Three quarters of the way through Satoko Fujii's year-long celebration of her sixtieth birthday, she once again moves in an unpredictable direction, this time in the company keyboardist Alister Spence. Having met in Australia in 2007, the two went on to record with the Raymond MacDonald International Big Band the following year. Intelsat marks the second meeting of Spence and Fujii in the year-long fête; their previous release Bright Force (Libra, 2018) was in Fujii's Kira Kira quartet. The Intelsat material was recorded during a 2017 tour in Japan.

Australian composer Alister Spence wrote this in five parts composed for an improvising orchestra, which was first premiered in 2016 by Satoko Fujii's orchestras in Kobe, Nagoya and Tokyo, and the Glasgow Improvisers Orchestra; this recordings in 2017 at Big Apple Jazz Club in Kobe revisits the work with Fujii's Orchestra Kobe, conducted by the composer.

Christof Lauer is a German jazz tenor and soprano saxophonist, born in Melsungen, Germany, perhaps most well known in Europe where he has done projects with various musicians, such as Palle Danielsson, Carla Bley, Michel Godard, Volker Kriegel, Michel Portal, Maria Joao, Anthony Cox, Gary Husband, Alphonse Mouzon, and Peter Erskine.

This is rare private free jazz LP, perhaps best known as one of the most obscure items on Thurston Moore's infamous free jazz underground top ten. It appears that "Seikatsu Kojyo Iinkai" means "Life improvement committee". The first two tracks, are great free jazz suites, very creative, very energetic. I think "Not So Long Don" is really interesting though, because it's like an attempt to apply the atmosphere and ideas that motivated the creation of "Stravizauls" and "Kim" to a much more conventional context. I'm not entirely sure it works but it's such an interesting attempt that I'm more than willing to forgive it.

Here is an interesting and not paradoxical combination: Bennie Maupin on Cryptogramophone. Maupin hasn't been heard from as a leader since 1998 on his fine, funky, Driving While Black. That doesn't mean he hasn't been busy; he's played on records by Chick Corea, the Headhunters, George Cables, Victor Bailey, David Arnay, Mike Clark, and others. He was also part of DJ and producer Carl Craig's revolutionary Detroit Experiment. Penumbra is all his, however, and aside from Jewel in the Lotus, it may be the finest outing in his catalog as a leader. Maupin plays his usual array of instruments – tenor, soprano, flute, bass clarinet, and piano. He is joined by the excellent bassist Darek Oleszkiewicz (also known as "Oles"), drummer Michael Stephans, and Darryl "Munyungo" Jackson on percussion. Rhythm is the key here, as all of these 14 compositions are rhythmically propelled. Maupin's compositional frame has been informed by all of his teachers, most notably John Coltrane, Sonny Rollins, and Yusef Lateef. Modal motifs can be heard in most pieces, and Maupin's playing around and through the rhythm makes for infectious and quietly dramatic listening. Restraint is a key element of all the tracks on this set. Tunes don't "swing" per se, but they are excellent examples of the deep interplay of the ensemble.

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.