Blues & Jazz

“New Blue Sun is the continuation of discovery for me. My entire career has been fueled by this and it is the only thing that keeps me honest. This album is the most honest and interesting offering I can give today. I never could have imagined in high school, when I started rapping and doing music that I would be here right now playing wind instruments. Ha. This life ride always surprises me. I’m here for it.” — Andre 3000

This limited edition 3-LP vinyl is pressed on 180g black vinyl with fold out poster, printed inner sleeves and note from the artist.

Bassist and composer Marcel Bonfim’s debut album, Farewell / Despedida, features a set of original compositions and two unique cover arrangements, introducing listeners to his world of influences and experiences from growing up in Brazil then coming to the United States. Ranging from jazz to Brazilian popular music, the emotion pours from this debut offering.

The funk fans have been waiting for this one. Finally available on vinyl, Grant Green's near perfect slice of jazz funk and soul, Live at Club Mozambique, remastered and rendered back in the Motor City. Grant Green's band had been playing a series of live dates at Detroit's Club Mozambique, (before it became a fabled Male dance club) when this session was recorded live on two cold January nights in 1971. Powerhouse drummer Idris Muhammad and soulful tenor star Houston Person were brought in to supplement Green's current band featuring Ronnie Foster on organ and Clarence Thomas on Soprano and Tenor Sax and Blue Note producer Francis Wolff recorded. This treasure was never released, though, and (conjectures aside) remained in the Blue Notes vaults for 35 years before a 2006 CD release. Sounding incredibly fresh and live, you'd be hard-pressed to find a more real stamping of Grant Green at the top of his game. The lp blends extremely hypnotic and wild funk such as their opening cover of a local funk hit ''Jan Jan'' by the Fabulous Counts next to laidback renditions of early 70's soul favorites ''Walk on By'', ''Patches'' and ''One More Chance'' by the Jackson 5. It perfectly captures the magic of hearing a legendary band effortlessly doing their thing in a small club while the audience unwinds after a long work day. Green pulls it all together with his melodic genius and perfect delivery. Great artists make it seem so easy. No pretensions here, just a great band burning up the stage with unmistakable chemistry on what might be the ultimate jazz funk time capsule. Maybe you can't go back in time, but if you close your eyes and light a cigarette, you might be convinced you're sitting in a wood-paneled club on Detroit's Westside enjoying Grant Green and his band tear it up.

313 Series
Detroit has long held a shared respect with New York; a similar outlook on authenticity. Tough to describe, but you know it when you see it. Third Man Records and Blue Note Records share this respect and also a commitment to integrity regarding the musical legacies they support that extends to the collaboration happening on the 313 Series partnership. The five unique albums from the Blue Note catalog chosen for limited edition re-release by Blue Note Records President and Detroiter Don Was represent the best of the Motor City; innovative sounds, incredible playing and that inexplicable something you know is real.

For an undertaking like this you have to walk the extra mile. The original tapes were sent to Third Man's Detroit mastering and pressing facility where their extensive all analog re-mastering process ensured that the albums delivered live up to the tradition they are part of. The Third Man Records team's commitment to audio purity means no corners can be cut; sound and mastering engineer Warren Defever's goal being to provide the closest possible approximation of the magic found on the original master's tape brought to your living room. From the lacquers cut in the studio on the Neumann VMS-70 Cutting Lathe to the 180 gram vinyl pressed across the hall, every step of the process is tested in the facilities against exacting standards. That's the Detroit way and the reason why the musical legacy from the 313 area code remains beloved around the world.

Grant Green - Guitar
Ronnie Foster - Organ
Idris Muhammad - Drums
Clarence Thomas - Soprano Sax, Tenor Sax
Houston Person - Tenor Sax

Recorded live at Club Mozambique - Detroit, MI 1971 by Francis Wolff

Cloudward is the new release by Brooklyn-based guitarist, composer, and MacArthur fellow Mary Halvorson. The album features eight new compositions by Halvorson, performed with her sextet Amaryllis; the improvisatory band that performed on her critically praised 2022 albums Amaryllis and Belladonna comprises Halvorson, Patricia Brennan (vibraphone), Nick Dunston (bass), Tomas Fujiwara (drums), Jacob Garchik (trombone), and Adam O’Farrill (trumpet). Labelmate Laurie Anderson also is featured on the album track “Incarnadine.”  The dual 2022 releases’ acclaim included being named Jazz Album of the Year in DownBeat’s annual Critics Poll. Halvorson and the ensemble will tour internationally following the Cloudward release, including February and March dates in Maryland and New York, as well as at the Big Ears Festival as part of Nonesuch’s 60th anniversary celebration.

“All the music on Cloudward was written in 2022, mostly in the fall and winter, when things started moving forward. Life felt like a creaky machine starting up again,” Halvorson says. “Air travel, however chaotic, had resumed, and we were once again cloudward. Performances and tours and recordings were happening after a long hiatus and with a renewed sense of gratitude. This band, for me, was quite simply working, both musically and personally, and the main thing I felt while writing the music was optimism.”

Composer and trumpeter Ambrose Akinmusire makes his Nonesuch Records debut with Owl Song on December 15, 2023. The album features a trio with two musicians Akinmusire has long admired, guitarist Bill Frisell and drummer Herlin Riley.

“This is my reaction to being assaulted by information,” Akinmusire says of Owl Song. “This record is me wanting to create a safe space. Part of the challenge was: Can I create something that’s oriented around open space, the way some of the records I love the most do?”

He says of his collaborators, “I had a feeling of wanting to record with Bill from the first time we played—it was a duo performance, very little rehearsal. We just played through some of my songs, and it worked. One of Bill’s special gifts is the ability to shape a piece he’s just heard for the first time. He seems to know what the music wants before the first note.

“With Herlin, his commitment to beauty you can find in the groove. I never like to tell musicians too much about what I’m going for, because it should be about what these particular people bring … I said, ‘I know you’re the right person for this because of the way you approach the groove.’ And, of course, what he did is just beautiful.” He continues, “Also, I wanted to put people together who didn’t seem like they would go together ... and it turns out they haven’t played a lot. So, it was cross generational, cross subgenre, cross whatever.”

Quickly rising jazz pianist Isaiah J. Thompson is back with his tribute to Vince Guaraldi and his music. He comments "Although many claim to not like jazz, I’ve never heard anyone say they dislike holiday music. In my experience, the popular holiday music is jazz. I think Vince Guaraldi in his time deeply influenced how people experienced the music because by being connected to “Peanuts”, it became a part of the popular culture."

Trumpeter Paul Dietrich’s 5+4 arose from the composer’s desire to explore the possibilities of the string quartet within the context of modern jazz. With this group, Dietrich, who also leads both a jazz quintet and a big band, found a solid middle ground between large ensemble compositional approach and small group sensibilities. The result is a record that feels large in scale yet intimate in its improvisational landscape.

As Duke Ellington would have said, Dinah Washington was “beyond category.” Subtle and inventive enough to hold an honored place in the jazz pantheon yet tough and forceful enough to command the attention of blues, R&B and rock n’ roll audiences.

Virtuosic pianist/ composer Hiromi electrifies audiences with a creative energy that encompasses the boundaries of jazz, classical and pop. With her new band, Hiromi's Sonicwonder, she introduces their debut album, Sonicwonderland, out October 6, 2023 via Telarc. A musical nod to her 2007 band Sonicbloom, the quartet showcases 9 original tracks featuring Hiromi on piano/ keyboards, Hadrien Feraud on bass, Gene Coye on drums and Adam O’Farrill on trumpet. Available on CD, 2-LP and digitally.