Last night in Nancy, France with John Zorn, Greg Cohen, and Joey Baron. Tonight in Treviso, Italy with the quintet: Donny McCaslin, Uri Caine, Scott Colley, and Clarence Penn.

Long overdue updates on comments. Guitarist Bruce Eisenbeil added some great composers to the 70s and 80s list. He wrote:

I’ve been enjoying the lists so many others have compiled of post-Vietnam War era improvisers/jazz records and now the foray into composers of this era. It’s a rich legacy. Your list is informative and with some spare time this afternoon I thought I’d send over a few names that also came to mind that
I’ve enjoyed and learned something from. My tastes might be a bit catholic for some but natural for me:

David Amram, Gheorge Costinescu, David Del Tredici, David Diamond, Tan Dun, Henryk Gorecki, Howard Hanson, Roy Harris, Lou Harrison, Paul Levi, Magnus Lindberg, Michael Nyman, Pauline Oliveros, Krzysztof Penderecki, Sun Ra, George Rochberg, Cecil Taylor, Frank Zappa.

And Armen Nalbandian from Fresno wrote:

Have you had the chance to check out Michael Tilson-Thomas project,
American Mavericks? The website has an incredible wealth of material on
countless composers (including Nancarrow, Earle Brown, Milton Babbitt,
Anthony Braxton, Joan LaBarbara, etc.) many of who you mentioned on a
previous blog posting on modern composers. The site has many interviews,
sound samples, and a 12 part documentary series narrated by Suzanne Vega
among other things. I am really impressed.

The website is:
http://musicmavericks.publicradio.org/