(Updated 1/4/2026)
Here we are, already at the end of a year that went so fast it feels like a blur. As always, there was plenty of brilliant music to listen to, although sometimes it felt difficult to pay full attention while the world has been burning. As I suggested in my post about the M³ Festival at Roulette, more than ever we need art to as a refuge, and also a utopia where we can construct the kind of world we want to live in. Maybe the exercise of making a list of one’s favorites helps channel a little bit of that energy.
Once again, I feel I have to make my obligatory caveats about year-end “best of” lists. This is a list of my “favorites” because I make no pretense that the albums I like are the “best” (although I’m confident all the records I’ve cited below are really, really great). The creation and consumption of art is not a race with winners or losers, and I feel more firmly than ever that art can’t be measured by an objective yardstick. But I still think the exercise is valuable because it increases awareness of the art and the artists who create that art, and helps share information (and beauty) with those who are looking for it and maybe who need this art as well. Another glaring shortcoming of these types of lists is that there are so many deserving artists, and it’s totally arbitrary to stop at just a list of 10 albums, or even 25 or 50. This is the problem that Thurston Moore has neatly solved with his list of the “best” 350 albums of the year – maybe he’s made all other lists irrelevant! But the Francis Davis poll has done the service of casting the net wide by publishing the full list of all the albums that get votes, and also linking to the individual ballots of voters. This allows you to use the results as a tool to catch up on literally hundreds of worthy albums. So I recommend you check out the full Francis Davis Jazz Critics poll results.
So without further ado, here’s my list. You’ll find my ranked top ten (as I submitted them to the Francis Davis Jazz Critics Poll), and under that the next 40 new jazz and experimental albums of 2025, unranked and in alphabetical order. Enjoy and I hope you find something new!
1 – Patricia Brennan – Of The Near And Far (Pyroclastic Records)
I would have thought “dreamy” and “energetic” were two distinct and irreconcilable lanes of music-making before I heard Of The Near and Far. Somehow, vibraphonist Patricia Brennan has combined these seemingly contradictory modes, creating the most unique record I’ve heard all year. Inspired by her love of astronomy, Brennan translates the celestial into sound. Helping her achieve this feat are frequent jazz collaborators pianist Sylvie Courvoiser and guitarist Miles Okazaki, a string quartet (Modney, Pala Garcia, Kyle Armbrust, Michael Nicolas), electronics played by Arktureye, and rhythm from Kim Cass on bass and John Hollenbeck on drums. Music that matches heavenly beauty with jazz fission.
2 – Pat Thomas – HIKMAH (TAO Forms)
With at least 11 albums out this year, what is a Pat Thomas fan to do when it comes time to pick a favorite? I could have chosen [Sama’a] (Audition), which distills the blistering energy of breakout quartet [Ahmed] in their first studio album. Or I could have picked The Bliss Of Bliss, a live solo piano performance where Thomas has the daring to play the first 14 minutes inside the piano – no keys – and the musicality to make that work. Or maybe I could have picked the collaboration of Thomas with Black Myths, The Mythstory School, featuring mash-ups of Monk and the only jazz cover of Eddie Murphy’s “Party All The Time” you’re likely to hear. But for me, the best Thomas album of the year is HIKMAH, released by the TAO Forms label. A solo studio album recorded on an excellent piano, HIKMAH is an ideal introduction to Thomas’ encyclopedic piano language and a view into a modern-day master developing personal musical statements in real time.
3 – Jason Moran x Trondheim Jazz Orchestra & Ole Morten Vagan – Go To Your North (Yes Records)
I’m a bit surprised critics have been sleeping on Jason Moran’s terrific collaboration with the Trondheim Jazz Orchestra & Ole Morten Vagan, Go To Your North. Their loss – Moran’s record takes his catalogue of compositions and turns them on their head, packing delightful surprises at every turn in these newly orchestrated performances. Moran sounds typically great in this new environment, but just as diverting are the Europeans. Sofia Jernberg delivers one of the vocal performances of the year, and the rest of the band is fantastic – I especially enjoyed the great reed solos (Karl Hjalmar Nyberg, Jonas Kullhammar, Eirik Hegdal, and Mette Rasmussen) and also loved Ole Morten Vagan’s brilliant arrangements. Go To Your North is both a summary of Moran’s music and a fresh new vista.
4 – Paul Rogers – Peace And Happiness (Fundacja Słuchaj)
Rogers, one of the consummate bassists, recorded these tracks at home in his garage in the summer of 2023. The sound quality only adds to the intimacy of this fascinating album. Both on arco and pizzicato, Rogers makes his custom 7-string bass sing. All the tracks are named after blissful states and emotions, which is how these often transcendent tracks make me feel as a listener. To my ears there’s a lot of Bach in there too, which only heightens the mythic feeling.
5 – Thomas Morgan – Around You Is A Forest (Loveland Music)
Few albums sound like nothing you’re ever heard before, but bassist Morgan’s astonishing Around You Is A Forest does just that. Morgan mostly sets his bass aside in favor of WOODS, a computer program of his own design that produces intensely rhythmic patterns. The sound is a bit like plucked strings, but also with an uncanny feeling, both organic and synthetic at the same time. Morgan invites the most creative improvisers of jazz to duet with his creation, and the collision of the algorithm and human sounds is striking, and thought-provoking as well. Morgan’s Substack post is essential reading. While he’s a veteran improviser, this is Morgan’s first album with a sole leader credit, and for me the debut album of the year.
6 – John Dikeman, Sun-Mi Hong, Aaron Lumley, Marta Warelis – Old Adam on Turtle Island (Relative Pitch Records)
This January release stuck with me the whole year, and I came back to it regularly. Tenor player John Dikeman can burn with the best of them, but here he wisely takes a more nuanced approach, putting the episodic music he composed for this performance (from 2022 at Splendor in Amsterdam) take center stage. Dikeman also leaves room for his great band to shine – percussionist Sun-Mi Hong and bassist Aaron Lumley are both excellent and I’ll be exploring their music in the future. But the draw for me is the great pianist Marta Warelis, whose nimble playing sounds like dancing and leaves melodic imprints on the mind for days. She’s one of a kind, and Old Adam on Turtle Island is an ideal introduction.
7 – Steve Lehman – The Music of Anthony Braxton (Pi Recordings)
One of the best birthday gifts for Anthony Braxton, who turned 80 years old in 2025, must have been this electrifying tribute from alto sax player Steve Lehman. Lehman enlists the tenor of Mark Turner, and adds two original tunes to the program which show his debt to Braxton by how seamlessly they fit in. Utterly burning throughout, Lehman demolishes the concept that Braxton is “cerebral.”
8 – Mary Halvorson – About Ghosts (Nonesuch Records)
About Ghosts was not only the consensus pick of the year, but also confirmed the continued development of Mary Halvorson’s composing. The music has an attractive melodicism that has won over jazz people and non jazzheads alike, and eschews unneeded complexity to let the band shine. And what a band! Each of the original “Amaryllis” band members again impresses here, and the addition of sax players Immanuel Wilkins and Brian Settles only increases the tools at Halvorson’s disposal. I especially need to single out trumpeter Adam O’Farrill, whose statement on “Amaranthine” is a glorious 92 seconds of music, full of brash confidence and telling a dozen stories; it’s my favorite solo of the year.
9 – Jakob Bro, Wadada Leo Smith, Marilyn Crispell & Andrew Cyrille – The Montclair Session (Loveland Music)
Wadada Leo Smith is one of the great living masters, and he again had a remarkable year. I could easily have swapped into this place his duet album with Sylvie Courvoisier, Angel Falls, which you’ll find below. The Montclair Session makes my top 10 because of the unusual and effective way it divides the album into several duets of each band member with Smith, a brief but astonishing solo from pianist Crispell, and then brings the full quartet together in the radiant closing tracks. Also Smith’s tone sounds especially glorious on this session; there’s nobody else like him.
10 – Ivo Perelman & Matthew Shipp String Trio – Armageddon Flower (TAO Forms)
Incredibly, before Armageddon Flower these four creative music legends (Perelman, Shipp, Mat Maneri, and William Parker) had played together in every possible configuration except as this quartet. We can all be glad that it has finally happened, because this group sounds so at ease, and the darkly luminous music of Armageddon Flower builds over its hour runtime with a convincing air of inevitability. I can’t think of a note I would change – despite Perelman and Shipp claiming this may be it, let’s hope there is a sequel!
Another 40 albums from 2025, unranked, in alphabetical order:
[Ahmed] – [Sama’a] (Audition) (Otoroku)
sophie agnel – Learning (Otoroku)
Tim Barnes – Inside Energy (Island House)
Gregg Belisle-Chi – Slow Crawl: Performing the Music of Tim Berne (Intakt)
Tim Berne – Yikes Too (Screwgun)
Blacks’ Myths meets Pat Thomas – The Mythstory School
Peter Brötzmann / John Edwards / Steve Noble / Jason Adasiewicz – The Quartet (Otoroku)
Rob Brown – Walkabout (Mahakala Music)
Chicago Underground Duo – Hyperglyph (International Anthem)
Marco Colonna, Izumi Kimura, Stephen Davis – The Dublin Session
Sylvie Courvoisier/Wadada Leo Smith – Angel Falls (Intakt)
Carl Dewhurst – Avicennia (Australian Independent)
Natacha Diels – Somewhere Beautiful (Carrier)
Nick Dunston – COLLA VOCE: Praylewd (Out Of Your Head Records)
哈米德·德雷克 Hamid Drake & 帕特·托马斯 Pat Thomas – 这山望那山 A Mountain Sees a Mountain (Old Heaven Books)
Marty Ehrlich Trio Exaltation – This Time (Sunnyside)
Peter Evans, Being & Becoming – Ars Ludicra (More Is More)
Adam O’Farrill – For These Streets (Out Of Your Head)
Fieldwork – Thereupon (Pi Recordings)
Fuubutsushi – Columbia Deluxe (American Dream)
Alexander Hawkins – Song Unconditional (Intakt)
Jason Kao Hwang – Myths of Origin (True Sound)
Susie Ibarra – Parallels and Confluence: Bugang and Pasig Rivers (Habitat Sounds)
ICP Orchestra – HAPPY BIRTHDAY -> NAAR ZEE Z.O.Z. (ICP)
Kim Jung Jae – Shamanism (Relative Pitch)
James Brandon Lewis – Apple Cores (Anti-)
Charles Lloyd – Figure In Blue (Blue Note)
Malaby / Dumoulin / Ber – Trees On Wheels (Challenge)
Will Mason Quartet – Hemlocks, Peacocks (New Focus)
Gard Nilsson Acoustic Unity – Great Intentions (Action Jazz)
Evan Parker and Bill Nace – Branches (Otoroku)
Zeena Parkins – Modesty Of The Magic Thing (Tzadik)
Sara Serpa & Matt Mitchell – End of Something (Obliquity)
Patrick Shiroishi – Forgetting Is Violent (American Dream)
Matthew Shipp – The Cosmic Piano (Cantaloupe Music)
Sifters – Sifters (Obliquity)
Pat Thomas – The Bliss Of Bliss (Konnekt)
Henry Threadgill – Listen Ship (Pi Recordings)
Mark Turner – We Raise Them To Lift Their Heads (Loveland Music)
Miguel Zenón Quartet – Vanguardia Subterránea: Live at The Village Vanguard (Miel Music)
Here’s my ballot as submitted to the Francis Davis poll:
NEW JAZZ ALBUMS
1. Patricia Brennan – Of The Near And Far (Pyroclastic Records)
2. Pat Thomas – HIKMAH (TAO Forms)
3. Jason Moran x Trondheim Jazz Orchestra & Ole Morten Vagan – Go To Your North (Yes Records)
4. Paul Rogers – Peace And Happiness (Fundacja Słuchaj)
5. Thomas Morgan – Around You Is A Forest (Loveland Music)
6. John Dikeman, Sun-Mi Hong, Aaron Lumley, Marta Warelis – Old Adam on Turtle Island (Relative Pitch Records)
7. Steve Lehman – The Music of Anthony Braxton (Pi Recordings)
8. Mary Halvorson – About Ghosts (Nonesuch Records)
9. Jakob Bro, Wadada Leo Smith, Marilyn Crispell & Andrew Cyrille – The Montclair Session (Loveland Music)
10. Ivo Perelman & Matthew Shipp String Trio – Armageddon Flower (TAO Forms)
REISSUES/ARCHIVAL (RARA AVIS)
1. Dave Burrell / Sam Woodyard – The Lost Session, Paris 1979 (NoBusiness Records)
2. Snakeoil – IN LIEU OF (2012, Screwgun Records)
3. Jessica Williams – Blue Abstraction: Prepared Piano Project 1985–1987 (Pre-Echo Press)
4. Anthony Braxton – Quartet (England) 1985 (Burning Ambulance)
5. Stanley Cowell – Musa: Ancestral Streams (1974, Strata East/Mack Avenue Music Group)
VOCAL
1. Sara Serpa & Matt Mitchell – End of Something (Obliquity Records)
2. Jason Moran x Trondheim Jazz Orchestra & Ole Morten Vagan – Go To Your North (Yes Records)
3. Lex Korten – Canopy (Sounderscore Inc.)
LATIN
No selections made
DEBUT
1. Thomas Morgan – Around You Is A Forest (Loveland Music)
2. Kim Jung Jae – Shamanism (Relative Pitch Records)
3. Lex Korten – Canopy (Sounderscore Inc.)