Jazz Articles

Dwight Frizzell: Bulldog Devildog President

by AAJ Staff
August 1, 2001

Life in the Missouri's Ozarks can be quite lonely. (Trust me, I've been there.) Wooded hills and occasional lakes and streams dot a sparsely inhabited terrain devoid of any dramatic geology or biology. Dwight Frizzell takes that isolation as both a starting point and an ending point for his new record, Bulldog Devildog President. He arranges this disc around five different versions of a Black Hawk Waltz piano recording made by President Harry S Truman. For those not in the ...

Phil James: Already Gone

by AAJ Staff
August 1, 2000

The integration of electronics with improvisation has taken a short and rocky course. The occasional use of the sampler is about as electronic as jazz usually gets without turning into cheese. But the full arsenal of turntables, loops and effects is successfully applied on Already Gone. From an electronica point of view, this would probably qualify as a form of “trance." From a jazz point of view, things are more complicated. Sparse improvisation motors forward through a thickly textured electronic ...

Noodle Shop: Moon Dog Girl

by AAJ Staff
March 1, 2000

Out of the creative firestorm of avant-garde music in New York comes Noodle Shop, an impromptu quartet consisting of Elliott Sharp, John Kruth, Jonathan Segel, and Atilla Engin. Their debut recording, which was recorded shortly after the death of the idiosyncratic blind multi-instrumentalist Moondog, spans the range from funk to free jazz with many stops in between.

The idea here, as far as I can tell, is to leave no stone unturned in their musical journey. Swirling mists of free ...

Brett Larner: Telemetry Transmission

by AAJ Staff
March 1, 2000

In the recent American discovery of traditional Japanese music, instruments like the koto and the shakuhachi have become more popularly utilized. One of the distinguishing features of the koto, a string instrument, is its staccato sound, due to its extremely limited sustain. American instrumentalist Brett Larner conceived a very unique solution to circumvent this limitation. His approach appears on Telemetry Transmission. By placing gyroscopes on the strings of the instrument, Larner creates a whole new sound, consisting of broad sweeping ...

Pran: Raga for the Rainy Season

by AAJ Staff
December 1, 1999

Unless you're really into esoteric music, you've never heard an Indian raga played by a trombonist and brass didjeriduist. Of this I am nearly certain. Well, Greg Powers (tb) and Stuart Dempster (bd) put their minds together to do just that. Powers handles the melody, and Dempster delivers the drone. The name Pran refers to the “vital enlivening breath" and bears relevance to both the instruments and the music. The particular raga on this recording originated in the 16th century ...

Philip Gelb: Between/Waves

by Glenn Astarita
September 1, 1999

Philip Gelb performs on the “shakuhachi” which is a Japanese flute made from bamboo with 4 finger holes and 1 thumbhole. Here, Mr. Gelb devises an interesting yet non-formulaic approach as he integrates his ideas into non-mainstream formats which include free-improvisation and electronics. The first piece, titled “The Space Between” was recorded live at Beanbender’s in Berkely, CA. Clocking in at 29 minutes, Gelb performs along with accordionist Pauline Oliveros, ROVA’s saxophonist Jon Raskin and pianist Dana Reason. This piece ...

Philip Gelb: Between/waves

by AAJ Staff
June 1, 1999

Shakuhachi player Philip Gelb seems to understand that silence can carry as much weight as sound. His new record, between/waves, celebrates this fact. The sounds on this record, made by Gelb and colleagues, explore the dynamics of breathing in the setting of free improvisation.

On “The Space Between," Gelb and quartet exchange bird-like noises, twisting and re-interpreting the age-old standard of call-and-response. On “Waves," a thickly textured electronic field becomes the backdrop for Gelb's plaintive cries. Whirring and buzzing noises ...