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

Man Overboard Quintet: Down In The Deep Deep Blue

Read "Down In The Deep Deep Blue" reviewed by Bruce Lindsay

by Bruce Lindsay
August 23, 2015

A rhythm section that would make even a half-decent front line sound great; a front line that would enhance any ensemble; a bunch of great, sometimes neglected, songs with catchy tunes and quirky, image-laden lyrics. Surely, it's all just a wonderful dream? Nope, it isn't. It's Down In The Deep, Deep Blue, album number two from the Man Overboard Quintet.All Hands On Deck (Champs Hill Records, 2013) was released under the name of Man Overboard, giving no clue ...

Extended Analysis

Jimi Hendrix: Freedom-Atlanta Pop Festival

by Doug Collette
August 23, 2015

Jimi Hendrix' performance at the Woodstock Music and Arts Festival in Bethel, NY may be his most iconic single live performance, but as the conclusion of the August 1969 event, it was offered in front of approximately half the 300-400,000audience he faced at the Atlanta Pop Festival roughly a year later. Contained on two-disc sets of compact disc and vinyl LP, Freedom documents the concert in its entirety (except for a grievously out-of-tune “Hey Baby (New Rising Sun)" ...

Album Review

Mort Weiss: Mort Weiss is a Jazz Reality Show

Read "Mort Weiss is a Jazz Reality Show" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey

by C. Michael Bailey
August 23, 2015

The informal definition of a Character is an “odd, eccentric, or unusual person." That is a bit disappointing in that “odd, eccentric, and unusual" more often than not may be pejorative. I prefer a “unique, memorable, or exceptional person." That said, it takes all six adjectives to adequately describe clarinetist Mort Weiss, who with this recording makes me eat a whole crow soufflé considering I was tempted to take him at his word that his last release, A Giant Step ...

Album Review

Spin Marvel: Infolding

Read "Infolding" reviewed by Chris M. Slawecki

by Chris M. Slawecki
August 23, 2015

As a Professor of Jazz (Drums/Percussion) at the Royal Academy of Music in London, and as contributor to recordings and performances by Lee Konitz, Dave Holland, Bill Bruford's Earthworks and other progressive jazz thinkers, drummer, composer and bandleader Martin France is accustomed to deep and heady jazz waters. In Spin Marvel, France teams up with two of Norway's most exploratory progressive jazz musicians, electronic sound sculptor Terje Evensen and electronic/electric trumpet pioneer Nils Petter Molvaer. Infolding captures Spin ...

Live Review

George Benson at the NYCB Theatre at Westbury

by Mike Perciaccante
August 23, 2015

George Benson with special guest Chrisette Michele NYCB Theatre at Westbury Westbury, NY August 14, 2015 George Benson is a multi-platinum (R.I.A.A. certified), best selling, Grammy Award-winning guitarist and singer-songwriter. In 2009, Benson was recognized by the U.S. National Endowment of the Arts as a Jazz Master, the country's highest jazz honor. Benson was born and raised in the Hill District in Pittsburgh, PA. A child prodigy, at 8 years of age, ...

Live Review

JJ Grey & Mofro, G. Love & Special Sauce and Big Head Todd & The Monsters at the NYCB Theatre at Westbury

by Mike Perciaccante
August 23, 2015

JJ Grey & Mofro, G. Love & Special Sauce and Big Head Todd & The Monsters NYCB Theatre at Westbury Westbury, NY August 13, 2015 On a pleasant August evening, when the high temperatures between two separate, yet equally oppressive heat waves, had dropped and a pleasant breeze blew across Long Island, JJ Grey & Mofro, G. Love & Special Sauce and Big Head Todd teamed up for a triple headlining performance ...

Album Review

Giacomo Gates: Everything Is Cool

Read "Everything Is Cool" reviewed by Jack Bowers

by Jack Bowers
August 22, 2015

Giacomo Gates was almost forty years old when someone suggested that he try his hand at singing. Luckily for the rest of us, Gates thought that was a good idea, moved to New York City later that year (1989) and began singing in clubs. Six years later Gates recorded his first CD, Blue Skies, and Everything Is Cool is the eighth. Simply put, no one on the scene today sings quite like Gates--and that is a compliment. He has a ...

Album Review

Liberty Ellman: Radiate

by Troy Collins
August 22, 2015

Radiate is guitarist Liberty Ellman's fourth album under his own name since 1997 and his third for Pi Recordings, following 2006's Ophiuchus Butterfly. Ellman's output as a bandleader over the years has been secondary to his role as an in-demand sideman however, working with such luminaries as Vijay Iyer, Rudresh Mahanthappa, Myra Melford, and Jason Robinson--hence his somewhat limited discography. Most significantly, Ellman has been a charter member and sole guitarist in renowned composer Henry Threadgill's longstanding Zooid ensemble, serving ...

Rediscovery

Dire Straits: On Every Street

by John Kelman
August 22, 2015

Dire Straits On Every Streetuniversal Music Japan2013 (1991) After a lengthy hiatus, Rediscovery returns with a Japanese SHM CD edition of Dire Straits' final studio record, 1991's On Every Street. While many folks who bought it on the strength of the mega-selling Brothers in Arms (Warner Bros., 1985)--which contained so many hits so (still) consistently overplayed that, for some, it's taken literally decades to begin loving it again--were disappointed at On Every Street's relative lack ...

Album Review

Tomoko Omura: Roots

by Mark F. Turner
August 22, 2015

Chosen as one of 2015's “Rising Stars" in Downbeat magazine's critics poll, violinist Tomoko Omura's Roots is evidence that some of the most alluring music is that which combines disparate locales and cultures. The artistic fusion of songs from her homeland in Japan with verdant progressive jazz is presented by Omura and her top flight group as they produce music that ardently reflects both worlds. Originally from Shizuoka, Japan, the New York violinist revisions pop and folk ...