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Hello Ed, good to have you here!

Jazz Is Dead, Laughing Waters.

The piano trio, a classic jazz configuration. Tord Gustavsen Trio, is one of my favorites : " a paradoxical blend of simplicity, quietude, and sensuality built on the hymns of his youth, a Nordic kind of blues, and an instinct for composition... leaves room for an exemplary amount of space in its music, but engaged listeners will find no dull moment."

The Martin Denny version is my favorite, we had this LP, too. The Beatles' version on their Please Please Me LP was a head scratcher for me.

Something I listened to as a teen, we had several of the Herb Alpert's Tijuana Brass LPs. Interesting backstory.

Imagine a beginners guides to jazz but inverted–"Something a little different...Not reissues, but newly released albums." Point a compass to New Jazz horizons, sail the seas of recent recordings or (different) most recent recordings of an artist's catalogue. Flipping through Downbeat, JazzTimes & JazzIz magazines at a bookseller is a favorite weekend leisure. I jot down things to search for, one thing leads to another & like opening a dictionary you eventually arrive at the destination. Zig-zag. There is jazz to be heard around the world! "This is a watershed moment in Weber's recorded output, because it reveals his collective gifts as a musician, which, even when understated, are shining examples of the European jazz, folk, classical, and new music he has forged these last 40 years as a leader and as a valued sideman and composer."

Nie Bartsch's Ronin, Live "Swiss pianist Nik Bärtsch describes the music of Ronin as "Zen Funk" or "Ritual Groove Music". This is a band that gets into a groove and won't let go, setting up—with extended repetition of three, four or five-note riffs and layered rhythms—huge tension, released (finally) by explosive, rock energy bursts that settle back into new momentums, new repeated motifs, new layers. The collective band sound has a sharp edg; Bärtsch's piano often has a metallic sheen. Bassist Bjørn Meyer locks hard into sometimes loping, sometimes hyper-tight runs. Sha, the band's reedman, who in a more standard ensemble might be the lead melodic voice, sets up deep low moans on the contrabass clarinet that sound like the atomic power source of a starship approaching a leap across interstellar space, while drummer Kasper Rast and percussionist Andi Pupato drive the sub-nuclear energy sources serving the ship's mechanical components." ps: This is part of a just arrived package of CDs, some taken from recommended new jazz here. ?✌️

Of Danish guitarist Jakob Bro, “There is no hurry to this music, but there is great depth." And, "landscapes of sound that are achingly beautiful, sparse, yet full bodied at the same time”. “Much of my music is constructed around melodies. My compositions are almost like a song. But within the frame I set up with a melody, a lot of things can happen. New layers of music are constantly added to the vocabulary, and when you play, you unconsciously get to a new place.” If you cotton to Bill Frisell, or, the lyricism of Polish trumpeter Tomasz Stanko (whom Bro played with), you might like this.

Welcome, Pat O., the canned aerosol "dusters" should not get you into any trouble–the techs here will correct me if I am in error–used at a distance that dislodges debris with minimum but sufficient force. Search with keyword cleaning will bring up some guides with pictures. The contacts for push button switches & rotary dial pots may need cleaning; DeOxit is popular. Welcome.!

" I first started listening to jazz when I was a teenager in Tunis in the 70s. At the time I was I was passionately & exclusively devoted to the the traditional Arab music...Paradoxically, I was full of curiosity about other forms of musical expression...The aesthetics of jazz were very different...I didn't always understand...[but] it was an extraordinary field for ...intermixing & cross-breeding...and I felt I could find my place there." "The album title, by Tunis oud master Anouar Brahem, signifies the union between the incredibly complex Arabic modal and harmonic system and the 'blue' so often evoked in jazz improvisation. Throughout, Brahem seamlessly combines the uncommon time signatures, sonic timbres, and whole-tone textures of Arabic music with the dynamic adventure of jazz improv. There is Arabic melody augmented with layers of rhythmic invention, the uncommon time signatures, sonic timbres of Arabic music with the dynamic adventure of jazz improv, Western chamber and Arabic classical music & full-blown quartet jazz jam. " This has been on my wish list–chanced upon it at the library. ?

Norwegian Mathias Eick, trumpeter, multi-instrumentalist, composer and bandleader, "a highly listenable blend of emotions, without jolting fluctuations...deeply atmospheric", melodic in a way that summons up early Pat Metheny. I think of his music as cinematic, moving one through a window and out into the world, watching it as it passes by, dissolving into it, only to emerge back home transformed. Good thread, Rod, thanks.

Why We Like Sad Music New York Times "SADNESS is an emotion we usually try to avoid. So why do we choose to listen to sad music? ...what we experience when we listen to sad music might be thought of as 'vicarious emotions.'... ...we may be able to improve our understanding of a neglected feature of our emotional system — namely, its sensitivity to something other than palpable needs or threats. When we weep at the beauty of sad music, we experience a profound aspect of our emotional selves that may contain insights about the meaning and significance of artistic experience — and also about ourselves as human beings."

Good for you, Paul! Now, where is that bottle of ipa? ?

All the best to you in the coming year, Wayne!