Jazz Articles
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Loren Schoenberg and His Jazz Orchestra: So Many Memories
by Jack Bowers
Jazz polymath Loren Schoenberg reverses the hands of time on So Many Memories, unveiling sixteen never-before- recorded charts written by the renowned melodist Eddie Sauter in the late 1930s for the Red Norvo-Mildred Bailey Orchestra. To paint his canvas, Schoenberg enlisted students and recent graduates of New York's Juilliard School of Music to be his orchestra, with guest artist Warren Wolf sitting in on xylophone for Norvo, the jazz world's acknowledged master of that instrument before he moved later in ...
Continue ReadingHigh Society New Orleans Jazz Band: Live at Birdland
by Jack Bowers
Long before Bird (Charlie Parker), Diz (Dizzy Gillespie), Prez (Lester Young), the Count (Count Basie) or the Duke (Duke Ellington) raised their voices, jazz was being performed, for audiences large and small, in New Orleans and other cities and towns along the Mississippi River and elsewhere, lending those yet to come the bedrock from which to explore fresh ideas and chart new musical pathways. Even though the world of jazz has been remodeled and amplified ...
Continue ReadingColin Hancock's Jazz Hounds Featuring Catherine Russell: Cat & The Hounds
by Pierre Giroux
Catherine Russell teams up with Colin Hancock's Jazz Hounds for the release Cat & The Hounds, a recording exploring the roots of Black popular music from the early 1920s. Far from simply nostalgic, the project acts as a lively revival of an evolving art form, balancing the syncopated ragtime style and blues-infused improvisations that defined the Jazz Age. Russell's commanding voice, rich with warmth and character, serves as the perfect centre of attention as the band uncovers rare and overlooked ...
Continue ReadingTerry Waldo & the Gotham City Band: Treasury, Volume 2
by Jack Bowers
Like any other handiwork you can name, contemporary jazz did not emerge from a vacuum. It sprang forth from a variety of sources, including but not limited to bebop, cool jazz, swing, trad jazz (Dixieland), blues, stride and perhaps the granddaddy of them all, ragtime. Yes, ragtime. Before there was King Oliver or Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington or Woody Herman, Charlie Parker or Dizzy Gillespie, Oscar Peterson or John Coltrane, there was ragtime. And for those who surmise that ragtime ...
Continue ReadingChampian Fulton: At Home
by Richard J Salvucci
Champian Fulton is just fun to hear, no question. There are so many singers and, Heaven knows, even more pianists, so finding one who never really disappoints is no small feat, especially after nearly 20 recordings. Paired here with Stockholm-based reed player Klas Lindquist, Fulton sings and plays her way through various 'songbook' material that bubbles with enthusiasm, not to say chops. Fulton has a kind of coy relation to the beat--sometimes right there, sometimes not, but that makes her ...
Continue ReadingTerry Waldo: Treasury Volume 1
by Nicholas F. Mondello
Simply stated, and without hyperbole, Terry Waldo is an American musical treasure. He's also a treasure purveyor. A protégé of and mentored by Eubie Blake, Waldo is a player, composer, arranger, author, podcaster, theatrical director, and the noted oracle for ragtime and early American popular music. With Treasury Volume 1 (the first of a three-volume set), Waldo and his all-star Gotham City Band cover ten selections from the embryonic days of American jazz.Things kick this lively session off ...
Continue ReadingTerry Waldo & the Gotham City Band: Treasury Volume 1
by Jack Bowers
Pianist Terry Waldo isn't stuck in the past; he revels in it, as do his eager teammates on Treasury, Vol. 1--the first of three such discourses, according to the album's liner notes--recorded not in jazz's primal era but in May and June 2022 (save for “After You've Gone," recorded in October 2018 with the splendid guest vocalist Veronica Swift). Waldo, a student of jazz from its origins to present-day genres, treads a well-worn path here, reprising bright and enduring themes ...
Continue ReadingWayne Alpern: Gotham
by Jack Bowers
There are a number of bright and interesting moments on New York-based arranger Wayne Alpern's album, Gotham, wherein he makes good use of a well-polished tentet on several generally handsome and engaging charts. Alpern's choice of music is eclectic, ranging from Tchaikovsky to Jobim, Rodgers and Hart to Stephen Sondheim, Hoagy Carmichael to Horace Silver, Alex North to John Lennon and Paul McCartney. All of which should be anticipated from a music-lover whose training and background ranges from classical to ...
Continue ReadingHannah Gill: Spooky Jazz. Vol. 2
by Kyle Simpler
In most cases, seasonal albums get shelved after the holiday passes, but Hannah Gill's Spooky Jazz Vol. 2 is an exception. Although it might appear to be a novelty record centered on Halloween-themed songs, the music here transcends the holiday, offering a collection of tunes enjoyable throughout the year. Although the selections here are overall light-hearted and whimsical, this is by no means a comedy record. Much like Slim Gaillard's music, Hannah Gill's material entertains and ...
Continue ReadingThe New Wonders: Steppin' Out
by Jack Bowers
Although the ten songs performed by cornetist Mike Davis' Brooklyn-based septet, The New Wonders, on the group's second album, Steppin' Out, are well removed from new, most have stood the test of time and remained popular with a small yet devoted number of trad jazz enthusiasts, some for a century or more. The New Wonders carry forward a storied tradition that dates at least as far back as the Original Dixieland Jazz Band in the early 1920s and whose best-known ...
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