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

Darrell Katz and OddSong: Jailhouse Doc With Holes In Her Socks

Read "Jailhouse Doc With Holes In Her Socks" reviewed by Jerome Wilson

by Jerome Wilson
September 24, 2016

Darrell Katz has been working in Boston for over 30 years compiling an impressive body of work as leader of the Jazz Composers Alliance Orchestra whose music has drawn from current events, literary works and anecdotes about Charles Mingus and Albert Einstein among other sources. On this new CD he revisits several of the compositions he's written for the Orchestra with a smaller seven-piece ensemble called OddSong. The makeup of this group is four saxophones, violin ,marimba and ...

Jazz Raconteurs

Live Trane: Never Before, Never After

by David Liebman
September 23, 2016

NEA Jazz Master and much celebrated saxophonist, composer, bandleader, educator and author Dave Liebman recounts the life-changing experiences of witnessing live performances by John Coltrane as told to Dave Kaufman. I always say my epiphany was the first time I saw Coltrane in February of 1962 at Birdland. The fact that I even knew about Birdland at 15 years old was because I was invited to go there a few months earlier by some of the older guys ...

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Interview

Lewis Porter on John Coltrane

by Victor L. Schermer
September 23, 2016

The following interview with Lewis Porter, author of John Coltrane: His life and Music, was conducted by telephone on April 15, 2000. I am indebted to Dr. Porter for taking the time from his exceptionally busy schedule as musician, writer, teacher, and father to share his views with us. All About Jazz: It's indeed an honor to interview you, Dr. Porter. Just to get us started, could you tell us your favorite albums and books about jazz, ...

Album Review

Jonas Cambien Trio: A Zoology of the Future

Read "A Zoology of the Future" reviewed by John Sharpe

by John Sharpe
September 23, 2016

For the debut of his new trio, Belgian-born, Oslo-based pianist Jonas Cambien joins with two rising stars of the Norwegian scene for a series of incisive cuts notable for their inventive arrangements and maverick rhythms. Drummer Andreas Wildhagen is part of Paal Nilssen-Love's Large Unit and may not be known to many, but on this showing that is likely to change, while reedman André Roligheten performs with Friends & Neighbors and Gard Nilssen, making a strong appearance on the drummer's ...

Album Review

John MacLeod & His Rex Hotel Orchestra: Our Second Set

Read "Our Second Set" reviewed by Jack Bowers

by Jack Bowers
September 23, 2016

Somewhere, Rob McConnell must be smiling broadly. McConnell, once the peerless leader of Canada's flagship jazz ensemble, the Boss Brass, is no longer with us, sad to say, but the Brass lives on in the guise of trumpeter John MacLeod's superlative Rex Hotel Orchestra, which mirrors McConnell's band from its skin-tight section work and well-drawn charts right down to the lustrous French horn section, a striking signature of the Boss Brass. As noted in a review of ...

Album Review

Duane Eubanks/Eric McPherson/Dezron Douglas: Live At Maxwell's

Read "Live At Maxwell's" reviewed by Budd Kopman

by Budd Kopman
September 23, 2016

DE3 is a cooperative trio whose name is an acronym for its members: bassist Dezron Douglas, drummer Eric McPherson both of whom came from trumpeter Duane Eubanks's, quintet (which includes saxophonist Abraham Burton and Marc Cary on keyboards). Engineer Jimmy Katz, who recorded Noah Preminger's trio on Pivot: Live At The 55 Bar so well, invited the trio to record at Steve Maxwell's Drum Shop with no pressures of time or otherwise. The result is the ...

Album Review

Nels Cline: Lovers

by Mark Sullivan
September 23, 2016

No one can accuse guitarist Nels Cline of being predictable. He has recorded with his avant-garde trio the Nels Cline Singers most consistently (with bassist Devin Hoff and drummer Scott Amendola), but also led larger groups, such as the one on New Monastery (Cryptogramophone, 2006). More recently there was his duet with guitarist Julian Lage on Room (Mack Avenue, 2014), not to mention his membership in the rock group Wilco since 2004. His Blue Note debut Lovers is a unique ...

Top Ten List

John Coltrane: My Favorite Things (Not Including “My Favorite Things”)

by Matt J. Popham
September 22, 2016

John Coltrane died on July 17, 1967 at the age of forty. Had he lived, he would have turned 90 on September 23rd of this year. When one considers the profound effect he had--not just on jazz, but on music as a whole--in the brief two decades of his career, it's not only daunting, but depressing, to try and imagine what he might have done with four or five more. Initially a gifted Hard Bop player, his own musical and ...

New York @ Night

The Cookers, Mingus Big Band and Cyrus Chestnut

by Peter Jurew
September 22, 2016

The Cookers Birdland New York, NY September 15, 2016 The Cookers are an all-star septet that takes its name from the classic Freddie Hubbard album, The Night Of The Cookers, a 1965 live effort from the master trumpeter who passed in 2008. A somewhat fluid lineup earlier in the group's seven year existence has solidified with trumpeters David Weiss and Eddie Henderson out front with Billy Harper on tenor and Donald Harrison ...

Album Review

Shirantha Beddage: Momentum

Read "Momentum" reviewed by Franz A. Matzner

by Franz A. Matzner
September 22, 2016

The baritone sax is an underutilized part of the jazz arsenal, at least as a lead, soloist instrument. Its deep sonority tends to tilt its use either toward ensemble settings or the cooler styles of soloist work, following the trajectory of Gerry Mulligan's early innovations on the instrument. With Momentum, Canadian composer and multi-instrumentalist Shirantha Beddage unfetters the baritone's capacities, both by exploring the instrument's higher registers and utilizing it in a wide variety of musical settings, while taking full ...