The Bad Plus Joshua Redman kicks off a tour featuring music from its newly released self-titled debut album. The tour begins with two sets at the Highline Ballroom in NYC Wednesday for the Blue Note Jazz Festival, followed by shows in the US and festival sets across Canada through June. The European leg of the tour begins at the Love Supreme Jazz Festival in England on July 4. The US tour picks up again in October. "Full of genre-blending compositions and crafty rhythms," says The New Yorker, "the record shows that they are jazz outliers who remain primed for adventure."

The Bad Plus Joshua Redman, the debut album from the eponymous quartet, is out now in North America (June 8 for the rest of the world). "The album is a knockout," exclaims the New York Times. "It is impressive how much vital presence [Redman] brings to the Bad Plus without altering the band’s dynamic." It's "a roaring and beautiful summit meeting," says NPR. "The ideas are impressive by themselves, but become more powerful as Redman and the rhythm section go about developing them ... [T]he real triumph of The Bad Plus Joshua Redman: It exhibits genuinely fresh thinking." The Bad Plus Joshua Redman begins a world tour in NYC June 10.

The Bad Plus Joshua Redman, whose self-titled debut album is due out next week in North America and June 8 elsewhere, performed at the Detroit Jazz Festival in 2014, when Redman was Artist in Residence there. NPR's Jazz Night in America was there to capture the new quartet, fresh out of the studio. Watch the performance and an interview with the band here. The new album is streaming in full till May 25 as an NPR First Listen. The quartet kicks off a tour at the Blue Note Jazz Festival on June 10.

The Bad Plus Joshua Redman's self-titled, debut album is due out next week and is streaming in full till then as an NPR First Listen at npr.org. The album is "a roaring and beautiful summit meeting," says NPR's Tom Moon. "The ideas are impressive by themselves, but become more powerful as Redman and the rhythm section go about developing them ... [T]he real triumph of The Bad Plus Joshua Redman: It exhibits genuinely fresh thinking." The album, he concludes, "draws on a range of old ideas (as old as Chopin nocturnes and '60s rock) as fuel for a journey into the murky, terrifying, thrilling unknown."

Joshua Redman traveled to Myanmar with the International Rescue Committee in February to visit IRC-run maternal health and community engagement programs. He spoke with villagers who were building roads and water systems based on community consensus gained through an election organized by the IRC—giving some villagers the chance to vote for the very first time. Redman became an IRC Voice in 2013 and says of his trip, "I have played music all over the world, but I have never before experienced something like this." Watch a video from the visit here.

In 2011, The Bad Plus invited saxophonist Joshua Redman to join them for a week of performances at the Blue Note in NYC. They then played a handful of dates before heading into the studio in 2014 to record their debut album, The Bad Plus Joshua Redman, due May 26 on Nonesuch (June 8 outside North America). Pre-order to download the track "Dirty Blonde," written by bassist Reid Anderson, now. Seven of the nine tracks on the album are new compositions by the quartet members who, in addition to Anderson and Redman, include The Bad Plus pianist Ethan Iverson and drummer David King; the other two songs on the album are new arrangements of Bad Plus favorites. The Bad Plus Joshua Redman begins a world tour in NYC June 10.

The ECHO Jazz 2015 Award nominations have been announced by the German Recording Academy, and among the nominees are Brad Mehldau, who is up for International Instrumentalist of the Year, Piano/Keyboards, for his album with drummer Mark Guiliana, Mehliana: Taming the Dragon; Pat Metheny for International Instrumentalist of the Year, Guitar, and Pat Metheny Unity Group for International Ensemble of the Year for Kin (←→); and Joshua Redman for International Instrumentalist of the Year, Saxophone/Woodwinds, for Trios Live. 

James Farm’s sophomore album, City Folk, is out now, a new collection of ten original tunes written by all four members of the collaborative band: Joshua Redman, Aaron Parks, Matt Penman, and Eric Harland. It earns five stars from the Financial Times ("ten beautifully crafted miniatures that rock with rhythm") and four stars from the Guardian, which notes the "enthralling improvisations [on] this inviting set," and the Evening Standard, which describes the band as "four crack musicians and improvisers whose fierce grooves and synergy make for spine-tingling listening." The Buffalo News calls City Folk "the second first-rate disc by one of the more impressive jazz quartets to come together in the past few years."

Nonesuch Records releases James Farm’s sophomore album, City Folk, on October 27, 2014. The album features a new collection of ten original tunes written by all four members of the collaborative band: saxophonist Joshua Redman, pianist Aaron Parks, bassist Matt Penman, and drummer Eric Harland. Redman says, “The first record was more of a proposition, almost a question. ‘What is James Farm?’ The second record is, in a certain sense, a partial answer.” The album is available for pre-order on iTunes and in the Nonesuch Store with an instant download of the opening song “Two Steps” from the record, written by Penman, which you can hear here.

Saxophonist Joshua Redman’s trio, featuring Reuben Rogers on bass and Gregory Hutchinson on drums—which can be heard on Redman’s recent Nonesuch release, Trios Live—will tour the US this fall. The tour kicks off with two sets at Catalina’s in LA on September 29 and makes stops across the country, including multi-night residencies in San Francisco, Seattle, Boston, NYC, St. Louis, and Washington, DC’s Blues Alley, where the trio recorded the new album. (Trios Live also includes tracks recorded at NYC’s Jazz Standard with Matt Penman on bass.) 

Joshua Redman's new album, Trios Live, earns four stars from BBC Music Magazine, which lauds Redman's "athletic, exuberant and all-consuming extemporization" on the album, calling it "a thrill-a-minute set," and All About Jazz, which says "Redman's definitely got the fire and burns hot as coals in Trios Live which captures the essence of his unbridled abilities as musician and performer ... Redman is in his element."

Joshua Redman's new album, Trios Live, is a "sax fan's dream of a live set," says the Guardian in a four-star review. "Joshua Redman, one of the most technically accomplished saxists in jazz today, parades his powers on this live set ... [He] performs with a skill that sometimes justifies comparison with early Sonny Rollins—notably on the old Rollins vehicle 'Moritat (Mack the Knife),'" and "the crowd goes wild." Jazzwise writes: "Anyone who's seen Redman, especially live, will know about his forceful sonic presence and eloquence at reinvigorating a familiar jazz language while always remaining mindful of its more contemporary shifts."