Top 10 Jazz Albums of 2025 | jazz

10. Tom Smith’s Big Band – A Year in the Life

UK saxophonist, composer and bandleader Tom Smith was providing evidence of his distinctively contemporary take on the jazz tradition when he was a finalist for the BBC Young Jazz Musician of the Year in 2014 and 2016, and subsequently as leader of groups including the sax trio Gecko and the LGBTQI+ Queertet. But his powerful 2025 big band release, A Year in the Life, unveiled how delightfully Smith’s writing blends the orchestral influences of Maria Schneider and Carla Bley with the raucous instrumentation of the big band swing era, and a deep understanding of bebop’s string acrobatics, with raw, metallic guitar interweavings.

9. Artemis – arboreal

Arboresque is the third and best release by Blue Note label Artemis, evolving from a band formed for International Women’s Day in 2016 by renowned Canadian pianist and composer Rene Rosnes. All five members compose. Highlights include sax player Nicole Glover’s ethereal Petrichor for its theme and improving tenor, and trumpeter Ingrid Jensen’s Sights Unseen with its lively post-bop dialogue with Rosnes. There are typically Rosnes’ evocative arrangements of the footprints of his former employer Wayne Shorter, and the standard the world needs now is love. Cliché-free individualism was combined with a radiantly harmonious collective spirit.

8. Jacob Bro – Take turns

Danish guitarist Jacob Bro is an apparent fan of Bill Frisell, but he also admires the unique melodic imagination of legendary saxophonist Lee Kunitz. In 2014, ECM recorded this mini-masterpiece with Bro, an 86-year-old Kunitz, and a large avant-jazz ensemble made up of Frisell, pianist Jason Moran, bassist Thomas Morgan, and former Cecil Taylor drummer Andrew Serrell – and then sat in on it. This late release reveals serenely resonant harmonies and lyrical waltzes for the inimitable Kunitz to shine and breathe through, along with Cyril and Morgan’s free-floating notions of swing, and the simple, interwoven delicacies of two contemporary guitar masters who paint the sound. Read the full review

7. Ahmed [Ahmed] – sky

Keyboardist Pat Thomas has been an idiomatically diverse creative maverick in UK jazz and improvisation for over three decades, and this two-album set features Ahmed [Ahmed] A stormy, sonically abstract, rhythmic quartet work dedicated to bassist Art Blakey and Thelonious Monk Ahmed Abdel Malik, a pioneering fusion of jazz and Middle Eastern music. Saxophonist Seymour Wright (a fine heir to the styles of Albert Ayler and Evan Parker) and bassist Joel Grebe often link raw polyphony with rhythmically bending vocals, while the sometimes sultry stylings of Cecil Taylor-style Thomas Thomas and drummer Antonin Gerbal oscillate between boiling free jazz storms and raucous folk dances, in a bold but infectious session. Compelling free jazz. Read the full review

6. Cecil McLaurin Salvant – Oh Snap

Twelve originals and one quirky cover, first created alone on a computer by French/Haitian/American singer Cecile McLaurin Salvant, then combined in the studio with some long-time vocal and instrumental partners. Salvant draws on memories of teenage pop, popular and classical music, and a rich jazz life during her years in France. Brittle song lines drift over drum loops, elegant jazz pianist Sullivan Fortner leads the old-school swingers, while genre-spanning vocal partners John McDoom and Kate Davis join in with achingly sympathetic harmonies. “What Does Blue Mean to You?”, inspired by Toni Morrison’s film “Beloved,” is the highlight of a bold, personal and unforgettable project. Read the full review

5. Linda Mae Han Oh – Strange Skies

Malaysian-born, New York-based Australian harpist and composer Linda May Han Oh has long played with stars (among them Vijay Iyer and Pat Metheny); Her own projects were few, but special. Strange Heavens revisits the partnership that debuted in 2009 with Miles-influenced but unique trumpeter Ambrose Akinmusire. Joining the duo here is Tyshawn Sorey, one of the greatest drummers – and improvisers – in contemporary music. Soft melodies flourish from Suri’s bass strums and spacey frames, Miles’ improvised trumpet slides over hip-hop grooves, and Geri Allen’s Skin and Melba Liston’s Just Waiting get respectfully stunning makeovers. Read the full review

4. Joshua Redman – Words fall short

American saxophone master Joshua Redman’s 2023 debut with the band Blue Note (three decades after his breakthrough 1993 debut) had an unusual and inappropriate focus on covers and vocals. But this year’s edition features one voice, an all-original repertoire and a new road band, celebrated Chilean saxophonist Melissa Aldana and 19-year-old West Coast trumpeter Skylar Tang. Both improvise with Redman as if they were soulmates, “Borrowed Eyes” exquisitely evolving in Redman’s spacey whispers against softly clipped bass sounds, and Gabriel Cavassa’s haunting, ghostly voice participating in a stunning vocal/tenor sax exchange at the end of the closing era. Read the full review

3. Anthony Braxton – Quartet (England) 1985

The influence of 80-year-old Anthony Braxton, one of the great pioneers of jazz, new and conceptual music, has spanned music from free improvisation to symphonies and opera. But his small jazz groups often brought out the best of his multi-reed virtuosity and driving imagination. These live recordings from the Braxton Quartet’s remarkable 1985 UK tour feature swashbuckling bebop storms, freestyle ensemble passages, captivating warm-ups of standard songs, and the power and precision of pianist Marilyn Crispell, bassist Mark Dresser, and drummer Jerry Hemingway. The sound recorded on cassette is understandably incomplete, but the sense of presence in its creation is vital. Read the full review

2. Mary Halvorson – About Ghosts

About Ghosts Amaryllis expands on New York guitarist/composer Mary Halvorson’s band, with whom she featured on 2024’s acclaimed Cloudward release. They’re augmented here by two lively saxophonists: contortionist Emanuel Wilkins, and tenor player Brian Settles, whose arrival exacerbates the surprises with which Halvorson’s pieces are constantly played. Filled with neon march-like pulses and rich ensemble harmonies shouted through disaffected horn exclamations, and taut guitar figures mix with whooping alto enhancement on Carved From, the bebopish blasts move so quickly that they sound overly compressed. Halvorson said she loves singer-songwriter Robert Wyatt’s music for its blend of “the strange with the beautiful.” She sure knows all about how to do it. Read the full review

1. Michael Woolney Trio – Living Ghosts

The 10-year-old group of brilliant German pianist and composer Michael Wolny, along with David Bowie’s Black Star guitarist Tim Lefebvre and drummer Eric Schaefer, is going from strength to strength. Living Ghosts is a live recording that showcases the group’s preferred avoidance of setlists or arrangements, allowing for what the pianist called “séances where the ghosts of the trio’s songbook visit us at will.” Alban Berg and Paul Hindemith’s miniatures turn into rock-driven pedals or bass-walking bebop, swing turns into raw improvisation, and Nick’s Hand of God becomes Guillaume de Machaut’s How to Lassie! But what governs all this is what the types of music have in common, not what separates them. Read the full review