It’s been a good year for jazz. No single new recording stands out, as Ornette Coleman’s Sound Grammar did in 2006, but many albums more than satisfy. ATFW You ” (the initials standing for Art Tatum/Fats Waller), segues to Mingus plucking a soulful bass solo on “Sophisticated Lady,” then moves into a string of original tunes’”Mingus classics (” Faubus Fables ,” “Orange Was the Color of Her Dress, Then Blue Silk,” “So Long, Eric”), some of them played for the first time in public here.

Horn solos by Eric Dolphy , Clifford Jordan, and Johnny Coles sizzle throughout. Drummer Danny Richmond plays near his peak, too. The discs aren’t as revelatory as Monk and Coltrane’s unearthed Carnegie Hall tapes of 1957, which topped this list (and many others) in 2005, but they’ll do. lush stacked harmonies , have stretched into rich, melodic lines and exotic (usually Latin-tinged ) rhythms. The band members, always skilled, have developed into exuberant soloists.

Sky Blue is her most ambitious work: a testament to love, loss, memory, friendship, and the joys of birding (she has her quirks). She writes gorgeous ballads and snappy upbeat numbers, without dipping into sentimentalism or pop banality. The band is whip tight. The sound quality, by engineer Joe Ferla, is stunning and lifelike: dynamic, warm, and vivid. (Available only from Schneider’s or ArtistShare’s Web site.) haunting , lulling, adventurous, and disorientingly magical .

Friedlander combines a modern classicist’s sense of harmony’”Copland’s open chords, but also Crumb’s gnarly grit’”with rhythmic nods toward early folk and blues. Is it jazz? I’ll leave that to the philosophers. It’s great music by a great jazz musician; that should be enough. Lonnie’s Lament ” (with string quartet) that’s as stirring as any out there. near-minimalist progressions ‘”a scale inversion, a few chords, a bass line, a melody.