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Jazz Articles about Kweku Sumbry
Derrick Gardner & The Jazz Prophets: Pan Africa
by Mike Jurkovic
A big man with a big plan and a boisterous sextet at his back, trumpeter Derrick Gardner and his razor-fine Jazz Prophets unapologetically and unflinchingly blow the walls down with Pan Africa. Hyperbole? Not really. Just let Gardner and company free on Jackie McLean's hopscotching Appointment In Ghana" (from Jackie's Bag, his first for Blue Note in 1960). And feel the fever, fervor, and drive. Long time Jazz Prophet's alto/tenor saxophonist Robert Dixon, and trombonist brother Vincent Gardner ...
read moreImmanuel Wilkins: The 7th Hand
by Mike Jurkovic
That we are free to think saxophone firebrand Immanuel Wilkins' 2020 Blue Note debut Omega served as a sign of hope amid a particularly hopeless year puts an awful lot of weight on the shoulders of a 25-year-old and, beyond doubt, colors the fate of The 7th Hand. Humbly and characteristically, Wilkins and company meet the challenge head-on. Searching for nothingness in a culture of excess, Lift," the seventh and closing exhortation to empathy that guides The 7th ...
read moreImmanuel Wilkins: The 7th Hand
by Angelo Leonardi
Dopo l'acclamato debutto di Omega Immanuel Wilkins disegna un altro avvincente affresco, confermando l'intento a elaborare nuovi percorsi musicali inglobando la tradizione. Con lui ritroviamo i giovani partner del suo quartetto (Micah Thomas al pianoforte, Daryl Johns al contrabbasso e Kweku Sumbry alla batteria) più la bravissima flautista Elena Pinderhughes (già con Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah e Ambrose Akinmusire) e l'ensemble di percussioni Farafina Kan. Mentre conferma il magistrale eloquio strumentale con lunghi, intensi ...
read moreImmanuel Wilkins: Omega
by Paul Rauch
At the moment Omega, the debut solo album of young alto saxophonist Immanuel Wilkins, was released on Blue Note in May 2020, America was ablaze with the fight for justice following the murder by police of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The sessions for the album were recorded prior to the event that propelled the Black Lives Matter movement, and spread to the streets in demand for racial justice like no other time in American history. Yet the album is an ...
read moreJure Pukl: Broken Circles
by Friedrich Kunzmann
Slovenian tenor saxophonist Jure Pukl follows up his quartet outings Hybrid (Whirlwind Recordings 2017) and Doubtless (Whirlwind Recordings 2018) with an album that signals a clear change of direction. On Broken Circles Pukl swaps his saxophonist wife Melissa Aldana for Joel Ross on vibraphone and adds guitarist Charles Altura for some lyrical comping, on top of a well-versed rhythm section. As a direct result, harmony and flow arise more implicitly, giving Pukl the ideal environment to perform long stretches of ...
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