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

Gabriel Palatchi: Trivolution

Read "Trivolution" reviewed by Edward Blanco

by Edward Blanco
November 11, 2015

Argentinian pianist and composer Gabriel Palatchi offers his third album since 2010 with the genre-bending eclectic and multi-cultural Trivolution, forging a thirteen-piece repertoire of Latin jazz, Middle Eastern, Argentinian Tango, funk and other styles in a vibrant and varied musical package. The pianist--who currently spends his time between Canada, Mexico and Argentina--formed his working trio with Mexican drummer Jose Maria 'Chema' Gonzalez and Canadian bassist Kerry Galloway back in 2010 in Mexico City but includes eleven special guests spread throughout ...

Album Review

Kenny Wheeler/John Taylor: On The Way To Two

Read "On The Way To Two" reviewed by Budd Kopman

by Budd Kopman
November 11, 2015

Trumpeter/flugelhornist Kenny Wheeler's death in September, 2014 led to the posthumous release on ECM of the beautiful and moving Songs For Quintet. However, since 2004, Wheeler recorded on CAM Jazz label, many times with the pianist who seems to be everywhere, John Taylor, starting with the duo-recording Where Do We Go From Here?. 2005 found Wheeler recording two albums with Taylor, a quartet record, What Now? and a second duo record 2005 Other People. It turns ...

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Catching Up With

Yelena Eckemoff: Growing Into Jazz

by Mark Sullivan
November 10, 2015

Pianist/composer Yelena Eckemoff goes her own way. Since the 2010 release of Cold Sun on her own L&H Production label, she has produced a series of jazz recordings, all presenting original music, with an impressive array of renowned contemporary musicians. Our conversation mainly dealt with her recording career: making connections with other musicians, composing, and working in the studio as performer and producer. All About Jazz: When All About Jazz ran a Take Five article on you back ...

Take Five With...

Take Five with Michael Kocour

by AAJ Staff
November 10, 2015

Meet Michael Kocour: Michael Kocour is a jazz pianist, organist and composer. He also serves as Director of Jazz Studies in the School of Music at Arizona State University. Hailed by the Chicago Tribune as “one of the most sophisticated pianists in jazz," Kocour has performed at venues around the world and has been a guest on Marian McPartland's internationally syndicated NPR program Piano Jazz. Among the many artists and ensembles with whom he has appeared with are ...

Album Review

John Coltrane: A Love Supreme: The Complete Masters

Read "A Love Supreme: The Complete Masters" reviewed by Mark Corroto

by Mark Corroto
November 10, 2015

For many a jazz fan John Coltrane's A Love Supreme is their personal desert island pick, the one recording they would not hesitate to live their days out listening to. Recorded on December 9, 1964, the session has endured as a document of the saxophonist's faith, as it was the proclamation of his rebirth from the jazz life of alcohol and substance abuse. The 33-minutes that are A Love Supreme come as close to a musical paragon as ...

Extended Analysis

Art Pepper: Art Pepper Live at Fat Tuesday’s

by C. Michael Bailey
November 10, 2015

The discovery and release of Art Pepper Live at Fat Tuesday's is a surprising and welcome event that has some precedence in jazz reportage. “Art Pepper, 1926-1982" is a much anthologized obituary on Pepper by jazz writer Gary Giddins, originally published in his book Rhythm-a-ning (Da Capo Press, 1985) written shortly after the saxophonist's death. In that requiem essay, Giddins remarks of these shows: “He was living on borrowed time, and he knew it. The last time ...

Album Review

Gideon King & City Blog: City Blog

by Paul Naser
November 10, 2015

New York based guitarist/composer Gideon King's unique musical upbringing has allowed him to blend emotional, compelling songwriting that incorporates sophisticated harmonies and the always engaging element of improvisation. King says of himself, “ My brother, a well-known jazz pianist... cleverly referenced Mccoy Tyner, John Coltrane, Bill Evans, and many others. My sisters, on the other hand, were... celebrating the lyrics and melodies of Neil Young, Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell and... My parents... insisted that classical music was the only heightened ...

Album Review

Dan Wilensky: Made In Portland

Read "Made In Portland" reviewed by Edward Blanco

by Edward Blanco
November 10, 2015

A Hollywood/TV industry musician who has performed on, or arranged for such programs as, The Today Show, David Letterman, The Tonight Show and several others, Portland-based composer and saxophonist Dan Wilensky is currently performing and teaching in Portland, from where he records his fifth album as leader on Made In Portland, offering eight fresh new originals and five covers including vocal renditions of songs from Irving Berlin, Charles Trenet and Hoagy Carmichael. As the album title indicates, the saxophonist records ...

Album Review

Simon Nabatov / Mark Dresser: Projections

Read "Projections" reviewed by John Sharpe

by John Sharpe
November 10, 2015

Projections captures an improvised duo encounter between émigré Russian pianist Simon Nabatov and Californian bassist Mark Dresser. Although they first played together as part of German composer Klaus Konig's Orchestra in 1992, it's taken until now for their first head to head. Both are masters of their respective instruments, articulate, persuasive and responsive. They come together in a busy, volatile set recorded live in 2014 at the Loft in Nabatov's adopted hometown of Cologne. The result is a dazzling series ...

Album Review

Aram Bajakian: Music Inspired By the Color Of Pomegranates

Read "Music Inspired By the Color Of Pomegranates" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan

by Dan McClenaghan
November 10, 2015

Guitarist Aram Bajakian found a fitting concept to tie together his creative ideas and the extended techniques he's been exploring: An obscure Russian movie about the 18th century Armenian poet, Sayat Nova. The resulting album, Music Inspired by The Color of Pomegranates, is pensive, layered, brilliantly virtuosic music, sometimes minimalist, sometimes orchestral, all of it created by the artist alone in the studio with his 1937 Gibson archtop guitar. A versatile musician who spent two years walking on ...