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

Rodrigo Amado: This Is Our Language

Read "This Is Our Language" reviewed by John Sharpe

by John Sharpe
November 17, 2015

The title of Portuguese saxophonist Rodrigo Amado's latest offering pays unmistakable homage to the late Ornette Coleman. This Is Our Music (Atlantic, 1961) constituted one of Ornette's uncompromising early manifestos, while In All Languages (Caravan of Dreams, 1987) served to reveal both the differences and the similarities between his classic quartet and the electric Prime Time band. Although the music on this selection of five unfettered inventions bears little overt relationship to Coleman's oeuvre (even his seminal Free Jazz contained ...

Album Review

Richard Shelton: An Englishman In Love In L.A.

Read "An Englishman In Love In L.A." reviewed by Edward Blanco

by Edward Blanco
November 17, 2015

English-born actor Richard Shelton is a veteran of British theatre and television who recently moved to the United States for the opportunities that Hollywood may offer. As an actor, Shelton played the role of Frank Sinatra on the London stage in a play based on the book 'Rat Pack Confidential,' a dream come true for the actor who was provided with the chance to play his musical idol. Since then, Shelton has often been referred to as the “British Sinatra." ...

Album Review

Aguanko: Invisible

Read "Invisible" reviewed by Chris M. Slawecki

by Chris M. Slawecki
November 17, 2015

In 2012, conguero and composer Alberto Nacif, a Mexican native transplanted in Michigan, brought together some of the area's most skilled Afro-Cuban and Latin musicians to form Aguankó. Their small ensemble with a large Latin jazz sound herewith follows up their self-produced 2013 debut Elemental with a sparkling new set entirely written by Nacif, featuring Aguankó percussionist Jose “Pepe" Espinosa serving for the first time as their producer. “The idea for the title and the concept for this ...

Live Review

Wynton Marsalis Honored at Marian Anderson 2015 Awards Concert

by Victor L. Schermer
November 16, 2015

Wynton Marsalis Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts Marian Anderson Award Concert Philadelphia, PA November 10, 2015 On this celebratory occasion, Wynton Marsalis became the second bona fide jazz musician (the other being Quincy Jones) to win the prestigious Marian Anderson Award given to “a show business individual who has contributed notably to American cultural, artistic, and/or charitable development." Thus, this year's Award implicitly acknowledged the role of jazz in American life, popular ...

My Blue Note Obsession

Benny Golson and the Philadelphians - 1958

by Marc Davis
November 16, 2015

I have hundreds of jazz CDs. I'm a huge fan of bebop, hard bop and all manner of piano playing. Yet I have blind spots in my collection and in my jazz knowledge. The big names are all accounted for. And now that I've been exploring Blue Note's back catalogue--especially the 1950s and '60s--I'm filling in the less-well-known artists. I'm discovering how much I love Lee Morgan, Kenny Dorham, Lou Donaldson and Larry Young. I'm also finding obscurities ...

Album Review

Squakk: Willisau & Berlin

Read "Willisau & Berlin" reviewed by John Sharpe

by John Sharpe
November 16, 2015

Four Germans combine for a set that recalls some of the classic Anthony Braxton quartet sides with George Lewis or Ray Anderson from the 1970s. Common ground abounds in their free-bop structures and the delightful interplay as between reeds and trombone as they slip in and out of both tunes and time. There are also other precedents closer to home such as reedman Frank Gratkowski's combo with trombonist Wolter Wierbos. But whatever the inspiration, a palpable sense of fun allied ...

Album Review

Racha Fora: Racha S'Miles

Read "Racha S'Miles" reviewed by James Nadal

by James Nadal
November 16, 2015

The music of Miles Davis certainly needs no introduction. It has been covered in a myriad of styles, by a vast quantity of artists. Racha S'Miles is an ambitious project that deconstructs Davis's music and hurls it into a rhythmic and exotic orbit exhibiting Brazilian sensibilities. The Racha Fora ensemble consists of cross cultural musicians who have congealed into cohesive interpreters of global jazz with an ethnic tinge. The band centers on flutist/leader Hiroaki Honshuku, violinist Rika Ikeda, ...

Interview

Bill Kirchner: Finding Music's Intimacy

by R.J. DeLuke
November 15, 2015

The extremely accomplished Bill Kirchner--composer, arranger, saxophonist, writer, editor, teacher--enjoys a career anyone would be proud of. He's played with important musicians, led outstanding groups and had his arrangements played by top-shelf musicians and bands. In 1996, he won a Grammy for Best Album Notes for the revered Columbia/Mosaic re-issue Miles Davis and Gil Evans: The Complete Columbia Studio Recordings.Many of the accomplishments came about despite severe physical setbacks. In 1993, he was found to have a life-threatening ...

Take Five With...

Take Five with Andrea Brachfeld

by AAJ Staff
November 15, 2015

Meet Andrea Brachfeld: Flutist Andrea Brachfeld, a graduate of The Manhattan School of Music, and recent recipient of the “Best Jazz Flute" award from Hot House Magazine, began her musical career at 16 and has associated with Tito Puente, Ray Barretto, Hubert Laws, Nestor Torres, Dave Valentin, Paquito D'Rivera, Wycliffe Gordon and Wallace Roney, among many others. She is the first female flutist to play “Charanga" music in the United States, having recorded with Charanga '76 in 1976. ...

Album Review

Amos Hoffman: Back To The City

Read "Back To The City" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
November 15, 2015

Amos Hoffman's story is one of departures and returns. This guitarist-oudist cut his teeth in his native Israel, made his way to Amsterdam, and finally ended up in New York in the '90s as part of what could be considered the first wave of Israeli jazz talent to really make an impact on the Big Apple. And then he left. Hoffman returned to Israel, continuing to play, record on occasion, and mentor up-and-comers who've come stateside, or, no doubt, will. ...