"Two worlds become one: Classical and jazz blend with a beautiful blow." Magne Thormodsæter is an ECM-alumni, bassist, and in- demand session musician. On L’arte della persuasione, he fuses two worlds with the full force of a beautiful blow. A 35- minute story told in five acts, it pits a high-caliber classical ensemble against a jazz group. The result is captivatingly unclassifiable.

Bloom, the ACT debut of pianist and composer Bill Laurance as leader, marks the transition from the smallest possible form of musical interaction to a large-scale, broadband format: Following the internationally acclaimed ACT release Where You Wish You Were in duo with multi-instrumentalist and Snarky Puppy bandmate Michael League, Laurance now teams up with Manchester-based 18-piece string orchestra The Untold Orchestra and creates a work of convincingly epic pro-portions. Combining Bill Laurance’s classical sensibilities with jazz, pop grooves, and powerful orchestral synchronicity, Bloom runs the gamut of emotions and moods.

Eastwood Symphonic is a tribute from Kyle Eastwood to his father Clint Eastwood. It takes the form of a contemporary musical walk into the heart of the legendary actor-director's extraordinary career. As a young man, Kyle Eastwood appeared in a few films made by his father, but what has united them above all else is their mutual passion for music. It is precisely that passion, so dear to Clint and such an everyday part of Kyle's life today, which has bound their relationship so closely over the years. As bassist and frontman of a sparkling jazz quintet, he has already released one album, 2009's Cinematic, that takes up themes written for the silver screen. For Eastwood Symphonic, which fully embraces some of the music that has figured so prominently in his father's films, Kyle has chosen to have his quintet join by the Czech National Symphony Orchestra (CNSO) led by Grammy Award-winning conductor, Gast Waltzing. This family collaboration is a unique album that comes alongside a film produced by Arte.

Kristjan Randalu releases a newly arranged piano version of Robert Schumanns famous song cycle "Dichterliebe". As a jazz and crossover pianist he has put is own fingerprint on the pieces, improvising here and there and presenting the well-known melodies in an unheard of jazzy style.

Composer Valtteri Laurell Pöyhönen presents his Nonet formation of We Jazz Records. Their debut album "Tigers Are Better Looking" is released 3 Feb and the ensemble features internationally renowned Finnish clarinetist Antti Sarpila, plus a strong cast of Helsinki-based musicians from several of the top Finnish groups. Based on the writings of British-Caribbean author Jean Rhys (1890–1979), the 6-track album is a melancholy, intimate chamber jazz creation. Laurell's music swings, yet he doesn't stop there, but moves further to paint an original, richly-toned sonic image with the highly potent Nonet.

With his playing Emil Brandqvist has meanwhile firmly established himself among the elite of European Jazz musicians. The drummer from Gothenburg, Sweden has stirred up sensational attention, above all together with his trio featuring Tuomas A. Turunen on piano and Max Thornberg on bass. Only recently the trio won distinction for a solid 50 million streams of their music worldwide, and the last album, "Layers Of Life", climbed to No. 2 on the German Jazz Charts. But to scale Emil Brandqvist down to his role as bandleader and musician short-changes his track record, because it's primarily the composer Emil Brandqvist who allows this Swede's popularity to grow and grow. With "Interludes" he is now offering own compositions in variegated instrumentations.

The meeting of great minds usually happens behind closed doors, but for two of the world's foremost bassists – Christian McBride and Edgar Meyer – the collaboration proved so fruitful that a duo album exploring their collective backgrounds in jazz, folk, classical, bluegrass and funk was born.

h i l d e is curious, melancholic and brave. She embraces, disperses and puts together free improvisation with composed elements. She is wild and eccentric, with a courage to create beauty. h I l d e is Julia Brussels (violin), Marie Daniels (voice), Maria Trautmann (trombone) and Emily Wittbrodt (cello). All four are part of the The Dorf & Umland collective.

Nightwalker is a suite inspired by Ketil Bjornstads own experiences as a 'nightwalker' …in nature, in the streets of Oslo or in a musical landscape.

"Get yourself a trio, Erlend." These were the words spoken by the legendary Svein Finnerud to a young Erlend Skomsvoll in 1991. Since then, Erlend Skomsvoll has established himself as an exceptional interpreter of others' music, as an arranger and orchestra leader, collaborating with luminaries such as Chick Corea, Pat Metheny, Kaizers Orchestra, Mathias Eick, Marius Neset, Arve Tellefsen, The Norwegian Wind Ensemble, Norwegian Radio Orchestra, Trondheim Jazz Orchestra, Ensemble Allegria, and many more.

One of the more overlooked highlights of "new music" in the 1980s, blending a smorgasbord of multi-cultural influences into a whimsical and effective whole. It's not billed as such, but this could be most properly classified as late-20th century art songs, with a far greater accessibility to the rock and pop audience than most projects of this nature. It doesn't sound like it could work on paper–why would you want to hear such disparate influences as Cole Porter and middle eastern-like chanted background vocals mixed together, along with about ten other styles? But it does, in a fashion that's more seductive than challenging.

“There is a sense of place representing creativity, where endless space and emptiness – albeit with an underlying sense of beauty and timelessness – is a perfect context for creating something” — Arthur Jeffes

The music of this album is inspired in various ways by the seminal French composer, Lili Boulanger, and her astoundingly beautiful music. Lili Boulanger's musical accomplishments have yet to receive the universal celebration they deserve and this album looks to highlight her deeply compelling and inspiring music.

ConnecTrio's first album is named after a piece by contemporary Polish composer Tomasz Golinski: Luminosity - brightness in Hungarian. Through the language of music, we embark on a journey to explore the myriad facets of light, what the inner light means, or what the brightness of the world can give. It can be a force that gives security, it can be destructive and dangerous. The album presents music with classical, art-pop, jazz and folk influences for flute, piano, percussion and voices.

The latest album by Atom String Quartet - "Universum", is a natural consequence of the band's activities, and at the same time a completely new approach to composing. Each musician mastered great form and composed a full-scale, multi-part string quartet. These works are autonomous entities and tell different stories, precisely showing the individual character of each composer. "Atomizations" by Dawid Lubowicz talk about the vastness of the universe, are a reflection on the infinity of events, a story about a road that always surprises and never ends. "Varsovia" - Mateusz Smoczyński is a musical record of the heroism of Warsaw and the pain of its inhabitants, interwoven with images of the bustling metropolis of the times. present; "Bolero" by Michał Zaborski tells about dance, passion and love, while "Atlas of Butterflies" by Krzysztof Lenczowski is a musical illustration of a children's book with drawings and descriptions of butterflies. Stylistically and formally, the songs are close to classical music, i.e. to the natural environment of a string quartet, but they do not lack elements characteristic of Atom String Quartet, such as improvisation or new performance techniques.