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

Don Preston / Jeff Boynton / Philip Mantione: TriAngular Bent

Read "TriAngular Bent" reviewed by Dave Wayne

by Dave Wayne
September 22, 2016

A lot of artists Don Preston's age, with a similar musical pedigree, are revered as “national treasures." For whatever reason, this hasn't yet happened for the veteran sonic explorer, still going strong after 84 years on the planet. Perpetually a “Talent Deserving of Wider Recognition," he's most frequently remembered for his groundbreaking work with Frank Zappa. He contributed significantly to all of the iconoclastic guitarist / composer's tours and recordings through the mid-1970s. In collaboration with Bunk Gardner, Tom Fowler, ...

Album Review

Jason Stein/Paul Giallorenzo/Frank Rosaly: Hearts & Minds

Read "Hearts & Minds" reviewed by Mark Corroto

by Mark Corroto
September 22, 2016

When the Chicago trio of Jason Stein, Paul Giallorenzo, and Frank Rosaly, known as Hearts & Minds, plays music Sun Ra smiles from somewhere interplanetary. Not that the mighty Ra favored small groups, he mostly worked with his large Arkestra, rather, it's that the wellspring for this 21st century music are his concepts and instrumentation. Sun Ra's saxophonist John Gilmore, then later Robert Cummings, employed a bass clarinet as Jason Stein does here. Drummer Frank Rosaly juggles varied and complex ...

Album Review

Jane Ira Bloom: Early Americans

Read "Early Americans" reviewed by Ian Patterson

by Ian Patterson
September 22, 2016

Three years on from the ballad standards of Sixteen Sunsets (Outline, 2013), Jane Ira Bloom--one of the few specialist soprano saxophonists--returns with a lustrous collection of originals. At one extreme, the trio of Bloom, Mark Helias and Bobby Previte fairly bristles with collective energy; at the other, it seduces with caressing, impressionistic lyricism. At whatever tempi, however, Bloom's melodic improvisations and the rhythm section's industry and nuance are never less than captivating. Helias and Previte plied the rhythmic ...

In Pictures

Guelph Jazz Festival 2016

by Frank Rubolino
September 22, 2016

In the small college town of Guelph less than an hour's drive west of Toronto, a significant festival has occurred each September since 1994. Recently retired Artistic Director Ajay Heble prided himself on featuring the very best in improvised music, culling his program from the ranks of the best international purveyors of this music. By combining a colloquium of academic lectures on jazz with a top-notch performance agenda, the festival has gained a reputation as one of the best available. ...

Interview

Thomas Marriott: Balance in Life and Music

by Paul Rauch
September 21, 2016

If one should by chance be curious of what is happening with jazz in the city of Seattle, and the Pacific Northwest, one would do well to check out what trumpeter Thomas Marriott is up to. Thomas has established himself as one the most exciting artists to emerge on the national jazz scene in the past decade, in part by releasing eleven albums as a leader on the Origin Records label, and with his riveting live performances on stage with ...

Live Review

George Benson at Denver Botanic Gardens

by Geoff Anderson
September 21, 2016

George Benson Botanic Gardens Denver, CO August 31, 2016 NEWS FLASH: George Benson's gone pop! OK, maybe that one's about 40 years late. I even knew that at the time it happened, having purchased the Breezin' album (Warner Brothers, 1976) when it first came out. But, over the years, through careful picking and choosing and focusing on his older material, I've mainly been listening to his jazz side. Nevertheless, I knew that a ...

Album Review

Jimmy Scott: I Go Back Home: A Story About Hoping And Dreaming

Read "I Go Back Home: A Story About Hoping And Dreaming" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
September 21, 2016

Sadness naturally hovers like a black cloud over life's December days, but hope and joy can often find a way to peak through the overcast skies. That's a message that comes through most clearly on Jimmy Scott's beautiful parting gift to the world. I Go Back Home manages to serve as swan song, celebration, tribute, soiree, and soundtrack all at once. It brings Scott into contact with an incredible array of musicians while showcasing his inimitable voice--a ...

Album Review

The Rodger Fox Big Band: Plays New Zealand

Read "Plays New Zealand" reviewed by Jack Bowers

by Jack Bowers
September 21, 2016

Although trombonist Rodger Fox has somehow managed to keep New Zealand's finest big band alive and swinging for more than four decades, the band has never devoted an entire album to music written and arranged by New Zealanders--until now. That's not to say that Fox and the band have ignored music from their home country. Over the years, more than ninety compositions by New Zealand-based musicians have been commissioned for the ensemble, sixty-eight of which have made it onto various ...

Album Review

I Am Three: Mingus, Mingus, Mingus

Read "Mingus, Mingus, Mingus" reviewed by Troy Dostert

by Troy Dostert
September 21, 2016

In addition to her many other projects, German alto saxophonist Silke Eberhard has made her mark by delving into the jazz tradition via her own distinctive, forward-looking sound. She collaborated with pianist Aki Takase in 2007 on Ornette Coleman's compositions (Ornette Coleman Anthology, Intakt), and she's done some fantastic work with her larger ensemble Potsa Lotsa in tribute to Eric Dolphy; in this regard, last year's superb Plays Love Suite by Eric Dolphy (jazzwerkstatt) is truly a must-listen for all ...

Album Review

Parrinha / Lopes / Jacinto: Garden

Read "Garden" reviewed by Glenn Astarita

by Glenn Astarita
September 21, 2016

On a global basis, Portuguese guitarist Luis Lopes may be the more recognizable artist of the trio due to his longtime affiliation with Clean Feed Records via its worldly outreach. But his fellow countrymen, reedman Bruno Parrinha and cellist / electronics ace Ricardo Jacinto have been in the thick of things amid the newer horizons approach to jazz and improvisation on the European front. Garden is a sojourn into an alien musical world, as the band seemingly derives ...