Jazz Articles
Our daily articles are carefully curated by the All About Jazz staff. You can find more articles by searching our website, see what's trending on our popular articles page or read articles ahead of their published dates on our Coming Soon page. Read our daily album reviews.
Sign in to customize your My Articles page —or— Filter Article Results
OJC Odds & Ends: From Cal Tjader to Mal Waldron
by C. Andrew Hovan
Once the vinyl renaissance confirmed that record labels could bring in a steady income just by tapping their holdings, they began combing their archives to fuel a steady stream of reissues. With a catalog of more than 1.2 million songs, Concord Records was uniquely positioned to capitalize on this resurgence. Its Craft Recordings subsidiary has emerged as a standout in the field, not only for curating meaningful and historically significant releases, but also for doing so with a consistent commitment ...
Continue ReadingMeet Andy Bey
by Chris M. Slawecki
From the 1995-2003 archive: This article first appeared on All About Jazz in February 2000. Listening for the first time to Andy Bey is like stepping into a quiet, still lake. Your foot first parts a surface that's smooth and tranquil, but you can't really tell from that surface how deeply your foot must go to reach bottom. The first time you hear Bey's delicate yet muscular voice alone, accompanied only by his own piano, or in larger ...
Continue ReadingJo-Yu Chen: Rendezvous: Jazz Meets Beethoven, Tchaikovsky & More
by Dan McClenaghan
Pianist Jo-Yu Chen's artistic mission can be described in her words: “When the music is right, it brings us back to the true essence of music, beyond labels and boundaries." But a discussion of labels and boundaries is necessary when addressing her album Rendezvous: Jazz Meets Beethoven, Tchaikovsky & More. First, some background: Chen has established a top-level jazz career since moving from her native Taiwan to New York City at age 16 to study at ...
Continue ReadingChad LB: Time in a Bottle
by Jack Bowers
Sooner or later, jazz musicians--some, that is, not all--who have earned a measure of success decide they would like to try something different. In many cases, that “something different" involves a string section. Among the most recent wayfarers along the string-laden path is New York-based tenor saxophonist Chad LB (shorthand for Lefkowitz-Brown) whose recording, Time in a Bottle, showcases his impressive horn in front of a rhythm section and ten-member string component. The result is much the ...
Continue ReadingLuke Stewart, Silvia Bolognesi & Alexander Hawkins
by Maurice Hogue
I confess to having a thing about basses, particularly of the acoustic kind, so I got all excited when the latest Luke Stewart album rolled in. About to do a gig with his Remembrance Quintet, he change course and combined musicians from his Silt Trio and the Quintet for a live gig which was recorded with the result, the truly ass-kicking The Order. Italian bassist Silvia Bolognesi's album Is That Jazz? was also recorded live, but its origin was different. ...
Continue ReadingCaili O'Doherty: Bluer Than Blue
by Pierre Giroux
Pianist and arranger Caili O'Doherty has carved out a niche as both an incisive interpreter of the jazz tradition and an innovator unafraid to reshape it. With Bluer Than Blue, she turns her keen musical intellect toward the underappreciated Lil Hardin Armstrong, a trailblazing composer, pianist, and bandleader whose influence has long lingered in the shadows of her more famous husband Louis Armstrong. O'Doherty doesn't merely recreate Hardin's music; she reimagines it for the 21st Century with bold harmonies, time ...
Continue ReadingHvalfugl: Bag Vore Øjne Strømmer Drømme Sagte Forbi
by Jakob Baekgaard
An impossible creature flies across the sky; a whale-bird. It has the heaviness and mythic stature of a whale and the lightness of a bird in slow flight. It is both grounded and free. This creature does not exist and yet it does exist in music. Since 2016, the Danish trio, Hvalfugl (Whale-bird), has created its distinct brand of ambient jazz. The album with the elaborate title, Bag Vore Øjne Strømmer Drømme Sagte Forbi (Behind Our Eyes Dreams Flow Quietly), ...
Continue ReadingKandace Springs, Brandee Younger, Melissa Kassel, Atlantic Jazz Collective With Norma Winstone, Joe LaBarbera & More
by Mary Foster Conklin
This broadcast celebrates the beginning of May with new releases from Kandace Springs, Brandee Younger, Melissa Kassel & Tom Zicarelli Group and the Atlantic Jazz Collective featuring Norma Winstone and Joe LaBarbera, with birthday shoutouts to Connie Crothers, Shirley Horn, Angela Bofill, Andrea Brachfeld, Liz Terrell Brydge, honorable men Duke Ellington and Keith Ganz, among others. Happy listening and please support the artists you hear--see them live, buy their music so they can continue to comfort, distract, provoke and remind ...
Continue ReadingMeet Jack Bowers
by AAJ Staff
This article was first published on All About Jazz on September 5, 2020. I currently live in: Albuquerque, New Mexico I joined All About Jazz in: 1997 Why did you decide to contribute to All About Jazz? I had been writing about jazz, primarily big bands, for a number of years for various magazines, and AAJ presented an excellent opportunity to continue doing that after I retired from my “day job" as a newspaper ...
Continue ReadingJoanne Halev at Birdland
by Mark Edelman
Joanne Halev BirdlandNew York, NY April 21, 2025 Backed by everybody's favorite musical director Alex Rybeck and bassist Tom Hubbard, chanteuse Joanne Halev made her long-anticipated move upstairs to Birdland's main room for an elegant, thoughtful set of music and mirth. Drawing on life, love and the shifting tides of fortune in a show aptly titled “Sailing On," Halev brought a sold-out crowd to their feet in sincere appreciation for her mastery of ...
Continue Reading
