The title of Breaking Stretch is a concise representation of Brennan’s envelope-pushing ambitions. Breaking references her desire to push herself and her bandmates to their limits, to mine the transcendent results of virtuosic imaginations confronted by unexpected challenges. Stretch captures her music’s intense elasticity, its ability to stretch from the taut and minutely focused to the wide-angled and reaching. Those extremes are depicted in the album’s striking artwork, a mix of astronomical and volcanic images, placing the cosmic and the subterranean side by side – the differences between the opposing poles, as in Brennan’s work, at times nearly indistinguishable.

Brooklyn-based guitarist, composer, and MacArthur fellow Mary Halvorson’s new album, Cloudward, is due January 19, 2024 on Nonesuch Records. 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.

"Visions Of Your Other" is the third album by Adam O'Farrill's Stranger Days, one that takes the band back to its roots in original compositions after their Mexican folk music-inspired release, El Maquech. Adam and two of his bandmates, Walter Stinson on bass and Zack O'Farrill on drums, return along with the arrival of Xavier Del Castillo on tenor saxophone.