Adventurous sounds from jazz ages of recent and ghosts of jazz ages past from Leo Records…
If nothing else, the team of Walter Faehndrich/viola-voice, Christy Doran/eg, Remo/sax and Benedikt Vonder Muhll/b may have set the Guinness World Book record for most songs on a single disc. 99, count ’em 99 songs (or “miniatures’ as they call them) shoot through your ears like a swarm of flies in a barn, buzzing around, scratching, picking plucking and poking here and there. Strings are strummed, slapped, picked, bowed, and snapped, the sax huffs and puffs and shrieks, the guitar grinds, stutters and starts and the ears get impatient.
Christoph Grab plays various saxes and the visceral bass clarinet along with pianist Christoph Baumann, bassist Hami 
Hammerli and drummer Tony Renold for a mix of bop and frisky fun. The team waltzes on a peg leg with Grab’s tenor on the askance “Schoggimuss” while Renold supplies a funky backbeat after a rich bass intro on “Grossvater Var III”. The reeds get deep and thick on the loose fitting and dynamic changing “Cadavre Exquis No. 4” and bop starts to drop on “Cadvre Exquis No. 4”A light show of music.
Sergio Armaroli/vibe, Veli Kujala/acc, Harri Sjostrom/ss-sss and Giancarlo Schiaffini/tb hit the studios for some eerie moods that have the sax reeds shrieking on “Small Mirror #1” and “#3”, blurping with the gurgling trombone on “More Windows #9” and some plunging brass on the squeaky “Small Mirror “5”. The accordion gets a bit spooky with vibes on “#4” and shrieks during “#1”. Number nine, number nine, number nine, number nine…
The ringer here is a 1979 date featuring pianist/organist Amina Claudine Myers who teams up with drummer Pheeroan akLAFF and bassist Cecil McBee for a thrilling mix of adventurous ideas. On piano, Myers goes modal on a passionate “I’m Not Afraid” while bookending the album with a deep organ rendition. She sounds a bit like Randy Weston or Horace Tapscott on pieces like “The Real Side” and the soulful “Inner Destruction”, while getting into a gospel fell on the keys during “Song For Mother E”, getting funky on “3/4 of 4/4” and going from reflective to wild on “Have Mercy Upon Us”. This lady is still around and active-I wanna see her in concert. WHEW!