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.

Of all the strange records this French vanguard pop chanteuse ever recorded, this 1971 collaboration between the teams of Brigitte Fontaine and her songwriting partner Areski and the Art Ensemble of Chicago - who were beginning to think about returning to the United States after a two-year stay - is the strangest and easily most satisfying. While Fontaine's records could be beguiling with their innovation, they occasionally faltered by erring on the side of gimmickry and cuteness. Here, the Art Ensemble provide the perfect mysterious and ethereal backdrop for her vocal explorations. Featuring the entire Art Ensemble of that time period and including fellow Chicago AACM member Leo Smith on second trumpet, Fontaine and Areski stretched the very notion of what pop had been and could be…

There have been countless attempts to counteract the inherently boring nature of the CD as an artefact and the approach adopted by Feral shapes up better than some on the strength of this first release, which takes some excellent music by saxophonist Iain Ballamy (in the company of three young Norwegian musicians) and packages it with a set of intriguing print artworks by Dave McKean in an elegant library case. On the other hand, we may now be so accustomed to the blandness of the format that any attempt to escape it seems like a distraction. While debating this, it's important not to forget to play the disc, which is quite remarkable and a far cry from Ballamy's formative years in the sprawling bloke-jazz outfit Loose Tubes. Recorded live at the Molde Jazz Festival in 1998, it's astounding that this music seems to date from the very beginning of Ballamy's association with these musicians, given their obvious level of empathy.

In what could easily mistaken for a release on the ECM label, Morning Glory inhabits that crisp minimalist style so familiar to producer Manfred Eicher. Surprisingly enough, this studio recording, with bonus Live In New York disc, is delivered by three of today's most zealous improvisers and outcats. Formed in 2005, the trio's previous release, Aurora (Maya, 2006), began bassist Barry Guy established their improvisation bona fides with saxophonist Evan Parker's intellectual explorations and Mats Gustafsson's noisier ones. Each player also has a dedication to classical and chamber musics and perhaps that is where these compositions and improvisations intersect.

Wadada Leo Smith's recorded long-form works in the first half of the 2010s have all been justifiably celebrated. From 2010's Ten Freedom Summers to 2013's Occupy the World and 2015's Great Lakes Suites, his albums have evocatively and provocatively engaged their subjects in a deft musical language that investigates as well as illustrates. The six thematically and musically linked compositions of America's National Parks were birthed by Smith's own research on the congressional passing of the Organic Act in 1916 that created the National Parks Service. Unlike filmmaker Ken Burns' documentary, The National Parks: America's Best Idea, Smith doesn't celebrate the majesty of nature here…

Louis Sclavis has for decades dazzled and provoked listeners with his literate, ambitious musical projects that examine not only the many dimensions and directions of the sonic spectrum, but also his Renaissance-like embrace of literature, foreign cultures, and now, visual art. With a new quartet collaborating with him – only cellist Vincent Courtois is retained from his previous outing, L'Affrontement des Prétendants – Sclavis turns his eyes, ears, and spirit toward an investigation of the paintings of the French artist Ernest Pignon-Ernest on Napoli's Walls.

This is a reissue (first time on CD) of the seminal album by legendary German clarinetist/composer Rolf Kuhn (born 1929), recorded with a quintet, which also included his younger brother pianist/composer Joachim Kuhn (born 1944), bassist Klaus Koch and two Polish Jazz legends: saxophonist Michał Urbaniak and drummer Czesław Bartkowski. The album presents six pieces: three original compositions by Rolf Kuhn, two original compositions by Joachim Kuhn and one arrangement of a folk tune. Over the years this album achieved a legendary status and became a highly sought after collector's item, because of its political implications, as well as being one of the earliest East European Jazz recordings and an important cornerstone of European Jazz in general.