Jazz Articles
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Tom Waits In The House: Three Jazzy Winners From The Noir Prince Of La Pop
by George Wallace
No assessment of the interchange between jazz music and the spoken word idiom in contemporary music can be complete without paying a visit to Small Change, the fourth studio album by singer and songwriter Tom Waits, released on September 21, 1976 on Asylum Records. It was recorded in July at the Wally Heider Recording Studio in Hollywood. Harry Bluestone, violin, concertmaster and strings, Jim Hughart, bass, Ed Lustgarten, cello, orchestra manager and strings, Shelly Manne, drums, Lew Tabackin, tenor saxophone, ...
Continue ReadingDan Pitt | Noah Franche-Nolan: Arid Landscapes
by Glenn Astarita
In the capable hands of Toronto guitarist Dan Pitt and Vancouver pianist Noah Franche-Nolan, the self-titled debut from arid landscapes proves that ambient electroacoustic music need not be either precious or ponderous. Recorded across two sessions in November 2024, this ten-track collection is a work of atmospheric intelligence that knows the difference between space and emptiness. The duo's jazz pedigree reveals itself not through overt displays of virtuosity (mercifully, there are no gratuitous cadenzas here) but in the ...
Continue ReadingCarole Nelson Trio: Through The Storm
by Ian Patterson
Twenty million years of song. And then silence. The seeds of Through The Storm--Carole Nelson Trio's fourth album since forming in 2015--germinated from a cautionary tale. In 1987, a male Kauaʻi ʻōʻō --a bird native to Hawaii--sang to court a prospective mate. Its song met with silence. In 2000, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) declared the species extinct. Through The Storm is, in part, pianist Nelson's response to the Kauaʻi ʻōʻō's plight--a victim of habitat ...
Continue ReadingNeil Gray: In the Streets
by Jack Bowers
Saxophonist Cory Weeds, ever the entrepreneur, has never been one to let a clear opportunity raise his antenna without a response. When Weeds spots a promising jazz musician--especially one from his native Canada--he has been known to make the sort of proposal that is all but impossible to refuse. For example, Weeds may say he will produce the artist's next album, provide a recording venue, release the finished product on his Cellar Music Group label and even join the ensemble ...
Continue ReadingSubway Music
by George Wallace
The subway is full of high driving music tonight -- round eyed men & women jazzified in the hot wet tunnel --eyes flashing hips moving in & out of the crowd moving in & out like a slide trombone --at 14th street it's the flyaway boys from the foothills of North Carolina playing some gospel banjo--next stop West 4th St--cool, some very strange cats have set up shop they've got brass instruments & are wailing an up-tempo version of 'Don't blame me' by the light of the A train --the steps go ...
Continue ReadingMarcus Roberts: Jazz Piano And Technology's Promise
by Lawrence Peryer
Today, we're putting The Tonearm's needle on pianist Marcus Roberts. Roberts plays jazz piano like he's lived through its entire history. His style pulls from Jelly Roll Morton and Fats Waller as much as it does from bebop. He spent years in Wynton Marsalis' band, has performed piano concertos with Seiji Ozawa, and today leads The Modern Jazz Generation, a 12-piece ensemble encompassing three decades of musicians. Roberts is here today to talk about something beyond ...
Continue ReadingMark Corroto's Best Jazz Albums Of 2025
by Mark Corroto
I have an alternative to the year end list. I prefer a “what I listened to most this past year" list. Even so, the discs below would likely make a “best of" list, but that's not my preference. These are discs (and the dreaded digital files) I kept on a heavy rotation. For instance, I am currently spinning recent releases from artists such as Eri Yamamoto / Matthew Shipp's piano duos Horizon (Mahakala), saxophonist Pete Mills' organ quartet For The ...
Continue ReadingSylvie Courvoisier, Wadada Leo Smith and Mary Halvorson at Roulette
by Paul Reynolds
Sylvie Courvoisier, duets with Wadada Leo Smith and Mary Halvorson Roulette Intermedium New York, NY December 7, 2025 So far this jazz season, you'd be hard-pressed to find a double bill as savvy, timely and well-located as Sunday's concert of duets at Roulette Intermedium in Brooklyn. In successive sets, pianist Sylvie Courvoisier played with her partners for two acclaimed duo albums in 2025: trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith, with whom she recorded Angel Falls (Intakt Records, 2025), and ...
Continue ReadingErb / Mayas / Hemingway: Phyla music
by Glenn Astarita
The improvisational music captured on Phyla Music, a live recording featuring Christoph Erb (reeds), Magda Mayas (clavinet), and Gerry Hemingway (percussion), documents an evening of profound sonic exploration at The Wurm Club club in Basel. This specific venue, known for its conducive acoustic environment, appears to have inspired the ensemble to reach a heightened state of collective invention. The anchor of the release is the sprawling, 47-minute titled “Phyla music" and the two and one-half minute ...
Continue ReadingYoshie Fruchter's Pitom: Alive and Well
by Max Kutner
Yoshie Fruchter has been a presence within the Radical Jewish and Modern Klezmer music circles for nearly 3 decades. His ensemble, Pitom, showcases many facets of his deep knowledge in those scenes as filtered through the sludge-clouded lenses of grunge, doom, and just straight metal. The band has released three full length albums since its inception, including Pitom (Tzadik, 2008), a follow-up entitled Blasphemy And Other Serious Crimes (Tzadik, 2011), both housed on John Zorn 's Tzadik imprint--and now, Alive and Well ...
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