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

Debby Moore: My Kind Of Blues

Read "My Kind Of Blues" reviewed by James Nadal

by James Nadal
July 27, 2015

For the record hounds (you know who you are) out there that seek and scavenge the garage sales and flea markets for old albums, there is such a thing as redemption. After scoring My Kind Of Blues by singer Debby Moore at a flea market for one dollar, further research revealed a mysterious back story with a happy ending. Emmaline Maultsby was born in St. Augustine, Florida, in 1925, and by age 17 with a head full of ...

Album Review

Vladan: Ornaments

Read "Ornaments" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey

by C. Michael Bailey
July 27, 2015

Eastern Europe and, particularly the Balkans, have been fertile ground in the evolution of jazz, with an excellent recent example of Markelian Kapedani's Balkan Bop. Another pianist emerging from that same fecund spot is Vladan. Vladan is Vladan Mijatovic, a Serbian pianist and composer intent on trashing genre designations and fully expanding the piano sound palette. Vladan accomplishes an impressively seamless mash-up of Eastern European, Western Classical, and American jazz styles. Orchestral in scope, Vladan's pianism is muscular and virile, ...

Album Review

John Fedchock New York Big Band: Like It Is

Read "Like It Is" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
July 26, 2015

Trombonist John Fedchock may be a seasoned veteran, but he's not set in his ways as a player, arranger, or composer. While some big band leaders of his ilk either try to recreate the past or completely abandon it, attempting to reboot themselves by genuflecting at the altar of modernism, he isn't one of them. Fedchock appreciates the history of the music yet he understands that time marches on. With that in mind, he delivers Like It Is, an album ...

Book Excerpts

The Soul of Jazz: Stories and Inspiration from Those Who Followed the Song in Their Souls

by Trish Richardson
July 26, 2015

The Soul of Jazz: Stories and Inspiration from Those Who Followed the Song in Their Souls by Trish Richardson (Grayson James Press, 2011) includes interviews with nineteen world renowned jazz artists. The following is an excerpt from saxophonist Mindi Abair's chapter: What have you learned about your character as a result of being in this business? My dad was a musician, but he would never teach me music. My dad played sax and keyboards and bass--he ...

Album Review

Matthew Shipp & Mat Walerian Duo/The Uppercut: Live At Okuden

Read "Live At Okuden" reviewed by John Sharpe

by John Sharpe
July 26, 2015

While pianist Matthew Shipp has recorded a slew of head to heads with saxophonists, his duo -The Uppercut -with Polish reedman Mat Walerian is different. Reason being that on Live at Okuden the pair tackles a program of Walerian's compositions as well as four of the more expected jointly credited improvisations. However you might be hard pressed to distinguish between them as the compositional elements are subtle -a hint of sweetness from the hornman perhaps -but nothing too obvious. Although ...

Album Review

Alex Conde: Descarga for Monk

Read "Descarga for Monk" reviewed by Mark Sullivan

by Mark Sullivan
July 26, 2015

Spanish pianist-composer Alex Conde (currently residing in the Bay Area) unites his love of flamenco and the music of Thelonious Monk with these creative arrangements. Conde is a working flamenco musician, having spent the last four years with renowned U.S. flamenco company the Juan Siddi Flamenco Theatre Company. He also attended the Berklee College of Music, which may explain the fascination with Monk. He is accompanied by the Bay Area rhythm section of bassist Jeff Chambers and drummer John Arkin, ...

Live Review

Hall & Oates at the Nikon at Jones Beach Theater

by Mike Perciaccante
July 26, 2015

Hall & Oates Nikon at Jones Beach Theater Wantagh, NY July 15, 2015 In the 1980s, Daryl Hall & John Oates sold albums and CDs at a rate similar to that of Madonna, Bruce Springsteen, U2, Prince and Michael Jackson. Their songs could be found on and still can be found prominently on jukeboxes across the country. The duo's seemingly endless string “classic" blue-eyed soul/funk pop included six number 1 Billboard hits ("I Can't Go ...

Album Review

Stevie Holland: Life Goes On

Read "Life Goes On" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey

by C. Michael Bailey
July 26, 2015

Vocalist Stevie Holland has blazed quite a path for herself. She is fifteen years into a career that has produced seven recordings, the most recent being the present impressionistic Life Goes On. While always refined, Holland takes her refinement to a gilded level that is almost a vapor, an essence. She never overuses her perfectly balanced soprano voice, erring always on the side of sophistication and pure simplicity. Holland approaches ten Gary William Friedman-arranged standards and originals like Matisse beginning ...

Album Review

Wayne Horvitz: Some Places Are Forever Afternoon (11 Places For Richard Hugo)

Read "Some Places Are Forever Afternoon (11 Places For Richard Hugo)" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
July 25, 2015

Nature's gifts, depressive streaks, undiluted tastes of reality, and everyday slices of twentieth century northwestern American life all strongly inform the work of poet Richard Hugo (1923-1982); all of those elements, not surprisingly, also find there way into pianist Wayne Horvitz's Some Places Are Forever Afternoon (11 Places For Richard Hugo)--an absorbing collection of music that manages to merge the visceral and intellectual in much the same way that Hugo's writing does. While there's inherent difficulty in ...

Book Review

Brit Lit: The British Invasion & Led Zeppelin

by C. Michael Bailey
July 25, 2015

While “rock & roll" music had its genesis in the United States, most particularly in the American South, its subsequent (and essential) evolution occurred elsewhere, specifically in the United Kingdom. What is called “the British invasion" has been one of the most important and least studied and discussed elements in the ultimate development of the music. Simon Philo's British Invasion: The Crosscurrents of Musical Influence address this in the broadest terms, while Gregg Akkerman's Experiencing Led Zeppelin: A Listener's Companion ...