Flotation Device celebrates the 100th birthday of Sam Rivers (1923–2011), the versatile bandleader and woodwind player whose discography includes recordings with Miles Davis and Anthony Braxton. We also catch up on several interesting new releases, including Scottish composer James Dillon’s first portrait album in over a decade, plus fresh anthologies from Kevin Puts and Sarah Davachi that reflect their very different stylistic paths from the common fount of musical minimalism. Also, Olga Neuwirth accompanies Claire Chase with a typewriter, PoiL Ueda accompanies Japanese war epics with rock-n-roll, and Idol Ko Si and Location Location Location find new, off-kilter approaches to the power trio format. Cult of Light explores haunted asylums, Lary 7 explores Canal Street surplus stores, and Nasim Khorassani reworks the tersest, most modern propensities of Aaron Copland, who’s himself represented by an astringent and little-known late work for its 50th anniversary.
