Vibraphonist Stefon Harris, saxophonist David Sanchez and trumpeter Christian Scott bridge the cultural and musical divide between the United States and Cuba with their brand new collaboration, “Ninety Miles.” Recorded entirely in Havana, with the help of some highly talented Cuban players, the nine-song set is an experiment that examines the fascinating chemical reaction that takes places when musicians from different cultures come together and converse in a common language that transcends mere words.

When two of the most acclaimed modern explorers of Cuban music combine their prodigious talents on the music they love, musical magic happens. That is demonstrated in truly enchanting fashion on “Cuban Rhapsody” — the duet recording by Hilario Duran and Jane Bunnett. They are both virtuoso players, arrangers, composers and bandleaders in their own right, and both are famed for their innovative take on contemporary Latin jazz and Cuban styles. The disc is best described as an exploration of Cuban classical music, and the results are both educational and accessible.

Well known throughout his five-decade career for his quartets, beginning with his 1967 group featuring Larry Coryell, Roy Haynes and Steve Swallow, Gary Burton has returned to that configuration for the first time since the mid-’90s with the new disc, “Common Ground.” The Grammy-winning pioneer of the four mallet technique of playing the vibes is not only delivering his first studio release in six years but is also introducing his latest band. “I’ve always liked the vibraphone-guitar sound,” says Burton. “It’s something that I discovered when Nashville country guitarist Hank Garland invited me in the ’60s to record with him. The sound of the two instruments together has an ideal timbre and coolness.” The young guitarist Julian Lage rejoins Burton’s ensemble along with drummer Antonio Sanchez and bassist Scott Colley.

Though the world is poorer now that Freddie Hubbard is gone, it gets richer as previously unheard documentation of his art emerges for the public to savor on “Pinnacle: Live and Unreleased From Keystone Korner.” Recorded at the famed jazz club in San Francisco in 1980, Hubbard’s explosive and lyrical virtuosity as well as his flow of brilliant, spontaneous ideas are on full display. His band of West Coast all-stars includes pianist Billy Childs, drummer Eddie Marshall, saxophonist Hadley Caliman and trombonist Phil Ranelin.

Pianist Chick Corea, bassist Stanley Clarke and drummer Lenny White have done more in recent decades to redefine jazz-rock fusion and push the limits of its potential than any other musicians today. Together they formed the core of the classic lineup of Return to Forever, the legendary seminal electric jazz fusion band. After reclaiming the jazz-rock world in 2008 with the triumphant return of RTF, the trio decided to revisit where it all began, to get back to basics of their relationship. “Forever” is the name of the trio’s new two-disc set, featuring a sampler of their unplugged 2009 world tour and a gig they did to kick off that tour at the Hollywood Bowl featuring special guests violinist Jean-Luc Ponty and original RTF guitarist Bill Connors.

Since the mid-1980s, pianist and singer Eliane Elias has grafted various elements of jazz, pop, soul and other elements to her deep Brazilian roots to create a hybrid groove that appeals to listeners of every geographical locale and cultural persuasion. Her new disc — “Light My Fire” — wields this universal sound to explore the various corners of the human heart-from romance and passion to the shared joy of being alive. In addition to four Elias originals, there are covers of familiar works by songwriters as diverse as Jim Morrison, Stevie Wonder and Paul Desmond. Backing her up is a crew of twelve high-caliber players including trumpeter Randy Brecker, bassist Marc Johnson, and guitarists Romero Lubambo, Oscar Castro-Neves and Gilberto Gil.

Groundbreaking banjoist/composer/bandleader Bela Fleck has reconvened the original members of his band The Flecktones for a brand new disc — “Rocket Science” — marking the first recording by the initial line-up of the group in almost two decades. Pianist and harmonica player Howard Levy is back in the fold alongside Fleck, bassist Victor Wooten and percussionist Futureman. All manner of genres come into play, from jazz and classical to bluegrass and African music to electric blues and Eastern European folk dances, for a sound that Fleck has coined “blu-bop.”

Following his Grammy-nominated 2009 debut, virtuoso guitarist Julian Lage returns with “Gladwell” — the second effort by his offbeat, eclectic group. “We began playing with the idea of creating a story we could use as a guiding light in our writing process,” Lage explains. “The result was the development of an imaginary and forgotten town known as Gladwell. As a metaphor, Gladwell presented us with a clear architecture, to compose songs that evoke feelings of people and places we hold dear.” The disc reflects the Lage’s wide-ranging musical interests, ranging from chamber music, American folk and bluegrass to Latin, world, and modern jazz.

With the arrival of Memorial Day 2011, some KCCK staffers’ relatives, who are no longer with us, are being remembered for their service during war-time.

George Dorman’s father, Jack Dorman, was in the U.S. Army for nearly four years during World War II. Most of that time was spent in northern Africa, where he was a crytopgrapher, encoding and decoding secret messages.

Bob Stewart’s dad, Allan, served in the Army in Panama during WWII.

Craig Kessler’s father, Donald F. Kessler, was a bombardier in the 15th Air Force in WWII (Italy, Germany).

And, student producer Tim Johnston’s uncle, Lucien Levesque, was a paratrooper in the Korean conflict.

In his colorful and wide-ranging career, Alphonse Mouzon has long been considered one of the most skilled and versatile drummers in the music business. He was a member of the original versions of Weather Report and Larry Coryell’s Eleventh House, and worked with Gil Evans, McCoy Tyner, Herbie Hancock, Miles Davis and Jean-Luc Ponty. He’s led a couple dozen of his own recording sessions ranging from funk to fusion, smooth to straight ahead. Yet it is doubtful that he’s ever spent as much time on a project as on “Angel Face”, which took him 11 years to complete. Mouzon wrote and arranged all of the songs and gathered together a summit of musical giants including Cedar Walton, Kenny Barron, Christian McBride, Bob Mintzer, Arturo Sandoval and Wallace Roney.

Eric Alexander is the rarest type of jazz artist: one who garners critical acclaim from every corner while firmly establishing his own voice within the illustrious bop-based jazz tradition. He has trained and toughed it out with some of the best musicians in the business, and is a player possessing both accessibility without condescension and intelligence without alienation. For his latest CD — “Don’t Follow the Crowd” — Alexander was once again in Rudy Van Gelder’s studio with his long-time collaborators Harold Mabern, Joe Farnsworth and Nat Reeves for a program of originals, standards and not-so-standards delivered with the prerequisite imagination and daring that has earned him a place among the elite jazzmen of today.

If you’ve spent any time at all in a movie theater or in front of a TV set during prime time over the past four decades, chances are good you’ve encountered Dave Grusin along the way. In addition to a formidable body of work as a jazz recording artist, the pianist, composer, arranger, and winner of 10 Grammys and an Oscar has scored some of the most entertaining and enduring films and TV series of the past half-century. Grusin steps out from behind the various machinations of film and television work to take center stage on “An Evening with Dave Grusin” — a live recording that captures him conducting and performing with a host of stars and backed by a 75-piece orchestra. The list of guests includes Gary Burton, Patti Austin and Nestor Torres.

Uniting their mutual love for both jazz and Brazilian music, two acclaimed stylists, guitarist Ron Ben-Hur and bassist Nilson Matta, have found common ground on “Mojave” — their first recorded collaboration. With expert support from drummer Victor Lewis and Brazilian percussionist Café, Ben-Hur and Matta have conjured up a project that blends original tunes from all four players with compositions from some Brazilian masters. The pair are virtuosos thoroughly entrenched in the bebop idiom, yet both men are just as obviously in thrall to the rhythms and sophisticated melodic and harmonic shapes of classic Brazilian music.

“James Farm” is a collaborative band featuring saxophonist Joshua Redman, bassist Matt Penman, drummer Eric Harland and keyboardist Aaron Parks. The band uses traditional acoustic jazz quartet instrumentation for its song-based approach to jazz and incorporates the members’ myriad influences: rock, soul, folk, classical and electronica, among many others. The quartet has received critical acclaim since its debut at the 2009 Montreal Jazz Festival, where they played to rave reviews. Although this is the first time the quartet members have performed and recorded together in this exact configuration, Redman, Harland and Penmen have performed together in the past as part of the SF Jazz Collective.

Gretchen Parlato’s 2009 breakthrough CD signaled the arrival of one of this generation’s most inventive modern jazz singers. The recording garnered international acclaim, being voted onto year-end, “best-of” polls for Jazz Times, the Boston Globe, the Village Voice and NPR among others. Now with the release of her follow-up — “The Lost and Found” — Parlato demonstrates that she has staying power. It exposes a broad dynamic range in the young singer’s repertoire, which features her original compositions paired alongside interpretations of material ranging from that of Simply Red and Mary J. Blige to Wayne Shorter and Miles Davis.