Ivo Perelman and cohorts prove that sax, trumpet, vibes and stringed instruments can coalesce around spontaneous ideas, if you get the right guys together.

By erasing lines of distinction between immediate and contemplated, natural and processed, Joseph Branciforte and Theo Bleckmann crafted something that’s truly novel, yet truly inviting with ‘LP2.’

Drummer extraordinaire Jeff Cosgrove joins Noah Preminger and Kim Cass for an inspired sax/bass/drums performance, ‘Confusing Motion for Progress.’

André 3000 didn’t enter the studio intending to make an ‘Alice Coltrane’ or ‘Jon Hassell’ album, he simply followed his muse. If only more high profile artists did this.

The seriously advanced improvising of ‘Fire Within’ is borne out of the fun that Rich Halley clearly had joining forces again with the like-minded Matthew Shipp Trio.

‘Maximum Swing: The Unissued 1965 Half Note Recordings’ with the Wynton Kelly Trio only bolsters the case that Wes Montgomery is the greatest jazz guitarist of all time.

Incognito’s ‘Into You’ will lift spirits with craft grooves from start to finish because there are no sag points.

Satoko Fujii, Taiko Saito and Yuko Oshima are three wellsprings of creativity who as Trio San joined forces to find new ways to make uncommonly compelling music.

The Who’s platinum-selling Top 5 hit ‘Quadrophenia’ arrived 50 years ago as the rock-opera successor to ‘Tommy,’ and somehow never left its shadow.

Vince Guaraldi’s ‘A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving’ is a soundtrack for serious jazz heads and fusion heads, as much as it’s for the fans of the popular ‘Peanuts’ television specials.