Articles by Don Ball
Don Ball’s Favorite Jazz Albums of 2025
by Don Ball
Whether these are best releases in 2025 or not, they are the ones that resonated most with me. And 2025 seemed a good year for guitarists; they were often a driving force on many of these recordings and an important element in the mood and atmosphere of the songs. There's Anthony Pirog on Skullcap's Snakes of Albuquerque, Radomir Milojkovic on Muriel Grossmann's Breakthrough, Marvin Sewell on NEA Jazz Master Charles Lloyd's Figure in Blue, Nels Cline leading his Consentrik Quartet ...
Continue ReadingLuna Horns: Afro Space Hotel
by Don Ball
Listening to Luna Horns' Afro Space Hotel is like stepping into your neighborhood pub and being overwhelmed by the band playing there, with horns blazing like the Jamaica band The Skatalites and a bassist of the Bootsy Collins variety. This is the debut album by Luna Horns, which was formed in 2023 by Tim Lowerson in Oslo, Norway. The basic tracks were recorded live in the studio, with musicians huddled in a circle; overdubs of solos, percussion, and vocals ...
Continue ReadingBenoit LeBlanc: Mô kouzin mô kouzinn
by Don Ball
If you were ever curious as to what pre-jazz music might have sounded like in the Louisiana area, then Benoît LeBlanc's Mô kouzin mô kouzinn is the album for you. LeBlanc presents 27 Creole songs that in many ways form the basis for the emergence of jazz in New Orleans in the late 19th century, songs that enslaved Creole people might have played at New Orleans' Congo Square in the 19th century, one of the few places in the country ...
Continue ReadingPresenting Great Music: Adam Hopkins and Scott Clark of Out of Your Head Records
by Don Ball
It is difficult to make a living as a musician, especially as a jazz musician, and even more so as an avant-garde/free jazz musician. Venues are hard to come by, especially outside of major cities. The COVID pandemic made things worse, closing many of the few places that were available for live jazz. Even putting out recordings is a difficult task. Often, a musician will submit their work to various labels, hoping for a bite. And with so many of ...
Continue ReadingYazz Ahmed: A Paradise In The Hold
by Don Ball
Yazz Ahmed's music has focused on combining her love of jazz with her Bahrani heritage since her first recording in 2011, and with her release, A Paradise in the Hold (Night Time Stories, 2025), she adds a new component: voice. With lyrics in both English and Arabic, Ahmed uses stories and music from her childhood in Bahrain as the seed for this collection of songs, originating about a decade ago when she traveled back to Bahrain to complete a commissioned ...
Continue ReadingNels Cline: Consentrik Quartet
by Don Ball
While Nels Cline has been playing the guitar-hero rock star for the past two decades with Wilco, he continues to release his own solo recordings under various names (including the Nels Cline 4 and the Nels Cline Singers, which, amusingly, contain no vocalists) tailored toward the avant-garde side of jazz (with the notable exception of his lush, lovely jazz orchestra Blue Note release from 2016, Lovers). His 2025 release, Consentrik Quartet, brings together some of the finest jazz musicians working ...
Continue ReadingJanel Leppin: Her Own Space
by Don Ball
The first thing you learn about musician/composer Janel Leppin is that labels don't fit her music very easily. From structured compositions to free-wheeling improvisations, Leppin does it all. She has made chamber jazz recordings, worked with punk groups, and created lush solo vocal works, all in an effort to tell her own stories and create her own space in music. All About Jazz talked with Leppin in June 2025 about her new group, Skullcap, and their new album, ...
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