Omer Avital’s ‘New Song’ is a finely crafted synthesis of Middle Eastern, Afro-Cuban and American soul-jazz that’s world music without being self-consciously so.

Here is a review of ‘Nax,’ a free-jazz trumpet/bass encounter between Natsuki Tamura and Alexander Frangenheim.

Here is a review of ‘The Process’ by Bill Laswell, Chad Smith and Jon Batiste, a meeting of the minds of master musicians who hadn’t previously met.

Here is a sneak peek of Rudresh Mahanthappa’s “Chillin’,” from his upcoming February 2015 release ‘Bird Calls.’

The Huntertones, née The Dan White Sextet, lean on trombonist Chris Ott’s arranging magic to give another cinematic song a swift, hard-bop kick in the pants.

Perhaps not quite as amazing as his fabled sides for Blue Note Records, but Bud Powell’s ‘Live At The Blue Note Café, Paris 1961’ is plenty good enough to make any jazzbo wish they’d have been there.

Eric Bibb’s civil rights blues manifesto ‘Blues People’ is poignant, and also entertaining.

Here’s a review of ‘Bridges of Souls,’ a tasteful fusion excursion from Hungarian drum ace Ferenc Nemeth and Hugarian guitar ace Attila Laszlo.

Powered by the garage jazz-rock songs of Gregory Howe and Matt Montgomery with the brash saxophone stylings of Kamasi Washington, Throttle Elevator Music is back with a second helping.

South Indian jazz is practically Arun Ramamurthy’s life’s calling and he answers that call to virtual perfection with ‘Jazz Carnatica.’