This is our Jazz October 2026 selection, featuring amazing names and favorite artists who are currently capturing most of our attention. From transcendent acoustic collaborations to bold avant-garde expressions, here are eight amazing — we deeply believe —new jazz releases.

Read more: Jazz October 2026

October 2026 – New Jazz Releases Selection

• Monty Alexander – A Jamarican in Paris (PeeWee!)
• William Parker – Waltz for Gregory (AUM Fidelity)
• Francisco Mela – Carnaval De Oriente (577)
• Space – London Concert (Fönstret)
• Sean Mason – State of The Art (Taylor Christian)
• Devra Hoff – Baile as Baile (AUM Fidelity)
• James Brandon Lewis, Red Lily – Calling Antonín (TAO Forms)
• Anna Webber – it’s easier to imagine the end of the world… (Intakt)

(Albums are listed by release date)

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A “Jama-rican” in Paris. It took my spellchecker stumbling over the title for me to read it properly, but that word captures the whole idea: Jamaica and America meeting in Monty Alexander’s music. With his trio, joined by percussionist Bobby Thomas Jr., the pianist takes from both worlds to make jazz that sounds immediately charming.

I can imagine this album reaching people who rarely listen to jazz. It has the swing, groove, and sheer entertainment of straight-ahead playing, with Jamaican rhythms giving the music a distinctive flavor. And for jazz lovers, there is plenty to enjoy in how naturally Alexander brings those elements together, and the musicianship gives you every reason to stay.

Monty Alexander: piano; Luke Sellick: double bass; Jason Brown: drums; Bobby Thomas Jr.: percussion
Released October 2, 2026

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William Parker is an outstanding artist. The space and attention that will be given to him next year at the Big Ears Festival, which “will celebrate the 75th birthday of this free music powerhouse and mentor by hosting five of his bands,” really shows that everyone agrees.

On Waltz for Gregory, Parker does not play. Instead, just as he did for Migration of Silence Into and Out of The Tone World or on Voices Fall From The Sky, he focuses on composing and producing. The result is just as captivating and sublime.

In some ways, of course, we might miss hearing him play. Yet, because of this, the music becomes a direct expression of his vision, and it offers us more facets to listen to, discover, and investigate in him, and that is also captivating and sublime.

William Parker is an outstanding artist who continues to release outstanding albums.

Notably, this marks the second release this month in which a dancer is an integral part of the music's creation. Just as Melissa Almaguer opens and builds the rhythm here on the title track Waltz for Gregory, you will hereafter discover similar rhythmic chemistry on State of The Art with Reyna Nuñez and LeAndre Douglas.

William Parker: composer, lyricist, producer; Andrea Wolper: vocals; Bruce Barth: piano; Melissa Almaguer: tap dance; Jim Ferraiuolo: oboe, alto sax; Steve Swell: trombone; Ken Filiano: bass; Kevin Murray: drums
Released October 9, 2026

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On Carnaval De Oriente, Francisco Mela feels like a voice and an instrument singled out from the din of a larger celebration. Something poetic lives in this narrowing of focus and innocence: one sound can suggest the whole scene. His voice and percussion feel simpler and more direct here, leaving room for us to sense the community, the movement, and life that could be, that should be, surrounding him. Mela brings a memory to life and invites us to join the celebration he still holds within himself.

Francisco Mela: drums, voice, Glockenspiel, percussion, guitar
Released October 9, 2026

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This trio has an exceptional quality: a balance of forces that gives them a distinctive sound, making their music, despite its free, avant-garde nature, feel enveloping and absorbing. The wildness is there, as are the dissonances and extravagances. Yet it remains light, or rather, somehow cushioned. This comfort while listening to the live performance is its true beauty. It is the sense that everything here is natural and sincere, rooted in a quest for total expression and communion within the trio, rather than posturing, provocation, or any kind of display. This music exists because of who they are together. They prove their own artistic mantra: “In this aural space, every movement matters.” And it works perfectly.

Lisa Ullén: piano; Elsa Bergman: double bass; Anna Lund: drums
Released October 9, 2026

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Alongside Sean Mason’s trio, two movement artists, Reyna Nuñez and LeAndre Douglas, are credited on State of the Art—an uncommon presence on a jazz recording. Mason brought them into the studio to help shape the music as it happened. Their steps and gestures gave the musicians something to respond to, extending the conversation.

“I wanted the mission of the trio to help everyone become more like themselves,” Mason says. “I wanted to play with dancers instead of playing for dancers.”

That distinction is central to the project. The dancers could influence the direction of a performance, becoming participants in its creation. It also reconnects jazz with social dance, making that relationship part of how the music is conceived. And yes, the pleasure is here, palpable. It makes one want to see the band live—to enjoy this joyful music and to dance, taking part in the tradition Mason is pursuing. And that desire feels like a small measure of the project’s success: the very relationship that helped bring it into being.

Sean Mason: piano; Felix Moseholm: bass; Domo Branch: drums | Movement artists:
Reyna Nuñez, LeAndre Douglas
Released October 16, 2026

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Baile as Baile may be dark, but it is undoubtedly profound and poignant. It offers a universe where sadness and hope, external forces and changes, exist together. Devra Hoff gives those experiences a voice through the double bass, making music whose intimacy reaches far into personal life.

The release’s history helps join the dots. An earlier edition appeared in 2012 as a rare 25-minute EP, followed by a digital self-release in 2019. Now, AUM Fidelity presents the work ‘anew’ under Devra Hoff’s name—expanded with new movements that complete the cycle. That word, anew, feels particularly fitting. Music made during a period of concealment can now be encountered alongside the artist’s own account of what it carried.

The sound preserves something of that earlier life, but it has also evolved into something fresh, opening itself to higher pitches and new collaborations. The fact that this more than decade-long journey is here condensed for us to experience is breathtaking, standing as a powerful piece of art even for a listener without any background information.

“These pieces are also made with magical intention. Music is a form of magic, and hopefully these sounds have some power to help heal and transform, or at least to soothe.”
–Devra Hoff

Devra Hoff: double bass | On tracks 6 & 8: Tara Jane O’Neil, prepared autoharp; Julia Holter, harmonium
Released October 16, 2026

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You read the names James Brandon Lewis & Red Lily and directly hope for the best—expecting another release at the top of the year-end lists, something you can confidently add to your collection without even listening to it first. Rest assured; you can. This album is as magnificent as their two previous releases, astonishingly good.

On Calling Antonín, James Brandon Lewis enters a cross-generational dialogue that challenges how we view musical ownership. When Antonín Dvořák immersed himself in African American spirituals via Harry Burleigh in the 1890s, it reshaped his classical imagination. Generations later, Lewis approaches this history from the reverse direction: bringing Dvořák’s canonical melodies back into the modern Black American avant-garde through the Red Lily Quintet. This stunning reversal makes listening a catalyst for new creation.

The rendition of ‘Going Home’ beautifully encapsulates this cultural exchange. Though its melody originated in Dvořák’s New World Symphony, it was adopted into song so thoroughly that it is often misidentified as an ancestral spiritual. Lewis treats this piece not as a static artifact, but as living proof of how deeply melody can migrate, delivering a powerful thesis: a musical inheritance is never finished; it keeps evolving whenever a new generation finds its own voice within the notes.

“Dvořák makes a bold assertion in the late 1800s: he’s telling America where their source material is from.”
–James Brandon Lewis in The Line of Best Fit

James Brandon Lewis: tenor saxophone; Kirk Knuffke: cornet; Melanie Dyer: viola; Tomeka Reid: cello; Joshua Abrams: bass; Chad Taylor: drums
Released October 23, 2026

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The album’s opening track certainly shifts the Overton window of musical acceptability. After those first fifteen minutes, the rest of the album—abrupt though it may be—unfolds more peacefully by comparison, letting us appreciate the compositions in a different light.

By employing the very stylistic codes it critiques, the music highlights how the unacceptable becomes normalized. The resulting movement toward a different world, one to be invented together, is thrilling. And while the compositions are powerful, striking, and almost oppressive, they remain deeply spellbinding. Ultimately, this album is exceptional.

It’s easy for me to get dark and stay dark right now – to imagine the worst possible ending to everything. But in my reading, I found inspiration from people who helped me imagine a different kind of future, a future where we help each other out and ensure everyone’s basic rights; one in which we take care of each other and the planet.”
–Anna Webber

Anna Webber: tenor, soprano sax, flute; Ryan Easter: trumpet; Yuma Uesaka: clarinet, contrabass clarinet, soprano sax; Ingrid Laubrock: tenor, soprano sax; DoYeon Kim: 25-string gayageum; Mary Halvorson: guitar; David Virelles: piano; Chris Tordini: bass; Ches Smith: drums, chimes
Released October 30, 2026

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2026: New Releases Month by Month

January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, (October), November, and December 2026

…and the Playlist Jazz 2026:
Listen to our 2026 playlist (link to Spotify) with all the monthly new-release selections and excerpts of the above albums (when available) for a total of (soon) 120 breathtaking tracks.

New Jazz Releases October 2026

And that is it for this October jazz selection.

What about you? What have you been listening to this October? Which new releases have caught your attention, and which ones keep bringing you back? As always, feel free to share your discoveries with us in the comments.

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