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

Stirrup: Cuts

by Mark Corroto
August 5, 2016

The good news about the end of record stores as brick-and-mortar businesses is that people like you--weirdos and freaks (ok, me too)--cannot be segregated into the jazz section, and Fred Lonberg-Holm's music may be available to a wider listening audience. That might be just our dream, but with music coming from his trio Stirrup, internet crawlers and open-ear listeners can get hip to what he's putting down. Lonberg-Holm plays his signature cello, plus electronics and electric guitar here ...

Album Review

Peter Kuhn: No Coming, No Going – The Music of Peter Kuhn 1978-1979

Read "No Coming, No Going – The Music of Peter Kuhn 1978-1979" reviewed by John Sharpe

by John Sharpe
August 5, 2016

In No Coming No Going, the Lithuanian NoBusiness imprint has unearthed a real gem, as part of its continuing exhumation of the New York 1970s loft scene. Reedman Peter Kuhn was a minor presence during the latter half of the decade, releasing three discs under his own leadership, and appearing on dates by Frank Lowe and William Parker. But in Livin' Right, reissued here as the first installment of a two disc set, he waxed a masterpiece which sums up ...

Album Review

Nomade Orquestra: Nomade Orquestra

Read "Nomade Orquestra" reviewed by Chris M. Slawecki

by Chris M. Slawecki
August 5, 2016

In 2012, ten of the most adventurous and accomplished musicians in São Paulo, Brazil, came together, took root and blossomed like a tropical flower. Nomade Orquestra describes their music as “the point where different musical expressions and strands meet and interact in a unique way," a fair way of pointing out that there is no other band, and no other music, like Nomade Orquestra. Nomade Orquestra captures so many different instrumental sounds and styles that it challenges any ...

Book Review

Matthew Crampton: Human Cargo

by Duncan Heining
August 5, 2016

Human Cargo -Stories and Songs of Emigration, Slavery and Transportation Matthew Crampton 164 Pages ISBN: 978-0-9561361-2-1 Muddler Books 2016 The best books are those that tell their story with passion and, when needed, a sense of anger and disgust at human venality and corruption. But when a book tells a story you thought you knew too well already, adding not just nuance and detail but bringing whole new depths of understanding, you have ...

The Vinyl Post

John Coltrane: The Atlantic Years in Mono

by C. Andrew Hovan
August 4, 2016

Much has been made lately in audiophile circles about whether mono or stereo versions of vintage back catalog items best represent the truest form of the music. Of course, back before stereo was widely accepted and available to most consumers, monophonic was the only way to go. Stereo allowed for more choices in placement of the individual instruments, although some engineers were more skilled at such mixing than others. Still, mono often seems to present the music with a wider ...

Multiple Reviews

Three New Releases from Peter Kuhn

by Dave Wayne
August 4, 2016

Clarinetist Peter Kuhn came up in the 1970s. In those days, one could count the number of modern jazz clarinet specialists on one hand: John Carter, Perry Robinson, Theo Jorgensmann, Alvin Batiste and—if you include the bass clarinet—Michel Pilz. So, one hand and a finger. Still associated with Benny Goodman, Dixieland and Swing, the clarinet was considered deeply uncool in the age of fusion. The uncompromising music of these brave souls did little to sway anyone who was not predisposed ...

Album Review

Logan Strosahl: Up Go We

by Budd Kopman
August 4, 2016

Duke Ellington famously said, There are two kinds of music. Good music, and the other kind". Creative Improvised Music really has no boundaries, and there is virtually nothing that cannot influence the final result. It is quite possible for the adventurous listener to play a different album every day for a decade and never hear a musical style that repeats. Swing is dead, long live jazz! Saxophonist Logan Strosahl demonstrates this truism with Up Go We, a joyous, ...

Album Review

Sinikka Langeland: The Magical Forest

Read "The Magical Forest" reviewed by John Kelman

by John Kelman
August 4, 2016

Some pairings seem, in retrospect, to be made in heaven; so inevitable that it's only when they actually take place that it becomes clear how predestined they were all along. Sinikka Langeland--a forward-thinking traditional singer and kantele (Finnish zither/dulcimer variant) champion garnering significant attention in her home country of Norway over the past two decades--has, since coming to ECM with 2007's Starflowers, achieved even broader recognition for her somehow other-worldly, effortlessly beautiful music that is at once antiquated and timeless. ...

Album Review

Whit Dickey/Kirk Knuffke: Fierce Silence

Read "Fierce Silence" reviewed by Mark Corroto

by Mark Corroto
August 4, 2016

The fitness instructor kept yelling, “feel the burn, feel the burn." After an hour of aerobic exercise, that was not a difficult task. A much easier and painless way to experience the same fire is to listen to just one track of Fierce Silence, a collection of improvised duos between drummer Whit Dickey and cornetist Kirk Knuffke. The ten tracks never venture into the anaerobic, instead they smolder in a slow and deliberate manner. This choice of tempo ...

Album Review

John Stowell/Michael Zilber Quartet: Basement Blues

Read "Basement Blues" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan

by Dan McClenaghan
August 4, 2016

Basement Blues is the third Origin Records CD offering from the John Stowell/Michael Zilber Quartet, following Shot Through With Beauty (2009) and Live Beauty, (2013). Guitarist Stowell's approach is distinctive--silvery chords and pinprick single notes that reverberate from the rafters. Saxophonist Zilber is a flawless, soulful technician on soprano and tenor saxophones. Bassist John Shifflett and drummer Jason Lewis are perfection in the supportive rhythm rolls. It all comes together in a cohesive set that is probing and cerebral and ...