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

Teagan Taylor: The Subject Of...

Read "The Subject Of..." reviewed by Dan McClenaghan

by Dan McClenaghan
July 11, 2015

Teagan Taylor, San Diego's premier vocalist/cornetist/songwriter, released her first album I Can't Complain (Jazzomaniac Records), in 2011. It was a very capable, engaging, mosly jazz outing, featuring her distinctive take on the “Standards": “Taking a Chance on Love," “Bye Bye Blackbird," “Summertime" and the like. She was not yet twenty-one. A chance encounter with her back then at a street fair/farmer's market in San Diego's Little Italy--her cornet notes floating over the crowd like a jazz lover's dream--revealed a talented ...

Album Review

Maria Schneider Orchestra: The Thompson Fields

Read "The Thompson Fields" reviewed by Budd Kopman

by Budd Kopman
July 11, 2015

The singular achievement of Maria Schneider is to merge the particular with the universal: to use her very personal experiences and memories as grist for music which is aurally beautiful and deeply infused with love. This love originates from Schneider the person and artist; it is amplified and returned by those directly involved in the creation of this work through the ArtistShare process (including those who commissioned “Arbiters of Evolution," “Home" and “Lembranca"); finally, it is received by ...

Album Review

Boston Baroque, Martin Pearlman: Monteverdi: Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria

Read "Monteverdi: Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey

by C. Michael Bailey
July 11, 2015

The hinges of musical history have typically afforded one or two artists most associated with them. At the horizon of the Renaissance looking over into the Baroque period was Italian composer Claudio Monteverdi (1567--1643). He is often credited with developing polyphonic performance at the end of the Renaissance period and the basso continuo technique (establishment of a harmonic underpinning) in the Baroque period. New York Times classical music critic Harold Schonberg called Monteverdi, the “Pioneer of Opera," as his L'Orfeo ...

Film Review

Kenneth Whalum III: Taking Jazz Away From The Norm

by K. Shackelford
July 11, 2015

Kenneth Whalum III, a young jazz saxophonist, continues to grow and shine with his musical exploits. He's performed and helped shaped the live musical experiences of today's top hip-hop artists including Ludacris and Jay-Z, in addition to pop stars such as Justin Timberlake, Ciara and Bruno Mars. One person described Whalum's sound as “creatively engaging, intense, and artistically real, pushing the conventional boundaries of contemporary emerging artists." You can also hear him on the recently released The Gospel According To ...

Album Review

Tomasz Dąbrowski FREE4ARTS: Six Months and Ten Drops

Read "Six Months and Ten Drops" reviewed by Eyal Hareuveni

by Eyal Hareuveni
July 11, 2015

FREE4ARTS may be the most Nordic-sounding group of Polish, Copenhagen-based prolific trumpeter Tomasz Dąbrowski. The quartet features colleagues from the musicians-run collective and record label Barefoot Records including baritone saxophonist Sven Dam Meinild, who also plays in Dąbrowski international quartet Ocean Fanfare, and drummer Kasper Tom Christiansen, who collaborated before with Dąbrowski in the Polish-Danish trio Hunger Pangs. Pianist Jacob Anderskov, in his first recorded collaboration with Dąbrowski, recorded a fine duet with Christiansen, Chroma (Barefoot Records, 2014). ...

Record Label Profile

Kuai Music: Moving Jazz Forward Collectively

by Jakob Baekgaard
July 10, 2015

The history of jazz is often told as an evolution propelled by great individuals whose singular sounds have helped to shape the aesthetic of the music. This is understandable since artists like Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Charlie Parker, John Coltrane and Miles Davis really DID influence the development of jazz and this is confirmed every time an upcoming musician is asked about his or her inspiration and mentions a musician from the canon of jazz. Another advantage ...

My Blue Note Obsession

Charlie Rouse: Bossa Nova Bacchanal – 1962

by Marc Davis
July 10, 2015

What a happy record! And what a delightful change from the usual 1960s Blue Note formula. You know the drill. In the 1960s, Blue Note was the go-to label for two kinds of jazz: hard bop and soul-jazz. But Blue Note was never the reigning bossa nova label. When the Brazilian phenomenon swept the jazz world in the early 1960s, Verve was the capital of bossa nova, and Stan Getz was its main disciple. So it ...

Album Review

Donald Vega: With Respect To Monty

Read "With Respect To Monty" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
July 10, 2015

When pianist Donald Vega put together Spiritual Nature (Resonance Records, 2012), he presented an arresting mix of music that shined a light on some of his influences. There was a touch of Scriabin in the mix, pointing to classical music; a nod to pianist Oscar Peterson by way of bassist Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen's “Future Child"; a showing of respect toward mentor/employer Ron Carter via the bassist's “First Trip"; and, perhaps most tellingly of all, the inclusion of two numbers from ...

Album Review

Monique Canniere: Preachin’ to the Choir

Read "Preachin’ to the Choir" reviewed by Chris M. Slawecki

by Chris M. Slawecki
July 10, 2015

Violinist, composer and vocalist Monique Canniere began her musical career, one suspects, like many other violin players: By playing traditional Celtic music in competitions and folks festivals, which she did from the age of six with her musician father, Vic; and by earning her BM in performance (from Mansfield [PA] University, where she performed as violinist and vocalist with the MU Jazz Ensemble and as concertmaster of the MU Symphony, and was also a member of the nearby Williamsport Symphony). ...

Album Review

Penetralia: Grix

by John Sharpe
July 10, 2015

Three Greeks based in the musical melting pot of Berlin comprise the cooperative Penetralia. Best known may be reedman Floros Floridis, who has worked with both late master bassist Peter Kowald and drummer Gunter Baby" Sommer (on the bassist's Off The Road (Rogue Art, 2007) DVD). Completing the trio are Antonis Anissegos on piano and Yorgos Dimitriadis on drums. As a trio they evoke varied antecedent ranging from clarinetist Jimmy Giuffre's chamber trio to pianist Cecil Taylor's bass less threesome ...