Recorded live in Burghausen, Germany in 2007, Far Side features journeyman avant-garde saxophonist Roscoe Mitchell and his ensemble the Note Factory performing in a concert. Joining Mitchell here are trumpeter Corey Wilkes, pianists Craig Taborn and Vijay Iyer, bassists Jaribu Shahid and Harrison Bankhead, and drummers Tani Tabbal and Vincent Davis. Beginning with the epic three-part 30-minute suite "Far Side/Cards/Far Side," the concert is an atmospheric and cinematic mix of Mitchell's longstanding musical touchstones including free jazz, European classical music, and modern creative group improvisation. Tracks such as the fragmented and atonal "Quintet 2007 A for Eight" and the similarly inclined "Trio Four for Eight" have the feel of composed classical music while evincing a more freely improvised aesthetic. This is often achieved by juxtaposing bowed cello and bass parts against improvised piano and sections where each musician seems to interject a melodic idea into an overall harmonic theme. There are moments of layered percussion, expansive atonal soundscapes, and fiery and combative moments between Mitchell and Wilkes as well as windy, drawn-out passages that tilt upon silence. If you're a hardcore Mitchell aficionado and/or fan of ECM's cerebral jazz catalog, Far Side would be a stellar addition to your library.

Dual Unity is a live album by Annette Peacock and Paul Bley (credited as Annette & Paul Bley) which was released by Freedom Records in 1972.

Anyone for an antidote to repertory? On Sextessense: A Tribute To John Stevens and the SME, the musicians involved are acknowledging what through sheer persistence and longevity has become a part of the tradition (one that is still likely to have the reactionaries foaming at the mouth, which, of course, gives them something to do with their time). The musicians paying tribute are at the same time stating the case for renewal and creativity, which is as it should be.

Mota is an improvising guitarist from Lisbon who works emotive improvised magic from six strings with only the ghost of a Derek Bailey influence. Sings is a self-released album featuring nine solo guitar pieces – no singing – that have an up-close, intimate personality, tying up sighing melodies and cross-wired harmonics with gentle tweaks of string and the occasional blue note. Some of the more lunar playing here seems to pick up where Loren Mazzacane left off on his ‘big band’ record, Come Night, but Mota is even more involuted than Loren, his playing style almost a drawing-in as much as a teasing-out. Still, each piece feels like a full investigation of the guitar, fuelled by an inquisitive, exploratory logic that is just as open to straightahead tonal and melodic statement as it is to tying the whole thing up in a ball of twonk. Excellent.

ILL CONSIDERED are a talented 4-piece London-based jazz group consisting of Idris Rahman on Saxophone / FX, Leon Brichard on Electric bass, Emre Ramazanoglu on Drums/Mix/Mastering and Satin Singh on Percussion. They have released some stellar albums over the last few years including ILL CONSIDERED 5 and ILL CONSIDERED 6. Their music is lively and brings such soul and heart. I can really hear it through their last releases, and this new album isn’t any different.

Existing completely under the critical radar and largely ignored or unknown by music fans and critics alike, most of the musicians featured in this album won't be familiar to even the most seasoned jazz aficionado. But in this era of musical apathy, where so many music junkies look to the past for their musical fix, we have re-discovered hidden, obscure and esoteric jazz musicians who looked to the four corners of the earth - and beyond - for inspiration.

Pianist and composer Paul Bley has been making records now for more than 50 years. His solo recordings encompass a great deal of his generous catalog. Bley has studied so many different aspects of jazz, and improvisational music both American and European, that these recordings always offer a revealing, no-holds-barred glimpse of where he's at as a musician at any given time. About Time, released on the Montreal label Justin Time, contains just two pieces: the 33-plus-minute title track and the Sonny Rollins tune "Pent-Up House," which lasts another ten. They reveal the entire range of Bley's considerable gifts as a pianist and improviser.

Canadlan alto saxophonist François Carrier and drummer Michel Lambert went to Russia four times over the last six years to play their melodic abstract music with St. Petersburg-based pianist Alexey Lapin. They released their first Trilogy in 2012 then in 2014 FMR Records published The Russian Concerts Vol. 1 & Vol. 2) which were widely acclaimed.

Árni Karlsson is a pianist/composer based in Reykjavik, Iceland. He has played on several recordings and put out four albums with his own music, Hold (2014), Mold (2013), Boundaries (2009) and Q (2001) with another coming out this autumn called FLÆÐI. Árni made four tracks for The Good Heart (2009) by Dagur Kári and his last work in theatre with director Thorleifur Arnarsson in the play Njala, won him the Gríman Awards for Best Music in Theatre 2015.

Serenity is a double album by Swedish pianist Bobo Stenson recorded in 1999 and released on the ECM label. The Penguin Guide to Jazz selected this album as part of its suggested Core Collection. The Allmusic review by Thom Jurek awarded the album 4½ stars stating "Simply put, there are no records like the Stenson Trio's Serenity. The band has outdone themselves by their slow, careful development over three records and has become one of the premier rhythm trios on the planet. Serenity is not only the group's coup de grace, but also a jazz masterpiece of the highest order". The JazzTimes review by Stuart Nicholson stated "Here, Stenson emerges as an original voice within jazz, which in these renascent times is cause enough for celebration".

On the album Sails Set, recorded at Rainbow Studio in Oslo, we can hear the same trio line-up as featured on the critically acclaimed album Elegy: bassist Mats Eilertsen (Tord Gustavsen), pianist Harmen Fraanje (Michael Moore) and drummer Thomas Strønen (Food, Meadow).

Art Studio is an excellent Italian free jazz quartet, comprised of saxophonist Carlo Actis Dato, guitarist Claudio Lodati, bassist Enrico Fazio, and drummer Fiorenzo Sordini, plus, on occasion, vocalist Irene Robbins. This double-CD – a compilation of four albums released on the C.M.C. label from the late '70s to mid-'80s – paints a revealing picture of an empathically inclined band of world-class improvisors that's probably less well-known than it should be. Saxophonist Dato is an especially powerful musician. His technique is notably well-rounded; he might just as easily play a delicately articulated, finely nuanced slip of lyrical melody as a rabid, overtone-blowing saxophonic howl. I would imagine this to be an important document to Italian free jazz aficionados, and should be checked out by chauvinistic Americans, as well.

The new release from Italy's excellent electroacoustic experimental band Ossatura led by Elio Martusciello takes the band into new territory, detailed and more luminous, more acoustic, with vibes and clarinet (Michael Thieke) and even a lovely song surprising long-time fans.