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

Joe McPhee: Flowers

by Mark Corroto
September 19, 2016

For the longest time it was a commonly held belief that solo saxophone performances, especially freely improvised solo saxophone performances, were an acquired taste. Meaning they are things that one has come to like only through experience, but mostly it is a polite way to say you find the music distasteful. Certainly, much of improvised music can be spoken of in this manner, but when an artist performs with the sincerity and genuineness that saxophonist Joe McPhee does every night, ...

Album Review

Leverton Fox: Velcro Bird

Read "Velcro Bird" reviewed by John Eyles

by John Eyles
September 19, 2016

Leverton Fox was formed in 2007 when trumpeter/electronicist Alex Bonney, drummer/electronicist Tim Giles and guitarist/electronicist Matt Groom came together. That trio released Country Dances (Gravid Hands, 2009) but by the release of The Human Arm (Not Applicable, 2012) Groom had been replaced by Sam Britton on electronics. The line-up has remained stable ever since, through the release of Smart Casual (Not Applicable, 2013) and now this fourth album, with the only complication being Britton's use of pseudonyms. Here he is ...

Album Review

Tuomo Uusitalo: Love Song

Read "Love Song" reviewed by Tyran Grillo

by Tyran Grillo
September 19, 2016

Pianist, composer, and educator Tuomo Uusitalo--born in Finland and, since 2012, a resident fixture of the New York City jazz scene--offers up something special in Love Song, his second album as leader. Special, not only because with it Uusitalo has rewritten his name into the ledger of modern jazz in flowing script, but also because he has come more maturely into his own as an improviser. For while we can still count on the virtuosity that distinguished his debut, here ...

Jazz Near Me

The Cookers at Birdland

by Dorothy Johnson-Laird
September 19, 2016

The Cookers Birdland New York, NY September 17, 2016 On a warm night in New York City The Cookers took the stage. This appearance at Birdland marked the release of their latest CD, The Call of the Wild and Peaceful Heart (Smoke Session Records, 2016). Each member of the front line is a jazz stalwart, and leaders of their own bands. Billy Harper is old enough to have played with Art Blakey's Jazz ...

Live Review

2016 Detroit Jazz Festival

by C. Andrew Hovan
September 18, 2016

2016 Detroit Jazz Festival Hart Plaza Detroit, Michigan September 2-4, 2016 The staging of North America's largest free jazz festival must indeed be some kind of massive undertaking. In the years since artistic director Chris Collins has taken the reins of the festival, there have been many changes, some for the better and some for the worst. There certainly has been a more concerted effort to garner donors and folks willing to pay the big ...

Album Review

Derek Brown: Beatbox Sax

Read "Beatbox Sax" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan

by Dan McClenaghan
September 18, 2016

One man bands are something of a novelty: some guy with a half a dozen instruments (or more)--guitar, drums, harmonica--affixed to his body in various ways. Saxophonist Derek Brown blows the one man band route with just the saxophone on Beatbox Sax. The first reaction on spinning the disc, opening with Brown's original composition, “Catch 'Em Up," could understandably be: “That's not live, he's slipping in loops and salting the saxophonic sonic stew in the studio with electronics." ...

Extended Analysis

Seth Walker: Gotta Get Back

by Doug Collette
September 18, 2016

With Gotta Get Back, Seth Walker aligns himself with arguably the most authentic of Americana artists, the Wood Brothers. Both siblings contribute to this, the ninth album of the Southern-born and raised songwriter/musician, while the 'adopted' member of their brethren, Jano Rix, produced the record, adding not only his own multi-instrumental and vocal skills, but setting a casual tone that helped in no small part to conjure the inviting ambiance of this album. As such, this alliance is ...

Album Review

Fail Better!: OWT

by John Sharpe
September 18, 2016

Taking Samuel Beckett's exhortation from Worstward Ho as a moniker--and a highly appropriate credo for improvisers to aspire to--Portuguese co-operative ensemble Fail Better! proffer their second release, following Zero Sum (JACC, 2014), as a limited edition LP on the Lithuanian NoBusiness label. Of the five proponents, likely the most familiar will be trumpeter Luis Vicente and guitarist Marcelo dos Reis, both increasingly visible on the European scene and previously heard in fine style on the excellent Chamber 4 (FMR, 2015). ...

Album Review

Mike Melito: New York Connections

Read "New York Connections" reviewed by David A. Orthmann

by David A. Orthmann
September 18, 2016

It's somewhat misleading to summarize Mike Melito's New York Connections by dropping a few names of past masters for credibility's sake, applauding him for preserving the essence of hard bop designs from the 50s and 60s, and emphasizing just how effective he is at forging ties to these avenues of the music. Though all of these factors are germane, they're only a small part of the whole tale. The Rochester, NY area drummer and a band of excellent New York ...

Album Review

TAUK: Sir Nebula

Read "Sir Nebula" reviewed by Doug Collette

by Doug Collette
September 18, 2016

Fans of King Crimson or Return to Forever are as likely as those of Umphrey's McGee to dote on TAUK whose third studio album, Sir Nebula, interweaves hard rock, funk and spacey synths of all textures. Not anything groundbreaking to be sure, it's nevertheless a heady mix and it doesn't take long for the album to assault the mind and body: “Horizon" begins with gentle clean electric guitar strums before zooming with no little precision into a cosmic air quite ...