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.

Multiple Reviews

Three Treader releases conclude label’s first decade in fine style

by John Eyles
February 4, 2016

Since 2004 when Ashley Wales and John Coxon--collectively known as Spring Heel Jack (SHJ)--set up Treader records and released its first three CD's, the label has enjoyed a reputation for high quality music and distinctive packaging. Following Spring Heel Jack's switch from drum 'n' bass and jungle to free improvisation, they built up an impressive network of contacts with improvisers which they used to good effect with Treader. The label's roster reads like a Who's Who of improv: Evan Parker, ...

Album Review

Ken Peplowski: Enrapture

Read "Enrapture" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
February 4, 2016

How on earth do you successfully bind the music of Duke Ellington, John Lennon and Yoko Ono, Fats Waller, Herbie Nichols, Bernard Herrmann, Peter Erskine, and Noël Coward into one coherent statement? The answer is simple: You don't, unless you're Ken Peplowski. Over the course of ten tracks from the aforementioned composers and other well-known tunesmiths, Peplowski manages to simultaneously express his love of myriad sounds and styles, a fondness for days gone by, and an ability to move ever ...

Album Review

Various Artists: The Boston Creative Jazz Scene 1970-1983

Read "The Boston Creative Jazz Scene 1970-1983" reviewed by Dave Wayne

by Dave Wayne
February 4, 2016

Though New York City remains first and foremost in everyone's mind as the “Jazz Capital of the World," aficionados know that many other cities in the US and abroad support significant and artistically important jazz communities. Boston looms large among the most important jazz cities, worldwide. The birthplace of Harry Carney, Roy Haynes, George Russell, Sonny Stitt, George Wein, Makanda Ken McIntyre and Charlie Mariano, Boston is also the home of two of the most forward- looking institutions of higher ...

Album Review

W&E Swing: Moonshine

Read "Moonshine" reviewed by Wade Luquet

by Wade Luquet
February 4, 2016

Through a chance meeting at a weekly jam session at Round Guys Brewery in Lansdale, Pennsylvania, a group of musicians became friends and began to gel as a group. The jam organizer Mike Mahomet, has a small recording studio blocks away and invited the talented group to record some tunes. The group known as W&E Swing is lead by singer/guitarist Wendy Bourne and guitarist Ernie Pugliese who were joined by many of the Wednesday night regulars on this delightful CD. ...

Live Review

Hamid Drake Carte Blanche at Bimhuis Amsterdam: PUNKT+ICP

by Henning Bolte
February 4, 2016

Hamid Drake, Punkt + ICP Bimhuis Carte Blanche Amsterdam January 23, 2016 World-renowned Amsterdam Bimhuis invited illustrious Chicagoan drummer/percussionist Hamid Drake for a carte blanche night on January 23rd. This article covers the event and adds some background notes. Hamid Drake frequently performs at this venue. To date he played Bimhuis 18 times in its 40 years of existence. When we consider this as well as his enormous musical range a festival would be ...

Album Review

Jon Lundbom & Big Five Chord: Make Magic Happen

Read "Make Magic Happen" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan

by Dan McClenaghan
February 3, 2016

The computer/internet age ushers in new ways of selling music. Record stores, flipping through bins of long playing albums--long gone. Compact discs--not selling like they used to. Digital downloads--the thing of the future? Guitarist Jon Lundbom has come up with the idea--influenced by trumpeter Dave Douglas' foray into this territory, perhaps, with his Three Views (Greenleaf, 2011)--of releasing four digital EPs, “extended play" sets that clock in at about thirty minutes apiece, spreading those releases over the course of nine ...

Album Review

Hristo Vitchev Quartet: In Search of Wonders

Read "In Search of Wonders" reviewed by Mark Sullivan

by Mark Sullivan
February 3, 2016

Bulgarian-born San Franciscan jazz guitarist/composer Hristo Vitchev leads an experienced quartet on this double-CD collection of attractive modern jazz. This is his seventh release as a leader, and the third with this quartet (allowing for a change in the drum chair), following Familiar Fields (First Orbit Sounds Music, 2013) and Song For Messsambria (First Orbit Sounds Music, 2009). His influences are eclectic, but the chamber jazz sound of tracks like the piano solo “Stay (Prelude)" and the guitar/piano duet “We ...

Interview

Jasper Hoiby: In Conversation

by Nick Davies
February 3, 2016

Scandinavian/British jazz trio Phronesis have been described in Jazzwise Magazine as “one of the most exciting bands on the planet today" and by Jon Newy in the same publication as “the most exciting and imaginative piano trio since the Esbjorn Svensson Trio." They have been nominated for numerous awards such as “The Best Jazz Ensemble" at the Parliamentary Jazz Awards and “Best Jazz Act" at The MOBO Awards, both in 2010. The band are currently working on their latest project ...

Bailey's Bundles

Jazz Quanta February – Girl Power: Laura Perlman, Esperanza Spaulding, Susie Arioli, Roisin O

by C. Michael Bailey
February 2, 2016

Laura Perlman Precious Moments Miles High Records 2015 A cancer survivor who has worked in the periphery of the music-movie industry, vocalist Laura Perlman finally steps up and sets her spear in the sand with the suave and smoothly considered Previous Moments. An alto with a sure tempos feel and excellent taste in side musicians, Perlman expresses her gratitude for her good fortune with an even ten familiar standards that are taken ...

Album Review

Ark Ovrutski: Intersection

Read "Intersection" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
February 2, 2016

Ukrainian bassist Ark Ovrutski arrived on American soil just over a decade ago, and he's been rather busy ever since. A nonstop go-getter from his earliest days, Ovrutski immediately made the most out of that move, steadily working his way into the ultra-competitive New York jazz scene and seeking out opportunities to further his playing and knowledge in formal academic settings and informal environments. Now, with a full gigging schedule, a doctorate from the University of Illinois, and some notable ...