal change and built around the belief that music does not always need to make conventional sense. Sometimes, it simply needs to be honest.

Bob Coate Turns Life’s Looking Glass Into an Optimistic Jazz Journey With “Reflections”

For Bob Coate, looking back isn’t about dwelling on what has been. It’s about appreciating the people, places, experiences, and unexpected turns that have shaped his life — and using those memories as inspiration for what comes next.

That philosophy is at the heart of “Reflections,” the invigorating new contemporary jazz single from the Leesburg, Virginia-based keyboardist. Written by Coate, the track captures his grateful, forward-looking outlook while pairing jubilant keyboard work with the passionate saxophone playing of Peter Herold.

Produced by Peet Ferencz and Sandy Shore, “Reflections” brings together musicians whose chemistry is rooted in years of creative collaboration. Ferencz contributes guitar, piano, and drum programming, while his musical partnership with Herold draws from their long-running work together in Peet Project, the Budapest-based pop-jazz-funk band. Their collective energy gives the track a vibrant groove that complements Coate’s melodic vision.

For Coate, the song is deeply personal, but its message is universal. Rather than treating reflection as an exercise in regret or nostalgia, he sees the past as a source of gratitude and confidence.

“The inspiration for ‘Reflections’ came from thinking about the many people, places, and experiences that shape our lives,” Coate said. “As I looked back on the journey that has brought me to this point—from my career and family to my unexpected later-in-life journey into contemporary jazz—I realized that memories don't have to be about sadness or longing. They can remind us how fortunate we've been, inspire gratitude for the moments we've shared, and give us confidence to embrace whatever comes next. I wanted to capture that feeling in music.”

That unexpected journey into jazz began after Coate retired from a career in information technology. Rather than slowing down, retirement opened the door to a creative second act, giving him the freedom to explore composition, recording, and performance with renewed enthusiasm.

Five years ago, Coate introduced himself to contemporary jazz listeners with “Super Smooth,” a single that spent five weeks on the Radiowave chart. He subsequently wrote, recorded, and released ten singles independently, developing a distinctive sound that blends contemporary jazz with chillout and funk.

His evolution as an artist eventually led to collaborations with accomplished professionals, beginning with GRAMMY®-nominated producer SONIX (David Bowie, Lauryn Hill) on “Sasha.” His latest partnership with Ferencz represents another step forward, with “Reflections” now receiving airplay and appearing on playlists around the world.

Coate approaches his music as a kind of musical mixologist, combining melody, atmosphere, and groove to create tracks designed not only to entertain but also to connect emotionally. His goal is simple yet meaningful: to lift moods and give listeners something they can carry with them.

“Reflections” embodies that mission. Its melodies occasionally carry a bittersweet quality, acknowledging the complexity of memory, but beneath them runs an unmistakable sense of optimism. It is music about honoring where we have been without allowing the past to define where we are going.

“‘Reflections’ blends reflective, sometimes bittersweet melodies with an optimistic undercurrent, inviting listeners to look back with gratitude while moving confidently toward the future,” Coate said.

In many ways, the single mirrors Coate’s own story. Retirement did not mark an ending; it became the beginning of a new creative chapter. His journey from information technology to contemporary jazz demonstrates that inspiration does not necessarily arrive on a conventional schedule — and that a second act can sometimes be the one that reveals a new sense of purpose.

With “Reflections,” Coate turns that lesson into sound: warm, melodic, rhythmic, and unmistakably hopeful. It’s an invitation to appreciate the road behind us while remaining curious about the road ahead.

Smooth Jazz Top 20® Countdown Reaches 1,000 Episodes, Celebrating Four Decades of Allen Kepler’s Influence

Few milestones in broadcasting carry the weight of 1,000 episodes. This Labor Day Weekend, the Smooth Jazz Top 20® Countdown with Allen Kepler reaches that remarkable mark, celebrating not only the longevity of a syndicated radio program but also more than four decades of influence on the sound, culture, and global reach of smooth jazz.

Launched in 2007, the Smooth Jazz Top 20® Countdown tracks airplay across Mediabase-reporting radio stations, streaming channels, and the Smooth Jazz Network®. Today, the weekly program is heard on more than 40 radio stations and streaming outlets, giving artists and listeners a continuing platform dedicated to one of contemporary music’s most enduring formats.

For Kepler, the 1,000th episode represents a milestone shared by an entire community of artists, programmers, broadcasters, and fans who have helped sustain the music.

“Smooth Jazz is more vibrant than ever…The 1,000th episode is a testament to the artists, programmers, and listeners who keep this music thriving,” Kepler said.

Kepler’s connection to the genre stretches back to its formative years. He was part of the team that coined the term “smooth jazz” in 1989 and subsequently created the Smooth Jazz Network® 35 years ago, helping introduce the phrase to a national audience and contributing to the format’s dramatic growth throughout the 1990s and 2000s.

Over the course of his career, Kepler has worked with more than 100 Smooth Jazz-branded radio stations and streaming channels, adapting the brand as the way audiences consume music has evolved. In 2012, the network was retooled around what Kepler describes as a Top 100 format, expanding its presence through LIVE365, iHeart, radio affiliates, independent streaming channels, and the network’s app.

That ability to evolve has been central to the Smooth Jazz Network’s continued relevance. While traditional radio remains an important part of its footprint, streaming and digital platforms have opened new avenues for the music to reach listeners around the world.

The Smooth Jazz Top 20® Countdown also extends beyond the weekly chart. Each year, its cycle culminates with the publication of Kepler’s BEATS magazine, an editorial showcase featuring the year-end chart, extensive artist interviews, and honors including Best Artist, Breakout Artist, and Local Radio Station of the Year. The 2026 edition will mark the seventh annual issue of the magazine.

The countdown is part of a larger syndicated programming lineup. Alongside Smooth Jazz Top 20®, the Smooth Jazz Network® offers Smooth Jazz® Weekend and Smooth Jazz® Classics, with all three programs available to radio stations and streaming outlets on a barter and cost-free basis.

Kepler’s creative reach has also expanded beyond broadcasting. Earlier this year, he introduced Smooth Jazz® Wines, a collection inspired by classic smooth jazz songs. The portfolio features five red and three white varietals, with names including “Rise,” “Maputo,” and “Breezin’.” A Smooth Jazz® Wines pairing cookbook is scheduled for publication later this month, adding another dimension to Kepler’s growing portfolio.

His work as a creator has continued in music as well. Kepler co-wrote “Keep It Smooth” with GRAMMY®-winning producer and songwriter Michael Mani. The song serves as the debut release from Colombian singer Lali P and features urban-jazz saxophone icon Najee. The single is set to begin collecting playlist adds September 14.

The breadth of Kepler’s career — spanning radio hosting, show creation, acting, writing, consulting, publishing, and winemaking — reflects an ability to turn a musical format into a broader cultural brand. Yet at the center of it all remains the music and the artists who continue to give smooth jazz its vitality.

More than 40 years after Kepler helped establish the language and infrastructure surrounding the genre, smooth jazz continues to find audiences through radio, streaming, live programming, publishing, and increasingly diverse forms of cultural expression.

The 1,000th episode of the Smooth Jazz Top 20® Countdown is therefore more than a numerical achievement. It is a celebration of endurance — and a reminder of how a musical movement that emerged decades ago can continue to evolve without losing its identity.

“We really helped to create something truly special so many years ago and it is wonderful to see the music and artists thriving today,” Kepler said.

As the Smooth Jazz Top 20® Countdown enters its next thousand episodes, that combination of history, adaptability, and optimism remains at the heart of Kepler’s vision for the genre.

Ray Russell Navigates Dangerous Bends With a Stellar U.K. Ensemble

Ray Russell has spent decades developing a guitar sound that is unmistakably his own. On Dangerous Bends, his latest album for Cuneiform Records, the British guitar hero continues to push that sound into adventurous territory, combining sophisticated composition, improvisation and the chemistry of a seasoned U.K. studio ensemble.

Russell’s playing can soar with the melodic intensity of David Gilmour, twist with the nuanced filigree of Jeff Beck and move with the angular fluidity associated with Allan Holdsworth. But these comparisons only hint at what makes Russell distinctive. As he puts it, “I believe in the sonic signature. Gil Evans used to say, ‘Everyone has a cry. Without it, only notes come out of the instrument.’”

That distinctive voice has been heard in some remarkable places. As a young guitarist, Russell played on vintage James Bond soundtracks while a member of the John Barry Seven, contributing to seven films featuring Sean Connery and Roger Moore. His career in film and television has continued throughout the decades, including an appearance on the soundtrack to Anchorman. His work has earned recognition from organizations including BAFTA, the Royal Television Society, ASCAP, OFTA and others.

His studio résumé is equally extraordinary. Russell has worked with Tina Turner, Heaven 17, George Harrison, Phil Collins, Cat Stevens, Robert Plant, Art Garfunkel and David Bowie, among many other major artists. Yet alongside this prolific career as a first-call studio musician, Russell has consistently pursued a more experimental path under his own name.

That adventurous side has earned the admiration of influential figures in experimental music, including Jim O’Rourke, who has championed Russell’s work and helped oversee archival releases. Dangerous Bends continues that evolution, putting Russell’s ever-changing Stratocaster sound at the center of a record that is both muscular and remarkably fluid.

The album is Russell’s fourth release as bandleader, composer and guitarist for Cuneiform, following Fluid Architecture (2020), Goodbye Svengali—his 2006 tribute to Gil Evans—and the label’s 2021 reissue of his 1972 album Secret Asylum. Cuneiform has also released Russell’s collaborative projects Stacked, a live improvisation with drummer Eddie Prévost and guitarist Nathan Moore, and Celestial Squid, his avant-improv collaboration with guitarist Henry Kaiser and a band. Russell also appears on Cuneiform’s archival Nucleus release Live in Bremen, recorded in 1972.

For Dangerous Bends, Russell wanted to capture the energy of a quintet playing largely live in the studio. He shared the melodic frontline with saxophonist Tim Whitehead, while bassist Laurence Cottle, keyboardist Jim Watson and drummer Ian Palmer formed a rhythm section capable of responding instinctively to his compositions. Russell describes their chemistry as “a telepathic thing—they know where you’re going when you start.”

That sense of communication gives the album its sleek, agile character. Russell composed with the live personality of the musicians in mind, often writing quickly in order to preserve the feeling of the ensemble. His approach was informed by his experiences with Gil Evans, particularly Evans’ ability to maintain the memory and shape of a composition even while allowing musicians considerable freedom during their solos.

That philosophy is evident on “From Here to Dexterity,” where Russell and Watson’s electric piano and ARP Odyssey interact with guest trumpeter and flugelhorn player Johnny Thirkell. The track constantly blurs the boundary between composition and improvisation, with the musicians moving naturally through its shifting musical landscape.

Melody takes center stage on “Airscapes,” a ballad built around Russell’s mournful, reverb-soaked guitar. The sound evokes the spare emotional quality of Steve Cropper, an influence Russell connected with through his early R&B work and memories of the classic Blues Brothers era.

Longtime collaborator Simon Phillips adds another dimension to the album. Best known for his work with artists including Toto, The Who and Joe Satriani, Phillips has maintained a creative partnership with Russell for decades. The pair co-wrote two tracks on Dangerous Bends.

They open the album together with “Just For Clicks,” a moody, shifting composition featuring Phillips on drums. His hard-driving groove provides a powerful foundation for Russell’s sinewy guitar lines, allowing the guitarist to stretch melodically while remaining firmly connected to the harmonic structure.

Phillips and Russell also co-wrote the title track, with George Baldwin on bass. Beginning as a hard-rocking, highly motivated workout, “Dangerous Bends” develops into something far more expansive, with large melodic intervals, angular chord changes and sweeping synthesizer textures. Russell responds with fiery guitar passages that demonstrate both his technical command and his extraordinary ability to use tone as an expressive tool.

Producer Greg Walsh, another longtime Russell collaborator from his work on Tina Turner’s “Let’s Stay Together,” completes the team behind the album.

With Dangerous Bends, Russell demonstrates that there is still plenty of unexplored territory in the career of a musician who has already done almost everything. His extensive studio history may have made him a veteran of the U.K. music scene, but the album sounds anything but retrospective. Instead, Russell remains focused on where the guitar can go next, surrounded by musicians who understand exactly how to help him get there.

As Jim O’Rourke observes, Russell plays “as if the guitar is not enough,” reaching beyond the conventional boundaries of the six-string instrument. On Dangerous Bends, that restless spirit remains very much alive.

Joshua Breakstone’s Wonderful! Returns After Nearly 40 Years Out of Print

Nearly four decades after it disappeared from circulation, Joshua Breakstone’s Wonderful! is getting a new life. First released in 1983, the acclaimed guitarist’s debut album as a leader will be reissued August 21, 2026, by Capri Records, marking the recording’s first appearance on CD.

Breakstone was just 27 when he made Wonderful!, but the album already revealed a guitarist with a remarkably mature voice. Joined by legendary pianist Barry Harris, bassist Earl Sauls and drummer Leroy Williams, Breakstone leads a swinging quartet through seven performances that capture the energy, sophistication and interplay of a young musician already finding his identity.

The album opens with George Gershwin’s “S’Wonderful,” setting an immediate tone with a spirited performance that showcases Breakstone’s fluid guitar work. The quartet then stretches out on Tadd Dameron’s “Soultrane,” before turning to Vincent Youmans’ “Time on My Hands.”

Breakstone also brings two original compositions to the album, “Sevens-Up” and “This Is It!,” offering an early glimpse of his developing skills as a composer. The set also includes Thelonious Tristano’s “Two Not One,” a natural choice given Breakstone’s work with saxophonist Warne Marsh around the time of the recording. Marsh had been deeply influenced by Tristano, and Breakstone’s interpretation reflects that connection.

Django Reinhardt is represented by “Django’s Castle,” giving the guitarist another opportunity to acknowledge one of the musicians who helped shape the jazz guitar tradition. Across the album, Breakstone demonstrates an impressive command of swing, melody and improvisation, while Harris, Sauls and Williams provide an exceptionally strong rhythmic and harmonic foundation.

Breakstone himself looks back on Wonderful! with the perspective of a musician who has spent more than four decades developing his craft. “When I hear the young guitar player that I was,” he says, “I can’t help but think, if I only knew then what I know now.”

For listeners discovering the album today, however, there is little reason for such self-criticism. Wonderful! documents an important moment in the career of a guitarist whose playing would eventually earn descriptions such as “fire in velvet” from the Santa Fe New Mexican and recognition from DownBeat as one of the best young jazz guitarists of his generation.

More than simply a debut, the album captures the beginning of a musical journey that would take Breakstone around the world and result in well over a dozen recordings. He would go on to record projects devoted to Thelonious Monk, Wes Montgomery and Bud Powell, as well as collaborations with musicians including Kenny Barron. Japan would become an especially important part of his career following his first tour there in 1986, with Breakstone eventually returning multiple times each year.

His path to Wonderful! began in Elizabeth, New Jersey, where he was born in 1955. Music was already central to his family life, with his parents introducing him to Broadway and the New York Philharmonic while his older sisters exposed him to jazz, rock and roll and other forms of popular music. He picked up the guitar at 14 and began playing with a high school group called Moon Unit.

Jazz soon became the focus. Hearing Lee Morgan and Charlie Parker sparked Breakstone’s fascination with the music, leading him to study at New College of the University of South Florida and Berklee College of Music. After moving to New York City, he performed, taught and worked with an impressive range of musicians, including Vinnie Burke, Warne Marsh, Emily Remler and Aaron Bell, before making his debut as a leader.

Looking back, Breakstone describes Wonderful! as more than an early album. “This recording documents the germ of musical ideas that were just beginning to flower in my approach to playing jazz,” he says.

That makes the album’s return particularly significant. Heard today, Wonderful! is both a snapshot of a young guitarist at the beginning of his career and an early statement from an artist whose musical ideas would continue to evolve for decades. With Barry Harris, Earl Sauls and Leroy Williams alongside him, Breakstone created a recording that remains vibrant, swinging and full of possibility.

After nearly 40 years out of print, Wonderful! finally gets the chance to be heard by a new generation—and the title still seems entirely appropriate.

Yuma Koda Explores “Imagined Nostalgia” on Debut Album Amid Kinos

Tokyo-based artist and award-winning composer Yuma Koda will release his debut full-length album, Amid Kinos, October 2 via Newhere Music, the Tokyo-based label known for releases by Jim O’Rourke and Eiko Ishibashi, including Ishibashi’s acclaimed soundtrack for Drive My Car.

Built around what Koda calls “imagined nostalgia,” Amid Kinos is a deeply personal exploration of memory, place and experience—and of the ways imagination can sometimes become inseparable from what was actually lived. Rather than simply looking backward, Koda uses sound to examine how memories change, fragment and acquire new meanings over time.

Koda describes the album as a “personal attempt to translate, socialize, and contemporize those feelings through sound,” and its first single, “kopfkino,” offers an evocative introduction to that idea. The title comes from the German compound word combining Kopf (head) and Kino (cinema), referring to the vivid experience of the imagination playing out scenarios, conversations or worries like a movie inside the mind.

“kopfkino” carries a distinctly sentimental quality, drawing on Koda’s reflections on his youth. The recording brings together some of the most notable musicians in Tokyo’s contemporary music scene, including guitarist and producer Takuro Okada, saxophonist Kei Matsumaru, bassist Marty Holoubek and drummer Shun Ishiwaka, all of whom contribute to the album.

Koda expands that circle of collaborators throughout Amid Kinos, bringing in Brooklyn-based guitarist and songwriter Mei Semones, composer and vocalist LUCA, who previously contributed vocals to Ryuichi Sakamoto’s async, Julia Shortreed of Black Boboi, Osaka-born and Munich-based drummer Shinya Fukumori, and Yuma Abe of never young beach.

Together, the musicians help create an atmosphere that is quietly cinematic, with ECM-influenced jazz and electroacoustic composition continually flowing into one another. Koda’s piano is not treated as the dominant instrument. Instead, each musician becomes part of a larger sonic environment, with the individual performances woven together alongside field recordings captured in Portugal, Tokyo, Denmark and New York.

Koda uses techniques associated with musique concrète and sound collage to manipulate those recordings and performances, meticulously layering and processing sounds until their original boundaries become difficult to identify. The result is music that seems to exist somewhere between recollection and invention, where time can bend and familiar experiences become increasingly ambiguous.

The concept has roots in Koda’s childhood. He spent much of his early life in an independent movie theater operated by his father, an experience that immersed him in an expansive world of cinema. Later, while studying classical music theory in Italy and Japan, he developed a fascination with jazz and electronic music, while also becoming deeply influenced by the musical philosophy of Japanese composer Toru Takemitsu.

Those experiences eventually led Koda toward an interdisciplinary career encompassing film, television, fashion and installation work. His credits include the Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival-winning score for KONTORA, a Best Original Music nomination at the British Independent Film Awards for The Ceremony, compositions for fashion label HYKE, sound-art installations and television scores created in collaboration with Haruomi Hosono.

The music on Amid Kinos reflects that wide-ranging background without fitting neatly into a single genre. Instead, Koda approaches composition as a form of memory-making, combining acoustic musicianship, electronic processing, field recordings and carefully constructed spaces of silence and atmosphere.

“The nostalgia within me and the confusion surrounding it,” Koda says of the album. “My deep longing for images and language. While being influenced by the friends I've encountered over the past few years, I made this album by carefully considering how to reconcile these elements through my current methods.”

That tension between nostalgia and uncertainty is at the heart of Amid Kinos. Koda isn't attempting to recreate the past so much as understand the emotional traces it leaves behind. His debut becomes a kind of cinematic memory archive—one in which real places, imagined scenes, personal history and borrowed experiences can coexist.

Amid Kinos will be released October 2 via Newhere Music. The 12-track album includes “kopfkino,” “marthe” featuring Shuhei Kato and LUCA, “artemisia” featuring Julia Shortreed, “liquorice” featuring Takuro Okada, “images on loan” featuring Jan Urila Sas and Shun Ishiwaka, and the title track “amid kino[s]” featuring Kei Matsumaru and Shinya Fukumori. The closing track, “ende,” features Mei Semones and Yuma Abe.

Itzhak Perlman Returns to the American Songbook for His First New Album in More Than a Decade

 

Itzhak Perlman is returning to the music that has been part of his life for generations. The celebrated violinist today announces The Way We Were: My American Songbook, his first new album in more than a decade, arriving October 30 from Green Hill Music. Pre-orders begin today, coinciding with Perlman’s 81st birthday, along with the release of the album’s first single, “Summertime,” featuring GRAMMY® Award winner Jon Batiste.

Across more than seven decades of recording and performing, Perlman has become one of the world’s most admired musicians, known for the warmth, humanity and unmistakable voice of his violin. With The Way We Were: My American Songbook, he turns his attention to some of the melodies that have remained close to his heart, revisiting enduring works by George Gershwin, Irving Berlin, Jerome Kern, Stephen Sondheim, Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein, Leonard Bernstein and others.

The album represents something new for Perlman. Rather than approaching the material simply as a collection of classical arrangements, he draws on the origins of these songs and treats the violin almost as a singer, allowing the melodies to breathe and speak through the instrument.

“This recording is different because it’s a songbook. It’s something I’ve never done before,” Perlman said. “The repertoire I chose is very romantic, lyrical and poetic. Because so much of this music began as songs, I approached it as a singer would. The violin is a singing instrument, and this album became a natural way to let those melodies speak through it.”

That approach is especially evident on “Summertime,” the George Gershwin classic that serves as the album’s first single. Perlman is joined by Jon Batiste, whose vocals bring a jazz sensibility to a performance that places the violin and voice in an intimate musical conversation.

“Jon Batiste is a lot of fun. He’s terrific,” Perlman said. “He’s a wonderful improviser, and playing with someone like that was exciting because every take was a little different. That’s the beauty of making music together; you follow the inspiration wherever it leads.”

Produced by three-time GRAMMY® Award-winning producer David Lai and co-produced and arranged by Or Matias and Natalie Tenenbaum, the album surrounds Perlman with a full orchestra, creating the warm and romantic sound he envisioned for these familiar songs. The guest appearances extend beyond Batiste, with Josh Groban also joining the collection, along with a newly created performance built around the legendary voice of Ella Fitzgerald.

For Perlman, the project is both a personal return and a fresh interpretation of music that has become part of the American cultural landscape. These are songs that have crossed generations and genres, and his violin provides another way of hearing melodies audiences have known for decades.

“For generations, Itzhak Perlman has shown us that great music speaks to the heart, regardless of genre,” said Blake Davis, General Manager of Green Hill. “With The Way We Were: My American Songbook, he brings new life to songs that have become part of our shared musical heritage, honoring them with extraordinary warmth, imagination and artistry.”

The Way We Were: My American Songbook will be released October 30 on Green Hill Music. The album is available for pre-order now, with “Summertime” featuring Jon Batiste available to stream.

Will Sellenraad’s Greene Street Vol. 2 Captures Jazz at Its Most Immediate

There is a particular kind of magic that happens when musicians know one another well enough to stop thinking about where the music is supposed to go and simply listen for where it wants to go next. Greene Street Vol. 2, the new recording from guitarist Will Sellenraad, bassist Elam Friedlander, and drummer Eric McPherson, lives squarely in that space.

Recorded at GB’s Juke Joint in New York City on August 15, 2025, the album is rooted in trust, spontaneity, tradition, and the shared language that develops through years of playing together. As a continuation of Greene Street vol. 1, it reflects an ongoing exploration of the relationships, influences, and experiences that have shaped these three musicians within New York City’s creative music community.

This is not a record built around a single star. Instead, Greene Street Vol. 2 finds Sellenraad, Friedlander, and McPherson functioning as a true collective, with each musician influencing the direction of the music and responding instinctively to the others. The result is a trio sound defined less by accompaniment than by conversation.

That sense of immediacy was central to the recording process. The entire album was captured in a single afternoon, with only a handful of takes devoted to each composition. Rather than pursuing immaculate production or endless studio refinement, the musicians prioritized energy, personality, and the elusive quality they describe as “MoJo.” The approach preserves the feeling of three players discovering the music together in real time.

“This record is the result of us playing a lot over the years,” Sellenraad says. “We had the opportunity to get in the studio and really wanted to get as analog as possible with this recording. We hope you can feel it.”

That philosophy comes through in the repertoire, which moves naturally between Sellenraad’s original compositions and material drawn from the jazz tradition. “Double Down,” “Bean’s Blues,” and “Icebreaker” sit alongside David Raskin’s “My Love and I,” Frank Foster’s “Raunchy Rita,” John Coltrane’s “Satellite,” and Jerome Kern’s enduring “Yesterdays.” Rather than treating the compositions as fixed destinations, the trio uses each one as an invitation—to swing, stretch, converse, and discover.

The album begins with a lyrical reading of “My Love and I,” with Sellenraad playing nylon-string guitar before switching to electric guitar for the remainder of the session. From there, Friedlander’s deep, resonant bass and McPherson’s masterful drumming provide a foundation that is constantly in motion. They create room for Sellenraad to respond, while just as readily responding themselves, giving the performances a fluidity that feels spontaneous without ever becoming directionless.

That balance—between structure and freedom—is at the heart of Greene Street Vol. 2. The music honors the traditions from which these players emerged while refusing to treat those traditions as limitations. Melody remains important. So does swing. But equally important is the willingness to take chances and remain alert to what is happening in the room.

In that sense, Greene Street Vol. 2 documents more than a recording session. It documents a musical relationship. Three musicians bring their individual histories, influences, instincts, and years of shared experience into one room, press record, and allow the music to unfold.

The appeal is ultimately in that human quality. In an era when recordings can be endlessly edited and polished, Greene Street Vol. 2 embraces the imperfections, risks, interactions, and energy that make a live jazz performance feel alive. It is a record about listening—and about what can happen when musicians trust each other enough to listen deeply.

Track listing: “My Love and I” (David Raskin); “Double Down” (Will Sellenraad); “Raunchy Rita” (Frank Foster); “Bean’s Blues” (Will Sellenraad); “Icebreaker” (Will Sellenraad); “Satellite” (John Coltrane); “Yesterdays” (Jerome Kern).

Twin Talk Embrace the Joy of the Unexpected on New Album Delights

After nearly fifteen years of making music together, Chicago trio Twin Talk has reached a point where anticipation and surprise have become part of the same musical instinct. On Delights, the group’s fifth studio album, tenor saxophonist Dustin Laurenzi, bassist and vocalist Katie Ernst, and drummer Andrew Green turn years of shared experience into music that is intricate, spontaneous, deeply intuitive and, above all, playful.

Due November 6, 2026 via Shifting Paradigm Records, Delights features eleven original compositions that showcase a trio with an exceptionally developed collective language. The music can be lyrical and spacious one moment, knotty and bracing the next, but even at its most complex it retains a sense of movement and discovery.

The title is deliberately understated, even slightly tongue-in-cheek, but it captures something essential about the album. Twin Talk has never been a band interested in following the most predictable path through a composition. Instead, Laurenzi, Ernst and Green treat their written material as an invitation to interact, improvise and react to one another in real time.

That approach has been cultivated over years of playing together. While each musician maintains an active career outside the trio — Laurenzi tours with singer-songwriter Bill Callahan, Ernst performs with Iron & Wine, and Green is deeply embedded in Chicago’s indie and jazz communities — Twin Talk has developed into a musical home for all three.

Their live performances are known for embracing uncertainty, with the trio often abandoning fixed set lists and calling tunes on the fly. Recent appearances at Big Ears Festival and the Chicago Jazz Festival have further demonstrated the group’s ability to make spontaneous decisions feel completely natural. That spirit continues with a performance at Jazzfest Berlin on November 1, where Delights will receive its world premiere, just days before the album’s official release.

As with the group’s 2024 album Twin Talk Live, Laurenzi wrote the majority of the material on Delights. The opening track, “Red Cent,” immediately reveals a more forceful side of his tenor playing, with its intensity balanced by Ernst’s sharply defined bass work and Green’s instinctive use of space.

“Heavy Nice” pushes the trio into an elastic groove, with Laurenzi navigating unexpected turns while Ernst and Green constantly adjust the rhythmic landscape beneath him. On “Super Official,” meanwhile, an initially relaxed surface becomes something more unpredictable as Green introduces subtle disruptions that encourage the other musicians to rethink the material around him.

Ernst’s compositions bring another shade to the record. Her voice adds a striking warmth to “Northwest,” where the trio creates a spacious environment that allows the vocal performance to become another instrumental colour. “Shadow Kid” ventures further toward contemporary chamber music, combining Ernst’s ethereal vocals with Laurenzi’s low-register tenor and Green’s insistent drumming.

Green contributes the compact “Mississippi,” followed by “Both And,” a short but intricate piece built around shifting phrases and sudden changes. The track demonstrates just how precisely the three musicians can operate together without allowing that precision to become rigid.

Throughout Delights, complexity is never treated simply as a technical achievement. Instead, it becomes a mechanism for conversation. The compositions establish frameworks that the musicians can inhabit, stretch and reshape, constantly moving between individual statements and collective responses.

That balance becomes especially apparent as the album approaches its conclusion with “Similar Grit.” By this point, the distinctions between delicacy and intensity, composition and improvisation, restraint and expression have largely dissolved. What remains is the sound of three musicians responding to one another with the confidence that comes from years of shared musical experience.

The album was recorded with engineer Steve Shirk, whose work also helped shape the sound of Twin Talk Live. His recording captures the trio’s immediacy while preserving the fine details that make their music so engaging. Bass resonance, saxophone texture and individual percussion sounds remain clearly defined, creating the sensation of being in the room as the music unfolds.

That immediacy is crucial to Twin Talk’s identity. The trio’s music depends not only on what has been written, but on what happens between the musicians once the composition begins. Each player has enough understanding of the others to predict where the music might go, but enough individuality to derail those expectations.

It is that combination of familiarity and unpredictability that makes Delights so compelling. Nearly fifteen years into their collaboration, Twin Talk have not settled into a formula. Instead, they have used their accumulated chemistry to make the music more open.

The result is a record that is rigorous without feeling academic, spontaneous without feeling unfocused, and sophisticated without losing its sense of fun. Delights finds its energy in the unexpected — in the moments when three musicians who know each other extremely well still manage to surprise one another.

Twin Talk will perform at the Sound & Gravity Festival in Chicago on September 6, followed by the Delights world premiere at Jazzfest Berlin on November 1. A Chicago record release show is scheduled for November 13, with a performance at ROZZ-TOX in Rock Island, Illinois, on November 14.

Delights by Twin Talk will be released November 6, 2026 via Shifting Paradigm Records.

Sylvie Courvoisier’s New Quartet Amalthea Unleashes a World of Daring Jazz on Pyroclastic Records

Pianist and composer Sylvie Courvoisier has assembled a remarkable new quartet for Amalthea, an adventurous new album arriving November 13, 2026 via Pyroclastic Records. Featuring vibraphonist Patricia Brennan, bassist Thomas Morgan and drummer Dan Weiss, the record brings together four distinctive musical voices in a setting where intricate composition, fearless improvisation and extraordinary virtuosity collide.

The name Amalthea comes from Greek mythology, where Amalthea is described as the nursemaid of the infant Zeus, sometimes portrayed as a woman and sometimes as a goat. In the goat version of the story, her broken horn becomes the cornucopia, a magical source of seemingly limitless food and drink. For Courvoisier, the symbolism offered an ideal name for a quartet whose musical possibilities seem equally abundant.

“Patricia, Dan and Thomas are such amazing musicians,” Courvoisier says. “Each member of this ensemble brings a distinctive voice, a strong sense of identity, and a deep commitment to improvisation.” She adds that the musicians are capable of taking on her most intricate compositions without hesitation, allowing her to challenge both the band and herself.

The quartet was originally brought together in response to a commission from Brooklyn’s Roulette, supported by funding from the New York State Council on the Arts. Its first performance took place at Roulette in 2024, marking the beginning of a musical partnership that Courvoisier deliberately designed to be different from many of her previous ensembles.

Throughout her career, Courvoisier has often worked with musicians with whom she has developed long-standing creative relationships. Her established trio pairs her with bassist Drew Gress and drummer Kenny Wollesen, while her 2023 album Chimaera expanded that core with trumpeters Wadada Leo Smith and Nate Wooley and Austrian guitarist Christian Fennesz.

For Amalthea, however, Courvoisier chose musicians who were all somewhat younger than herself and with whom she had relatively limited prior experience. Thomas Morgan had previously recorded with Courvoisier on two albums co-led by violinist Mark Feldman in 2010 and 2011, but the pair had not worked together for many years. Courvoisier had only performed with Dan Weiss once before the quartet's formation, while her relationship with Patricia Brennan was relatively new, emerging from a duo recording session that Brennan had invited her to join.

That sense of discovery is central to Amalthea. The album is a thrilling exercise in balancing complexity and spontaneity, with compositions that can shift direction and tempo at breathtaking speed while retaining a strong emotional core. Courvoisier has written new material specifically for the quartet, while also revisiting pieces from Chimaera and her 2018 trio album D’Agala.

The result is music that demands close attention without sacrificing passion. Dense harmonic passages, abrupt rhythmic changes, intricate ensemble writing and expansive improvisational sections constantly interact, creating a sound that feels both meticulously constructed and completely alive.

A particularly compelling element is the relationship between Courvoisier’s piano and Brennan’s vibraphone. Their interplay extends Courvoisier’s long-running fascination with what she loosely describes as “two keyboard” ensembles. For her, the combination of two harmonic instruments provides the density, harmonic richness, complexity and bitonality necessary to realize the musical worlds she imagines.

That concept has appeared throughout Courvoisier’s career, from her earliest ensemble work with barrel organ player Pierre Charlal to more recent projects including her two-piano interpretation of Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring with Cory Smythe and her duo album Bone Bells with guitarist Mary Halvorson.

Brennan’s own conservatory background makes the partnership especially compelling. Like Courvoisier, she possesses a deep grounding in both contemporary classical music and modern jazz, allowing the two musicians to move naturally between precisely written passages and open improvisation.

Courvoisier drew inspiration from contemporary composers including Sofia Gubaidulina and György Ligeti while creating the music, giving herself room to explore the meeting point between her classical influences and the freedom of the New York avant-jazz scene.

The quartet’s generational dynamic is also reflected in the album’s title. Beyond the mythological connection, Amalthea carries a maternal resonance that mirrors Courvoisier’s desire to nurture and learn from the younger musicians around her.

“I wanted to have all new people in this band,” Courvoisier explains. While the musicians are presented with substantial written material designed around their considerable technical abilities, she has deliberately left space for each member to bring their own musical vocabulary to the pieces. The goal is not simply to have the musicians interpret her compositions, but to allow their individual perspectives to reshape them.

That philosophy lies at the heart of Courvoisier’s music. Her work has consistently occupied the space between composition and improvisation, European contemporary classical traditions and the restless energy of New York’s experimental jazz community.

A Brooklyn-based native of Lausanne, Switzerland, Courvoisier has built an international reputation as a pianist and composer capable of moving effortlessly between concert halls, jazz clubs and experimental performance spaces. Her achievements include the Swiss Grand Prix and the American Academy of Arts and Letters Music Award in 2025.

The New York Times has described her as a pianist of “equal parts audacity and poise,” an apt description for an artist whose music can be simultaneously playful, ferocious, disciplined and unpredictable.

Her extensive list of collaborators includes John Zorn, Wadada Leo Smith, Evan Parker, Ikue Mori, Ned Rothenberg, Fred Frith, Andrew Cyrille, Mark Feldman, Christian Fennesz, Nate Wooley and Mary Halvorson. Across these collaborations and her own projects, Courvoisier has continually crossed stylistic and geographical borders without sacrificing her individual identity.

Amalthea feels like a natural continuation of that journey, but also something distinctly new. With Brennan, Morgan and Weiss, Courvoisier has created an ensemble capable of handling her most demanding compositions while contributing ideas and personalities of their own.

The album’s striking artwork, a black-on-orange painting by French farmer and artist Philippe Azéma, reflects another of Courvoisier’s passions: art brut. Her connection to the movement dates back to the Collection de l’Art Brut museum in Lausanne, the city where she grew up, and its raw, unconventional aesthetic provides an apt visual counterpart to the music.

Amalthea promises an abundance of ideas in the truest sense of its mythological name: a record overflowing with sound, invention, precision and possibility. It is the work of an artist still pushing against boundaries, while creating an environment where younger musicians can challenge her, inspire her and ultimately help her hear her own music in new ways.

Amalthea by Sylvie Courvoisier, featuring Patricia Brennan, Thomas Morgan and Dan Weiss, will be released November 13, 2026 via Pyroclastic Records.