With his 13^th album, Suitable Benchmarks Of Reform released in late 2021, multi-instrumentalist Collin Sherman is set to breakout big time. Renowned for his Free-Jazz and Avant-garde jazz albums, Collin’s latest follows his earlier musical inclinations and the result is a somewhat disquieting yet thought-provoking set of contemporary jazz.

In the spirit of the far-out sax sounds of Charlie Parker, Ornette Coleman and Rahsaan Roland Kirk before him, Collin excites the auditory senses with Suitable Benchmarks. Considering some of this album’s more neo-romantic ideas, I could even see Benny Goodman fans liking this. The album-opening nearly 11-minute opening track “Phalanx Strictures” (performed in 15/4 rhythm) features a mix of soprano sax and bass and b-flat clarinet melodies enhanced by a range of keyboards, synths and drum programming.

With Collin performing, composing, producing, mixing and playing all the instruments, Suitable Benchmarks Of Reform is cutting-edge stuff and, being all-instrumental in nature, the music leaves a lot of room for the musical imagination. There is harmony and structure here but above all a sense of free musical exploration prevails. Even though the sax and clarinets takes up much of the spotlight, keyboard synths, vibraphone and even electric guitar sounds punctuate the sound spectrum adding a kind of progressive sound. If it all seems rather random and decomposed, that’s probably because the best freeform jazz is mostly based on experimental and spontaneous improvisation, yet Collin’s instrumentals hold together in a web of sonic elegance.

Suitable Benchmarks Of Reform might be a far cry from traditional jazz, contemporary jazz and jazz-rock fusion, yet the thought-provoking sounds keeps the listener fixed on some of the most remarkable horn-based, free-form jazz instrumentals being made today. With his earlier albums featuring titles like Indeterminate (2014), Static (2012), Accompaniments For Sparse Rhythms (2015) and Violence Of Faction (2018), to name just a few, Collin Sherman’s 13^th album Suitable Benchmarks Of Reform is a major addition to free-form, avant-garde jazz.