‘Buntús Rince’ translates from Irish as ‘basic rhythms’, and this new compilation explores how Irish musicians were influenced by strands of different genres of music from around the world, merging them to create their own unique sounds. The compilation features some of the most innovative and talented figures in the history of Irish music and includes rare Irish jazz, fusion and folk outliers from the 1970s and early 1980s from musicians relatively unknown outside of Ireland.

Over her fifty-plus year career, singer Maria Muldaur has released more than thirty recordings, scoring one bonafide hit with “Midnight At The Oasis” from her 1973 self-titled album. But she could have had a second hit from the same album. As she explains in her notes included in the packaging of her new release, disc jockeys across the country had another song on the album, “Don’t You Feel My Leg,” in more frequent rotation than “Oasis”. Discussions with her record company about making that song the follow-up broke down as the label considered the track too risque for the general public, a decision that certainly seems quaint today with standards that allow all kinds of potentially offensive language and sexual references on the air, even in the Oval Office at the White House. Muldaur includes an updated version of the song on her exceptional tribute to one of the tune’s writers, Louisa “Blue Lou” Barker.

A Certain Ratio - who celebrate their 40th anniversary this year - a lavish box set, ‘acr:box’, via Mute, with all material remastered by Martin Moscrop at Abbey Road studios and featuring over 20 unreleased tracks from the archive."Following on from 2018’s compilation, ‘acr:set’, the box showcases the diversity of the singles, B-sides and alternative versions of tracks that A Certain Ratio have released but without repeating tracks recently made available. ‘acr:box’ collates everything that fans had been missing from the recent reissue campaign and compliments that with a selection found after a deep delve into the archive to find all the hidden gems that had been talked about over the years but never heard - even a few releases the band had forgotten about.

The drummer gives the saxophonists some on Coexist, another round of sophisticated truth telling from Winard Harper that demonstrates high standards of musical excellence when it comes to expansive compositions, creative arrangements and choice of able bandmates. Leading ensembles ranging from sextets to tentets, the leader taps guest saxophonists on five of the disc’s 12 tracks. He also shows off his considerable gifts as a trap-set wizard, percussionist and, on his African-tinged “Ummah” and “Jeli Posse,” a player of the balaphone, a vibraphone-type instrument from West Africa.

An early outlier in the ECM catalog, Output convulses with as much lively originality as it did when it was first released. Wolfgang Dauner, perhaps better known as founder of the United Jazz + Rock Ensemble (which saw ECM greats Eberhard Weber, Kenny Wheeler, and Charlie Mariano pass through its hallowed halls), assembles a modest trio of talent for this classic 1970 studio free-for-all. The end result is humor, provocation, brilliance, and chaos all rolled into one.

When Harry Sokal played his interpretation of Wolfert Brederode's composition Trinity, ten years before the appearance of this CD, both Sokal and Brederode had the feeling that they had something worth developing. Some years passed however before they could make a joint recording. Following several international tours, the celebrated Austrian saxophonist baptised this project at the start of the new millennium. The duo was born and quickly earned its first laurels at its concerts. Sokal describes the end product of the work on this album as "the expression of sensual interaction with each other". In fact, it is a dialogue between Sokal, with his poetically expressive saxophone sound, and lyrical Brederode, with his crystal clear, sometimes dark piano sound, and is guided by their underlying wish "to spend some time together, telling stories".

Philippe Manoury (born 1952) is an unashamed modernist, but his works have an immediate sensual and intellectual appeal that should make them of interest to broad audiences. His rhythmic vocabulary, while not simple, is straightforward and easy to follow, and his harmonic language is richly chromatic but not grindingly dissonant. Most importantly, his works have a comprehensible dramatic arc; this is music that is telling a story, one compelling enough to demand the interest of listeners paying close attention.