The 20th Annual
Francis Davis Jazz Critics Poll:
2025
Ballot 2025
Stewart Smith (The Wire, We Jazz, Bandcamp Daily, The Quietus)
NEW JAZZ ALBUMS
- Ambrose Akinmusire, Honey From a Winter Stone (Nonesuch) →
- Sophie Agnel, Learning (Otoroku) →
- أحمد [Ahmed], سماع [Sama'a] (Audition) (Otoroku) →
- Amina Claudine Myers, Solace of the Mind (Red Hook) →
- @xcrswx, Moodboard (Feedback Moves) →
- Isaiah Collier - William Hooker - William Parker, The Ancients (Eremite) →
- Linda May Han Oh, Strange Heavens (Biophilia) →
- Pat Thomas, Hikmah (TAO Forms) →
- Webber/Morris Big Band, Unseparate (Out of Your Head) →
- Alexander Hawkins, Song Unconditional (Intakt) →
RARA AVIS (REISSUES/ARCHIVAL)
- The Bottle Tapes (1996-2005, Corbett vs. Dempsey) →
- Larry Stabbins - Keith Tippett - Louis Moholo-Moholo, Live in Foggia (1985, Ogun) →
- The Alien Territory Archives: A Collection of Experimental and Irrelevant Music From 1970s San Diego (1968-81, Nyahh) →
- Irène Schweizer - Rüdiger Carl - Johnny Dyani - Han Bennink, Irène's Hot Four (1981, Intakt) →
- Anthony Braxton, Quartet (England) 1985 (Burning Ambulance) →
VOCAL
- Amina Claudine Myers, Solace of the Mind (Red Hook) →
- Ingrid Laubrock, Purposing the Air (Pyroclastic) →
- Maggie Nicols & Geoff Eales, Beautiful Love (33 Jazz) →
LATIN
- Patricia Brennan, Of the Near and Far (Pyroclastic) →
- Fred Moten & Brandon López, Revision (TAO Forms) →
DEBUT
- Laura Cocks, FATHM (Relative Pitch/Out of Your Head) →
Note: Rejected Debut votes: Ishmael Ali, Burn the Plastic, Sell the Copper (Amalgam '26): 2026 release; X Ray Hextet (Reading Group '24): group includes Pat Thomas and Seymour Wright (among others).
