Jazz Articles

Salim Washington: Harlem Homecoming

by Florence Wetzel
February 23, 2007

Harlem Homecoming is a breath of fresh air, a powerful musical statement that will surely give hope to those who bemoan the future of jazz. These ten original songs were mostly composed by Washington and executed by the formidable Harlem Arts Ensemble; the CD is a heady mix of first-rate musicianship with positive intention and emotional warmth. The ensemble, comprised of fourteen uniformly excellent musicians--including Kuumba Frank Lacy (trombone, flugelhorn), as well as Washington's wife, Melanie Dyer (viola), and their ...

Salim Washington Harlem Arts Ensemble: Harlem Homecoming

by Nic Jones
December 25, 2006

Harlem Homecoming is a celebration of what this music ought to be all about. It's also some kind of antidote to all the technically proficient but ultimately clinical modern mainstream stuff, and its uninhibited joyfulness brings a smile to the face and a fire to the heart.

For evidence of this, look no further than the title track. The section work is of the order which would have had Mingus shouting his exhortations, and Melanie Dyer's viola extends the modest ...

Ted Daniel: Ted Daniel Sextet

by Clifford Allen
July 27, 2006

Fragile fragments and brittle smears make up much of the trumpet's language in creative music, and the 1970s saw an influx of important voices on the instrument, expanding on the innovations of their reed-playing brethren. Among them were Earl Cross, Raphe Malik, Eddie Gale, Butch Morris and Ted Daniel, a childhood friend of Sonny Sharrock who made his first appearance on the guitarist's Vortex LP Black Woman (specifically, the staggering “Portrait of Linda in Three Colors, All Black ).

Daniel ...