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Katchie Cartwright's Best Jazz Albums Of 2024
by Katchie Cartwright
2024 was another great year for jazz, and here are a dozen more reasons to think so... Hermeto Pascoal Pra você, Ilza Rocinante Records “I saw heaven on earth doing this work." --Hermeto Pascoal Rhiannon Giddens American Railroad: A Musical Journey of Reclamation Nonesuch Records “And we say never forget who you are or where you come from." --Pura Fé Crescioni
Continue ReadingMartial Solal: Martial Solal Live in Ottobrunn
by Jack Kenny
Bach wrote the Goldberg Variations, Beethoven wrote the Diabelli Variations. Martial Solal spent his life inventing variations which he played live in front of audiences. His love of the great composers--Duke Ellington. Richard Rodgers, Thelonious Monk, Miles Davis, George Gershwin, Jerome Kern, Cole Porter and the 20th century classical masters--illuminated his playing. Quite simply, Solal was one of the very greatest jazz pianists. His technique and his musical imagination were both breathtaking. The gap between the ...
Continue ReadingKresten Osgood: Presence in the Room
by Jakob Baekgaard
It is hard to underestimate the influence of drummer Kresten Osgood on Danish jazz. As a co-founder of the prominent ILK Music label and the man behind several festivals and musical events, he has been a vital part of creating a vibrant modern jazz scene and community that has also welcomed visits from the many jazz legends Osgood has played with. The later years have seen him deliberately slowing down on arranging events, although he has found ...
Continue ReadingAnat Cohen Quartetinho: Bloom
by Katchie Cartwright
Anat Cohen's Quartetinho emerged from her Tentet with a self-titled album in 2022 (Anat Cohen Quartetinho, Anzic). It is a mighty little group, enhanced by doubling: Vitor Gonçalves plays accordion and piano, Tal Mashiach is on bass and guitar, James Shipp handles vibes, marimba and percussion, Cohen on clarinets. For Bloom, the band's second album, each musician contributed new compositions, generating a harmonious program that mingles flamenco (Mashiach's “Paco") with tango (Gonçalves' “Tango Para Guillermo") and ...
Continue ReadingMarshall Allen, Leiba Trio & Gold Mother
by Maurice Hogue
Lights On A Satellite is a fitting title for an album celebrating the 100-year-old miracle, saxophonist Marshall Allen, the mainstay of Sun Ra's legacy. His continuing direction of the Sun Ra Arkestra puts him right up there beside Planet Ra. Other new releases sampled in this episode come from a very worthy Leiba Trio from Argentina led by pianist Santiago Leibson, Portugal's Gold Mother , Free jazz saxophonist Sakina Abdou from France, the duet of long-time musical associates bassoonist Karen ...
Continue ReadingChristopher Zuar Orchestra: Exuberance
by Jack Bowers
Composer/arranger Christopher Zuar's second album, Exuberance, recounts in musical terms a twisting yet picturesque journey that began seven years earlier, in 2017, when Zuar first met his now-wife, the animator Anne Beal, at MacDowell, the famed artists' residency in New Hampshire. While the relationship “blooms" in winter, there are “moments between" and other inescapable detours until “certainty" erases any lingering doubts, “exuberance" carries the day and Zuar and Beal are united as one. Yes, the music is ...
Continue ReadingNew Live Recording From Guitarist Emily Remler, Singles By Ute Lemper, Marianne Solivan, Holiday Fare From George Kahn, Penni Layne & More
by Mary Foster Conklin
This broadcast includes holiday recordings from George Kahn, Penni Layne, a collection of holiday vintage jazz from Concord Records, a new concert recording from Emily Remler, singles from Ute Lemper and Marianne Solivan, with birthday shoutouts to Beegie Adair, Joe Williams, Jihee Heo, Sheila E., Diane Schuur and Amanda Tosoff, among others. Happy listening and please support the artists you hear. See them live, purchase their music so they can continue to distract, comfort, provoke, inspire and remind the world ...
Continue ReadingGeorge Cables, Steve Allee, Camille Thurman, Lloyd McNeil, Roberto Magris
by Cheryl K.
During this week's two-hour program of Jazz and improvised music, cuts from new releases by octogenarian pianist George Cables, saxophonist Camille Thurman with the Darrell Green Quartet, the Lloyd McNeil Quartet from 1970, the re-release of Green Cosmos's only album, pianist Roberto Magris, and holiday tunes from George Kahn and Jazz & Blues Revue and pianist Donald Vega. Playlist Bobby Timmons “God Bless the Child" from Sweet and Soulful Sounds (Riverside) 5:05 George Cables “Morning Song" from I ...
Continue ReadingDorothy Fields, The Only Major Female Songwriter Of The Golden Age
by Joan Merrill
Whenever there's a discussion of the great songwriters of the Golden Age of popular music (1920s to 1960s), we hear the names Irving Berlin, Cole Porter, Rodgers and Hart, Harold Arlen, Harry Warren, Frank Loesser, George Gershwin, and a few others. You don't very often hear names Yip Harburg, PF Webster, Johnny Burke, Sammy Cahn, or Johnny Mercer. But you certainly don't hear the name Dorothy Fields, the only woman of the bunch. The lyricists seem to be given a ...
Continue ReadingGeorge Cables: I Hear Echoes
by Joshua Weiner
Pianist George Cables has released a steady stream of albums as a leader since the mid-1970s, but may be best known to listeners as a stalwart side man whose contributions to a slew of classic records by the likes of Freddie Hubbard, Art Pepper, Dexter Gordon, Bobby Hutcherson, Joe Henderson and Woody Shaw never fail to enliven the proceedings. I Hear Echoes, another in a string of strong releases on High Note Records, was released on his 80th birthday, though ...
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