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.

Live Review

Tom Harrell and TRIP

by Patricia Myers
August 20, 2015

Paris Jazz Diary 2015: Trumpeter Tom Harrell and TRIP Duc des Lombards Nous N'Irons Pas a New York Festival Paris, France July 17, 2015 The amazing and intriguing trumpeter Tom Harrell performed a program of nuanced creativity that stirred and expressed emotion, rather than displaying technique. His sparse solos were accented by sophisticated harmonies that appeared appealing to the rapt members of Duc des Lombard's first-set full-house. Harrell has never relied on ...

Album Review

Junior Mance: Jubilation

Read "Jubilation" reviewed by Hrayr Attarian

by Hrayr Attarian
August 20, 2015

Pianist Junior Mance has a bop-based facility with improvisation and a bluesy, “no- nonsense" candid style. Mance debuted his career with this unique blend of traits and his singular voice has changed little over the course of his prolific career that spans over half a century. The Delmark reissue of Jubilation, originally on the, now defunct, Canadian label Sackville, is a live solo recording from September of 1994 in Toronto's Montreal Bistro. On it Mance demonstrates a more crystalized and ...

Album Review

Jakob Norgren Jazz Orchestra: Pathfinding

Read "Pathfinding" reviewed by Chris Mosey

by Chris Mosey
August 20, 2015

The last word has yet to be spoken on the role of the baritone saxophone in jazz big band writing. Duke Ellington used Harry Carney to great, often magnificent effect. Then, in 1960, Gerry Mulligan took things further with his Concert Jazz Band. At that moment the Beatles and the beat boom that followed sounded the death knell for jazz as popular music. Big bands were no longer economically viable and the few that survived showed little ...

Album Review

Fort Knox Five: Pressurize the Cabin

Read "Pressurize the Cabin" reviewed by Chris M. Slawecki

by Chris M. Slawecki
August 20, 2015

Pressurize the Cabin delivers the best of the club dance experience--funky grooves, spacey loops and echoes, scratches and samples, shout outs and call outs--without overpriced drinks or the ubiquitous smoke, glitter or perfume. The core four of the Fort Knox Five--Sid Barcelona, Jon Horvath, Rob Myers and Steve Raskin--herewith present a jumping party that's just waiting for you to climb onboard. “Reach" smoothly opens pop, funk, R&B, hip-hop, electronic and groove styles, then blends them all into the ...

Album Review

Peter Hum: Alpha Moment

Read "Alpha Moment" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
August 20, 2015

Pianist Peter Hum's second album--Alpha Moment--was recorded back in December of 2011, but there's good reason for the fact that it's only just seeing the light of day in 2015: Hum has had his hands full, serving as the restaurant critic at the Ottawa Citizen, delivering some of the most informative and insightful jazz journalism out there via his blog, and living life to the fullest with his family whenever he puts his pen down. With all of that going ...

Live Review

Live From Coventry & Kings Heath: Trembling Bells, Willie Watson, Hailu Mergia & The Destroyers

by Martin Longley
August 19, 2015

Trembling Bells The Tin & The Kitchen Garden Café August 3 & 5, 2015 It's sometimes instructive, or even enjoyable, to catch a combo twice during their tour. Perhaps this might lead to what seems like a repeat showing, and on other occasions there is an insight into wildly varying tactics. There's always much talk from musicians about being affected by the room they're playing in, but when Glaswegian folk rockers Trembling Bells ...

My Blue Note Obsession

Sonny Rollins, Volume One – 1956

by Marc Davis
August 19, 2015

It's easy to like Sonny Rollins. The guy is bluesy, edgy and clever. And it almost doesn't matter which period of Rollins' career you choose. It's all pretty terrific. But there's an unexpected down side: Because Rollins has so many fantastic recordings, listening to ones that are merely good can be a little disappointing. That's how I feel about Sonny Rollins Volume One--the first of four recordings that Rollins made for Blue Note in 1956 and ...

Album Review

Blasie Siwula/Luciano Troja/John Murchison: Beneath the Ritual

Read "Beneath the Ritual" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan

by Dan McClenaghan
August 19, 2015

The biggest slice of the free jazz stew is cooked up with--going back to the beginnings of alto saxophonist Ornette Coleman's artistry--a horn or two stirred in with bass and drums. The chording instrument--guitar or piano--is generally optional. But when a piano sits in, the potential for sweetening the sound bounces up big time. Consider Coleman's rare outings with the piano: Colors: Live From Liepzig (Harmolodic/Verve, 1996) and the simultaneously-released Sound Museum Hidden Man and Sound Museum Three Women (Harmolodic, ...

Album Review

Larry Newcomb Quartet: Live Intentionally!

Read "Live Intentionally!" reviewed by Jack Bowers

by Jack Bowers
August 19, 2015

New York-based guitarist Larry Newcomb says his latest album was recorded “live"--but don't hold your breath waiting for the sound of applause. As it turns out, the CD was recorded “live" at Tom Tedesco Studios in Paramus, NJ. Using that as a measuring stick, it could be argued that every album is recorded “live" if the sundry musicians are upright and breathing. What Newcomb means is that the session was recorded without benefit of dubbing, splicing, patching or other post-production ...

Album Review

Mark Taylor and the BigBand: To the Edge

Read "To the Edge" reviewed by Nicholas F. Mondello

by Nicholas F. Mondello
August 19, 2015

The person who grasps the reins as big band arranger assumes assorted artistic and aesthetic responsibilities--a “structural" engineer, a sound painter, a decision-maker, and quite importantly, a challenger and motivator. The finest purveyors of the craft, both past and present, are all well-aware of these demands. Yet, they relish the opportunity and provide the musical canvas that allows the performers to do their own magic acts. Arranger and performer --it is a symbiotic relationship of the highest creative order.