Steve Coleman - Synovial Joints (2015) [Hi-Res]

Composer and alto saxophonist Steve Coleman is widely considered to be among the most influential artists in jazz. He was recipient in 2014 of three prestigious awards: a MacArthur Fellowship, Guggenheim Fellowship and Doris Duke Performing Artist Grant. This comes at a time when Coleman is at a creative peak, incorporating a lifetime of research into African diasporic culture and cycles found in nature and astronomy into his musical methods. His influence among young artists, particularly in his approach to rhythm, has never been stronger. Synovial Joints is the most ambitious project in Coleman s 30-year career as a bandleader. The music is written for 21 musicians, encompassing his core Five Elements group, augmented by musicians from jazz, Afro-Cuban, Afro-Brazilian and contemporary classical circles. The music was based on ideas that reflect the processes, functions and rhythms of the human body - to model individual elements of the musical composition on the physiological movements within the nervous, respiratory, cardiovascular, lymphatic, endocrine, and exocrine systems. The overall musical structure of the composition is held together based on the musculoskeletal system, hence the title.