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

Batik: Headland

Read "Headland" reviewed by Ian Patterson

by Ian Patterson
May 29, 2015

Batik may be a relatively new group but there's a natural chemistry in this debut recording that is the result of long years playing together in a variety of contexts. The genesis of the group dates back to Joost Lijbaart and Wolfert Brederode's duo collaborations, which began in 2005 and the pair are also part of the Yuri Honing Acoustic Quartet. Bassist Mark Haanstra and Lijbaart play in Honing's splendid Wired Paradise. Five of the eleven original tunes were composed ...

Live Review

Sheila Jordan & Steve Kuhn Trio at Birdland

by Tyran Grillo
May 29, 2015

Sheila Jordan & Steve Kuhn Trio Birdland New York, New York April 3, 2015 Sheila Jordan is a natural. Still going strong at 86, she does more than sing with her voice. She plays it like an instrument. Like any great jazz improviser, she bends notes to their expressive potential, traveling far but always returning home. Among few other musicians could this have been clearer than pianist Steve Kuhn, bassist Steve Laspina, and drummer Billy ...

Album Review

Gary Peacock Trio: Now This

Read "Now This" reviewed by Karl Ackermann

by Karl Ackermann
May 29, 2015

Some of bassist Gary Peacock's earliest musical associations speak to a career that has been nurtured by unusually well-rounded experiences. Subbing for Ron Carter in gigs with Miles Davis, playing with the Bill Evans Trio and pianist Paul Bley and a stay with saxophonist Albert Ayler provided Peacock with foundations that ran the gamut from main-stream balladry, to conceptually modern jazz to the most unrestricted free jazz. All of which led up to the three-decades long relationship with Keith Jarrett ...

Album Review

John Roney: Preludes

Read "Preludes" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey

by C. Michael Bailey
May 29, 2015

Intelligent programming in a jazz release provides its own reward in seasoning the recital contained therein with a thoughtful foundation. Canadian pianist John Roney entitles his recording Preludes and proceeds to populate the disc with exactly that, “Preludes," those brief, often standalone keyboard compositions from the Romantic era. Preludes most often feature a limited number of rhythmic and melodic motifs that recur through the piece. Important in jazz, the prelude is an improvisatory piece of music capably malleable to an ...

Live Review

Norfolk And Norwich Festival 2015

by Bruce Lindsay
May 28, 2015

Norfolk And Norwich Festival Norwich, UK May 8-24, 2015 With a program that includes dance, visual arts, site-specific theatre in city streets and ancient woodland and a few almost impossible to define events, a festival such as the annual Norfolk and Norwich Festival still manages to find space for jazz. The 2015 festival found space across a range of venues, for possibly the most exciting jazz line-up of recent years--hot jazz from the early ...

Album Review

Luis Perdomo: Twenty-Two

Read "Twenty-Two" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
May 28, 2015

In 1993, a twenty-two year old pianist named Luis Perdomo left Venezuela and arrived in New York City, eager to further his education and pursue his musical dreams. Now, twenty-two years later, Perdomo can certainly look back with a sense of accomplishment, having made a significant impact on the scene through his leader dates and important sideman contributions with tenor saxophonist Ravi Coltrane, alto saxophonist Miguel Zenon, and numerous others. The music on Twenty-Two was inspired by ...

Live Review

Live From Old York: Courtney Pine, Zoe Rahman, Ben Bedford & Colum Sands

by Martin Longley
May 28, 2015

Courtney Pine & Zoe Rahman Pocklington Arts Centre May 5, 2015 Courtney Pine's recent explorations have contrasted massively with the bulk of his career. Most of the time, he's fronted a fairly large, pretty driving and somewhat dense ensemble, its details changing but its powered, festival-orientated stance remaining quite stable. Suddenly, he's dipped down into an intimate duo format with pianist Zoe Rahman, who has lately been a band mate in the larger ...

Album Review

Vincent Peirani: Jazz At Berlin Philharmonic IV: Accordion Night

Read "Jazz At Berlin Philharmonic IV: Accordion Night" reviewed by Bruce Lindsay

by Bruce Lindsay
May 28, 2015

Exactly what went on at the Berlin Philharmonie's Kammermusiksaal during the evening of 13 February 2015? The venue played host to a Jazz At Berlin Philharmonic concert--the latest in the series, curated by the ACT Music label boss Siggi Loch. Each of these concerts has a single thematic focus and as the title of Jazz At The Berlin Philharmonic IV: Accordion Night suggests, the thematic focus on 13 February was firmly on the accordion. Four masters of the ...

Album Review

Nuno Costa: Detox

by Chris Mosey
May 28, 2015

Many things inspired Portuguese guitarist Nuno Costa making this, his third album: the Bible, Matthew 20:16, “So the last will be first, and the first will be last"; the life of a wasp; his pet dog, Mr Kido; and-- last but by no means least--his newly-born daughter Leonor. His songs start well, struggle to find meaningful direction and then--very often-- tend simply to peter out. Hey, but that's jazz... isn't it? The session kicks off with “Hum...?" ...

Album Review

Mercedes Nicole: People Are Talking

Read "People Are Talking" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey

by C. Michael Bailey
May 28, 2015

The difference between Mercedes Nicole's Beautiful Alignment (Self Produced, 2013) and People Are Talking is artistic growth and confidence. Beautiful Alignment was fueled by a youthful ambition and precocious talent. Nicole's evolution from that point manifests squarely in the refining fire of performance and practice, both which enhance her existing gift. People Are Talking reveals mature, completely polished approach to standards and originals that offers more than a recapitulation of previous approaches. Nicole's standards choices are a ...