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

Ron Thomas/Paul Klinefelter: Duo

by Dan McClenaghan
July 7, 2016

Pianist Ron Thomas' talents range widely, from his Karlheinz Stockhausen-influenced electric outings like Elysium (Vectordisc, 2009), through his fluid free association piano trio sets, Music In Three Parts (Art Of Life Records, 2006) and Doloroso (Art of Life Records, 2006), to his mainstream outings that draw their inspiration from the late pianist Bill Evans--Two Lonely People (Vectordisc, 2011) and Blues For Zaranthustra (Art Of Life Records, 2008), a pairing a duo set with bassist Paul Klinefelter. Duo is ...

Album Review

Sergio Krakowski: Pássaros: The Foundation of the Island

Read "Pássaros: The Foundation of the Island" reviewed by Jakob Baekgaard

by Jakob Baekgaard
July 6, 2016

Pássaros: The Foundation of the Island is the second release on the noteworthy Brooklyn label, Ruweh Records. It is a special release in many ways. First and foremost, the leader of the date, Sergio Krakowski, is playing an instrument that is very rare in jazz: the pandeiro. The pandeiro is a hand frame drum that is particularly popular in Brazil. It is no coincidence that the instrument has been named the Brazilian tambourine. However, there is a ...

Album Review

Wolfgang Lackerschmid & The Brazilian Trio: Samba Gostoso

Read "Samba Gostoso" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
July 6, 2016

This was bound to happen eventually. German vibraphonist Wolfgang Lackerschmid has worked with each man in The Brazilian Trio at different times and he's long been fascinated with the sounds of their homeland, so he was destined to eventually collaborate with this collective. On Samba Gostoso, Lackerschmid is seamlessly integrated into the already-established group dynamic that's been fleshed out over time by pianist Helio Alves, bassist Nilson Matta, and drummer Duduka Da Fonseca--three longtime collaborators who also ...

Album Review

Wolfert Brederode Trio: Black Ice

Read "Black Ice" reviewed by Mark Sullivan

by Mark Sullivan
July 6, 2016

Dutch pianist Wolfert Brederode returns to a piano trio format after the quartet albums Currents (ECM, 2007) and Post Scriptum (ECM, 2011). Not only a trio, but also new playing partners in bassist Gulli Gudmundsson and drummer Jasper van Hulten. While there's no radical stylistic shift with the new band--it's still mainly about mood and atmosphere--new material was written with these musicians in mind. The well-titled “Elegia" opens the album, setting the plaintive, elegiac tone. The title tune ...

Album Review

Lucio Capece / Kevin Drumm / Radu Malfatti: The Volume Surrounding the Task

Read "The Volume Surrounding the Task" reviewed by John Eyles

by John Eyles
July 6, 2016

The Volume Surrounding the Task was recorded live at Q-O2 in Brussels in January 2011 during a tour of France, Belgium and Switzerland by the international trio of Argentine-born Berlin resident Lucio Capece on bass clarinet and preparations, Chicago-based Kevin Drumm on electronics, and Austrian trombonist Radu Malfatti. The music consists of the unbroken title track which lasts over forty minutes and may well have been an entire set. The three players work well together as a trio, ...

Getting Into Jazz

The Best Of The Hot Five And Hot Seven Recordings

by Mark Barnett
July 6, 2016

Getting Started If you're new to jazz, go to our Getting Into Jazz primer for some hints on how to listen. CD Capsule Portrait of the artist as a young genius. In these immortal recordings, Armstrong blew new life into jazz and changed it forever. Background Many people remember Louis Armstrong only as a popular entertainer, recalling how he wrapped his warm, gravelly voice around such hits as “Hello, Dolly" ...

Building a Jazz Library

Jazz From Around The World: Latin America and the Caribbean

by Hrayr Attarian
July 5, 2016

The focus of the second installment of Jazz from Around the World is Latin America and the Caribbean. Because of both proximity to the US and the shared African heritage, particularly in the Caribbean, jazz was seamlessly and naturally adopted in this part of the world. Of course Latin jazz with its many guises is a very dominant force in today's music. Highlighted below are 10 early gems from south of the border. One of the first permutations ...

My Blue Note Obsession

Booker Ervin: The In Between -- 1968

by Marc Davis
July 5, 2016

There's a kind of music I like to think of as harder bop. It's a lot like conventional 1950s hard bop, but tougher, more muscular, more cerebral. Booker Ervin's The In Between is that kind of record. Ervin has an edgy style. It starts with a John Coltrane feel, then pushes a little further. Not into the crazy, atonal, unapproachable territory that Trane created in his later years, but into music that's more from the head than the ...

Album Review

Dick Sisto/Steve Allee Quartet: Earth Tones

Read "Earth Tones" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
July 5, 2016

While Earth Tones is the first album credited to the Dick Sisto/Steve Allee Quartet, it's not this foursome's first rodeo. This group has been at it as a working band for quite a while now, and it previously released Spirit of Life (Jazzen, 2013)--a date under Sisto's name that concentrates on the work of John Coltrane, Duke Ellington, and Billy Strayhorn. This follow-up focuses on originals, as all but one of the nine tracks come from Sisto or Allee, and ...

Album Review

Dom Minasi & Jack DeSalvo: Soldani Dieci Anni

Read "Soldani Dieci Anni" reviewed by Mark Sullivan

by Mark Sullivan
July 5, 2016

Guitarist Dom Minasi is known as an experimentalist and free player, so there is much in this set of acoustic duets with fellow guitarist Jack DeSalvo that will confound expectations. Opener “The Indelible Delible" is a free improvisation with the expected outside playing and flurries of notes--but there is also some delicate textural playing. Then Minasi's “Angela" announces a complete change of mood. It's a beautiful bossa, with DeSalvo taking the lead on classical guitar, followed by Minasi's acoustic flat-top ...