By painting impressionistic portraits out of cues and basic figures for ‘Words Unspoken,’ John Surman got the best contributions from his quartet.

Rarely ever going far outside, Vijay Iyer continues to pursue his piano trio jazz revolution from within with a persistent creative spark and an inspired rhythm section.

Ebarhard Weber’s 1974 debut ‘The Colours of Chloe’ deftly assimilates classical, jazz, folk and even world fusion into an impressionistic whole.

Jan Garbarek would continue to produce great records for ECM in the years and even decades that followed, but there won’t ever be another ‘Triptykon.’

Recorded during a hiatus from the Pat Metheny Group, ‘Rejoicing’ offers an underrated one-off diversion alongside Charlie Haden and Billy Higgins.

‘John Scofield’ shows that in stripping down the arrangements to just his parts, there remains a lot of him left to uncover.

In the 45 years since Pat Metheny’s debut album arrived, I haven’t gone many weeks (if even days) without listening. Yet there are still new revelations.

There’s nothing loud or audacious on Jakob Bro’s ‘Uma Elmo’ because it doesn’t have to in order to leave an impact. Through subtlety comes sublimity.

Nothing is lost when Nik Bärtsch, bandleader, becomes Nik Bärtsch, solo pianist. It’s still captivating music, only played through the single vessel of piano.

A restless, progressive artist through the last 50 years, Terje Rypdal shows he can still pack large ideas into a small band within the tighter confines of a studio.