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.

Album Review

Sara Bielanski: From the Heart

Read "From the Heart" reviewed by Victor L. Schermer

by Victor L. Schermer
December 20, 2016

This is vocalist Sara Bielanski's debut album, and for it she brought together a group of fine musicians with connections to the Berklee School of Music and The New England Conservatory, institutions where for well over more than a half-century many of our most outstanding players have gotten their jump start. Bielanski herself is a fine crossover singer and vocal teacher based in Cambridge, so the album has a touch of the sophisticated New England Back Bay feeling of those ...

Album Review

Michael Dease: All These Hands

Read "All These Hands" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
December 20, 2016

Trombonist Michael Dease is never short on ideas, but this one might be his best yet: With All These Hands, Dease traces the early migratory patterns of jazz through his own well-crafted originals. He starts in NOLA and moves along to many a music mecca, including the Mississippi Delta, Chicago, Detroit, Philadelphia, Washington D.C., and New York. All the while he addresses regional dialects that developed as jazz permeated different regions while remaining cognizant of the need to avoid the ...

Album Review

Paulo Chagas/Samuel Hällkvist/Stephan Sieben: Days Are Not Days

Read "Days Are Not Days" reviewed by Mark Corroto

by Mark Corroto
December 20, 2016

When an improvised recording presents itself as a meteor, some foreign object from another civilization, like Days Are Not Days does, we should rejoice that it has entered our atmosphere and like a bolide, exploded upon contact. Okay, this recording by Portuguese saxophonist and flutist Paulo Chagas, and guitarists Samuel Hällkvist, from Sweden, and Stephan Sieben, from Denmark, isn't a bomb. It is, though, an improvised explosive device, pieced together from chamber music debris, ambient dregs, noisy scraps, ...

Multiple Reviews

Badbadnotgood Is Truly Goodgoodnotbad

by Dave Wayne
December 20, 2016

Among the pleasantest surprises of 2016, a year replete with many notably unpleasant surprises, was the appearance of IV by the poly-stylistic jazz / instrumental hiphop quartet BadBadNotGood. IV came hot on the heels of Sour Soul, their remarkable 2015 collaboration with Ghostface Killah. If you still bristle when you see the words “jazz" and “hiphop" together in the same sentence, it may well be time to drop the attitude and give the music of BadBadNotGood—BBNG to their fans—a good ...

Take Five With...

Take Five with Tom Harrison

by AAJ Staff
December 19, 2016

Meet Tom Harrison: For alto saxophonist/composer Tom Harrison, the art of jazz is far more than mastery of the instrument, fluency in the repertoire and respect for the tradition. For Tom, the real undertaking is to connect with that which inspired the immortals of jazz, and to cultivate it within his own work. Born in Cardiff and raised in Sheffield, Tom has become one of UK jazz's fastest rising stars after finishing his studies in 2012. Since graduating ...

Album Review

John Ellis: Evolution - Seeds and Streams

Read "Evolution - Seeds and Streams" reviewed by Phil Barnes

by Phil Barnes
December 19, 2016

There's a temptation to assume with evolution that all of history has been leading to this point, that today's dominant species or situation will continue as such forever. Nonsense of course, think of the changes in the lifetimes of current generations and it's clear that evolution is not a defined end point but a dynamic, continuing process. If nothing else our planet has finite resources, so continuing on a fixed path is unlikely to work forever. Musically the risks are ...

Album Review

Alex Jønsson: Heart Of Gold: Live In Aarhus

Read "Heart Of Gold: Live In Aarhus" reviewed by Mark Sullivan

by Mark Sullivan
December 19, 2016

Recorded live at a living room concert, Heart of Gold presents an intimate portrait of Danish guitarist/composer Alex Jønsson and his trio. The title tune opens the set: it's not the well known Neil Young song, but it does have an Americana tinge. Drummer Andreas Skamby sets up a pillow of sound using mallets, bassist Jens Mikkel Madsen plays a repeating bass pattern, and Jønsson's guitar sings the tune. When he solos he usually favors single note lines with a ...

Multiple Reviews

Clouds and Stormy Nights: A New Pair from QFTF

by Geno Thackara
December 19, 2016

Germany's growing QFTF label remains ambitious as ever as 2016 draws to a close, showcasing two young off-the-beaten-path bandleaders with their own ideas of the directions modern jazz might take. With some fairly offbeat feels for melody, the pair manage to serve as two sides of the same semi-abstract coin. Matthew Sheens Cloud Appreciation Day QFTF 2016 It eases in with an almost stately air, then abruptly breaks into rhythmic careening like lightning ...

Album Review

Tom Challenger and Kit Downes: Black Shuck

Read "Black Shuck" reviewed by Karl Ackermann

by Karl Ackermann
December 19, 2016

The great--and often dark--writer, Neil Gaiman, in his recently published book of short stories titled Trigger Warning tells the tale of the mythical dog-beast--the black shuck--that is to be avoided at night because ..."if you see him--you die.." Well, that's fairly dark and it sets the tone for the third duo outing from Kit Downes and Tom Challenger. Black Shuck follows the pair's Wedding Music (Loop Records, 2014) and Vyamanical (Slip Imprint, 2016). Black Shuck has been issued ...

Multiple Reviews

Emanem Tidies Up

by John Eyles
December 19, 2016

As well as releasing contemporary recordings of improv, Martin Davidson's Emanem label has played a vital role in documenting the history of the music by releasing, re-releasing or re-curating recordings that are decades old. In the process, Davidson has sometimes worked tirelessly to improve the sound quality of recordings that were never intended for release, and has been relentless in his pursuit of vital recordings that plugged gaps in the discographies of important musicians. In a 2001 interview, Derek Bailey ...