Jeff Crompton Trio reinvents Dixieland at the Gallery at Avalon Island

When done correctly – and not in the case of several dudes simultaneously drowning each other out in a misguided quest for skronk supremacy – improvised free jazz can be a thrilling, bird-on-a-wire display of empathy and telepathy with few peers in the musical realm. Atlanta's Jeff Crompton Trio does it right, eschewing kinetics and skree for swing and saunter and shimmy and slither, all dynamics and implied motion and spaces to breathe. Bandleader Crompton is a legend in Southern experimental jazz circles, having done time in 4th Ward Afro-Klezmer Orchestra and Edgewood Saxophone Trio, along with collaborations with the likes of wildman Eugene Chadbourne and guitar outlier Davey Williams. The trio of saxophonist Crompton, Bob Stagner on drums and Evan Lipson on bass (keep an eye on this gent, he's racked up collab credits with everyone from Pauline Oliveros to Japan's Ruins), are playing a brief swath of dates through the South in the hottest, stickiest time of the year and it's the perfect climate to experience their leftfield Dixie noir.

8 p.m. Thursday, July 13 | Gallery at Avalon Island, 39 S. Magnolia Ave. | avalongallery.org | donations encouraged