When I contribute to threads about best music for the current year, I only consider new music from that year, or with regards to classical music, music that was composed recently, but it first recorded in the current year.
Mary Halvorson - Cloudward / This great jazz guitarist and composer has been on a roll for several years. Excellent, modern, progressive jazz. Creative and complex.
Present - this is NOT the end / Unfortunately for this brilliant Belgian avant-prog, chamber-prog band, with the death of leader, Roger Trigaux, it will be the end. What an amazing recording to leave behind as their last, Complex, darkly emotional, incredible musicianship.
Sleepytime Gorilla Museum - of the Last Human Being / After a 17 year hiatus, this US avant-prog returned with their best recording.
The Aristocrats - Duck / Intense, fiery heavy jazz-fusion with frightening levels of musicianship. But the music is more than a just vehicle for the musician to show off.
Black Art Jazz Collective - Truth to Power / Great 9 piece jazz ensemble. Sounds both modern but without straying too far from tradition, Fantastic playing and arrangements.
Isildurs Bane & Jinian Wilde - The Peal of Everchanging Shell / This Swedish prog band has been doing interesting collaborations recently (Peter Hammill, Steve Hogarth). Moody, bordering on ambient at times, introspective prog. Nice melodies, layered vocals.
Rob Mazurek and Exploding Star Orchestra - Spectral Fiction / Avant-garde jazz.
Vijay Iyer, Linda May Han Oh, Tyshawn Sorey - Compassion / Great jazz trio on the ECM label.
Thomas Adès – Aquifer / Another great piece from Ades. Dramatic, unmistakably modern, and approachable.
José Manuel López López - Infinita Domenica / Not very approachable. Great, thorny sounding chamber music from this great Spanish composer.