Free jazz encounters the English folk song. With his perceptive arrangements, Saxophonist-arranger-composer Joki Freund, a major force in German post-war jazz, captures and combines the atmospheres of both genres.

Jazz giants from six European countries coalesce to play wide-open music. One of Norway’s greatest jazz singers, Karin Krog has worked and recorded with Jan Garbarek and Clare Fischer. English multi-saxophonist John Surman and Krog have jointly won two Norwegian Grammys. Surman has played with Mike Westbrook’s Orchestra and John McLaughlin, as well as recorded a slew of records on the prestigious ECM label…

German trombonist Albert Mangelsdorff was a major innovator who has had an influence on jazz instrumentalists worldwide. His use of multiphonics, which utilizes vocalizing into the horn to produce chords and overtone effects, was ground-breaking. This 1973 album presented his newest group, with German saxophone great Heinz Sauer the one remaining member from Albert’s legendary 1960’s quartet. Saxophonist Gerd Dudek, lauded for his play with the likes of Manfred Schoof, Lester Bowie, and Joachim Kuhn, joins the front line. Buschi Niedergall was one of the most sought-after bassists on the avant-garde scene, and drummer Peter Giger is known best for his renowned group Family of Percussion.

This album’s a listening pleasure for any music lover, but if you have a particular fondness for the trombone’s warm-toned vocal sound, this album’s a must – a once in a lifetime conclave of four of the instrument’s greats. There’s Dane Kai Winding, best known for his classic series of jazz albums with modern trombone icon J.J. Johnson. With his multiphonics and exploratory bent, Germany’s Albert Mangelsdorff was a major innovator on the instrument.

Volker Kriegel was a German jazz guitarist and composer born in Darmstadt, Germany, perhaps most noteworthy for his contributions to the European jazz rock genre…

Don Cherry's Eternal Rhythm Group was organized and recorded in collaboration with the Berlin Jazz Festival 1968. Cherry assembled some of Europe's jazz elite, including Germans trombonist Albert Mangelsdorff, vibraphonist Karl Berger, and Pianist Joachim Kühn, and the innovative American guitarist Sonny Sharrock.

This 1972 production is a potpourri of “live” festival big bands, starring some of the greatest jazz musicians of the time: the Nordic All-Stars with Norwegian saxophonist Jan Garbarek of ECM fame, Poland’s Novi Singers and the Zurich International Festival All-Stars including Dexter Gordon and Art Farmer. These timeless performances sound as fresh today as when they were first recorded.

This album of duos stands out as one of a kind; recorded during a phase in which he began to consistently incorporate a freer musical language into his playing, and set within a constellation of diverse duo formations, there emerges an exciting portrait of the central figure in German jazz: Albert Mangelsdorff. "His Friends" here are: Don Cherry, Elvin Jones, Karl Berger, Attila Zoller, Wolfgang Dauner, and Lee Konitz.

Legendary Weather Report electric bassist Jaco Pastorius and quintessential jazz-fusion drummer Alphonse Mouzon join Mangelsdorff at the 1976 Berlin Jazz Days for a combustion of creativity. Trilogue starts off solo with a multiphonic melody line and then opens up with free-wheeling give-and-take between the three. Zores Mores is straight ahead swing with Mangelsdorf’s masterful oblique phrasing and the pyrotechnical playing of Pastorious and Mouzon.

A very unusual session for MPS - one that features mostly solo work by the four players named as 'leader' - Albert Mangelsdorff, Gunter Hampel, Joachim Kuhn, and Pierre Favre - each of whom get a few tracks to themselves, then join up for a few more duo tracks and one more quartet number.

From 1965 to 1981 Munich’s Domicile jazz club was a mecca for international jazz. This live 1971 album brings together that period's Who is Who of the German jazz scene.

Albert Mangelsdorff stands alongside the likes of Jack Teagarten and J. J. Johnson in the pantheon of trombone greats. Recorded in 1976, this album affords the listener the opportunity to hear Albert solo in all his wondrous multiphonic diversity. It starts with the down-home singing harmonies on Do Your Own Thing. Trombonliness and Brief Inventions are essentially pieces improvised on the spot - ‘spontaneous compositions’.