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.

Extended Analysis

(Living the Dream)

by John Kelman
May 18, 2016

While he's been living in Los Angeles for many years, Alex Machacek clearly values longterm musical relationships. While the majority of his recordings for the Raleigh, NC-based Abstract Logix imprint have seen the Austrian-born guitarist working with the likes of Jeff Sipe, Matthew Garrison, Neal Fountain and Gary Husband, his 2005 label debut, [sic], was notable--beyond its stunning compositions and mind-boggling post-Allan Holdsworth-ian guitar gymnastics--for the participation, on most tracks, of two fellow Austrians: bassist Raphael Preuschl and drummer Herbert ...

Album Review

Eyolf Dale: Wolf Valley

Read "Wolf Valley" reviewed by Roger Farbey

by Roger Farbey
May 18, 2016

Thirty one year old pianist Eyolf Dale is a leading figure in contemporary jazz in his home country of Norway and an Associate Professor of applied piano at the Norwegian Academy of Music department of jazz studies. The album's title, Wolf Valley, is actually a play on his name as in Norwegian, Eyolf means wolf and Dale means valley. This is chamber jazz of sorts, but paradoxically packing a surprisingly satisfying punch too. “Furet" initially evokes a feel ...

Album Review

Sam Sadigursky: Follow The Stick

Read "Follow The Stick" reviewed by Budd Kopman

by Budd Kopman
May 18, 2016

After spending nearly ten years with the four Words Project albums (see here, here and here for three of them), reedman and multi-instrumentalist Sam Sadigursky has decided to concentrate on clarinet, returning to purely instrumental music with Follow The Stick. Starting initially with a trio comprised of pianist Bobby Avey (who work with Dave Liebman's latest group is stellar; see Samsara , and The Puzzle) and drummer Jordan Perlson, the group was expanded to include vibraphonist Chris Dingman. ...

Album Review

Karen Lane Organ Project: Two Steps from the Blues

Read "Two Steps from the Blues" reviewed by Geno Thackara

by Geno Thackara
May 18, 2016

From intimate singer-songwriter crooning to bossa nova, Karen Lane and her versatile voice have graced many a stage in quite different contexts. The blues have always been an ingredient in there as well--albeit an infrequent one usually represented by the occasional encore--so it was probably inevitable that this facet of her personality would get its own outlet at some point. She cites Sarah Vaughan's Sarah Sings Soulfully (Roulette, 1963) as a lifelong staple and inspiration for this recording, while also ...

Interview

Greg Osby: Saxophone “Griot”

by Victor L. Schermer
May 17, 2016

The griot is a West African historian, storyteller, praise singer, poet and/or musician, a repository of oral tradition who is often seen as a societal leader. Saxophonist Greg Osby recently was excited to meet some griots on his travels. While he is originally from St. Louis, he himself is a griot in many senses of the word. As Peter Margasak said in Jazz Times as early as 2000, “Greg Osby has quietly become one of the most potent, complete and ...

Live Review

Allison Miller's Boom Tic Boom at the Philadelphia Art Alliance

by Asher Wolf
May 17, 2016

Allison Miller's Boom Tic Boom Philadelphia Art Alliance Ars Nova Workshop Philadelphia, PA May 13, 2016 Allison Miller's Boom Tic Boom plays jazz, but the woman herself is hardly a jazz drummer. Though she can swing and improvise like nobody's business, Miller seems equally at home with the grooves of funk and Latin, or even--God forbid--the fist-pumping, downbeat-loving attitude of rock and roll. To be sure, any jazz drummer with a shred of notoriety ...

Album Review

Simon Nabatov/Mark Dresser/Dominik Mahnig: Equal Poise

Read "Equal Poise" reviewed by Karl Ackermann

by Karl Ackermann
May 17, 2016

Russian born pianist Simon Nabatov has been composing since early childhood. His career has placed his residences in Italy, New York (where he studied at Juilliard), and Germany, where he finally settled. He has worked or recorded with Barre Phillips, Ray Anderson, Ed Schuller and, as a leader, has recorded in a variety of settings from solo to octet. Trombonist Nils Wogram has been one of Nabatov's frequent partners but the pianist's most unusual work has been Nature Morte (Leo, ...

Album Review

Kristin Norderval: Parrhésie

Read "Parrhésie" reviewed by Geno Thackara

by Geno Thackara
May 17, 2016

Kristin Norderval has a lot on her mind. Most of us do, of course, but most of us probably tend to keep some mental distance between the enjoyable pleasantries (art, music obsessions and the like) and the remainder of life that's somewhat less fun (worries about society or the future of the planet). Norderval isn't like most of us; for her it's all inseparable. Her instrument is the voice, and what she's feeling is what comes out at the microphone. ...

Album Review

Oleg Kireyev & Keith Javors: The Meeting

Read "The Meeting" reviewed by Edward Blanco

by Edward Blanco
May 17, 2016

Performing together since 2007, Russian saxophonist Oleg Kireyev and Philadelphia-based pianist Keith Javors formed a solid quartet they eventually led to the studio for their debut album Rhyme & Reason (Inarhyme Records, 2010). The Meeting is their follow up recording with a program of four originals and three re-imagined tunes from The Great American Songbook delivered in a tasteful post-bop style. Interestingly enough, it was Kireyev who discovered Javors while surfing the internet and cemented their friendship while ...

Album Review

Benny Golson: Horizon Ahead

Read "Horizon Ahead" reviewed by Jack Bowers

by Jack Bowers
May 17, 2016

At age eighty-seven, saxophonist Benny Golson is one of the last surviving links to the Golden Age of modern jazz, ushered in by the likes of Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Bud Powell, Kenny Clarke and others in the early '40s. Golson came on the bop scene about a decade later and has been a force ever since, whether playing, composing, arranging, buttressing Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers or leading groups of various sizes. In 1956, Golson wrote “Whisper Not," the first ...