Listen to this week’s playlist on YouTube and Spotify
When the late jazz impresario and trailblazer Meghan Stabile first launched the Revivalist platform and Revive Da Live concert series in NYC, the goal was to bridge the gap between young Hip Hop audiences and traditional jazz purists. Born from this vision in 2010 was the Revive Big Band, an inventive 20+ piece ensemble led by artistic director, trumpeter and composer Igmar Thomas. Merging tradition with groundbreaking creativity since its inception, the multi-generational band’s world-class cadre of musicians unite for “Like a Tree It Grows,” their official full-length debut representing the 14-year timeline of the Revive collective’s journey.

Jazz musicians are nocturnal by nature. Almost as essential as time spent on the bandstand are the hours celebrated in the hang, where bonds are forged that inevitably feed back into the spirit and camaraderie of the music. Those strong ties, lifelong relationships, and late-night revelries are vibrantly illustrated on “Out Late,” the exhilarating and inventive new album from pianist and composer Eric Scott Reed. The disc boasts a stellar quintet whose members share deep histories with one another. The date features trumpeter Nicholas Payton, tenor saxophonist Eric Alexander, bassist Peter Washington and drummer Joe Farnsworth.

Also this week, CCCM Orchestra & Hendrik Meurkens present “Big Band Brasil,” featuring special guests Paquito D’Rivera and Diego Urcola joining the Costa Rican Jazz Orchestra on a program of Meurkens originals; BeatleJazz, with Brian Melvin, David Kikoski and Boris Kozlov, returns to its trio format for its fourth CD, “Reunion”;  and guitarist Kurt Rosenwinkel and pianist Jean-Paul Brodbeck team up again on the heels of their successful first collaboration “The Chopin Project,” this time tackling the music of Johannes Brahms with “The Brahms Project.”