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

RED Trio and Mattias Ståhl: North And The Red Stream

Read "North And The Red Stream" reviewed by John Sharpe

by John Sharpe
November 18, 2014

On their fifth album, Swedish vibraphonist Mattias Ståhl joins the Portuguese Red Trio as a guest. He's the latest in a sequence which includes alliances with saxophonist John Butcher and trumpeter Nate Wooley on disc, and reedman Ken Vandermark in performance. The product, North And The Red Stream, comprises three collective improvisations recorded at the VDU Jazz Festival in the Lithuanian city of Kaunas in 2013. Each arises from an impromptu give and take, negotiated on the fly, as the ...

Live Review

Armand Boatman Trio + Jim Cooper at Musicians Hall

by Patricia Myers
November 18, 2014

Armand Boatman Trio + Jim Cooper Musicians Hall/Phoenix Federation of Musicians Local 586 AFM Phoenix, Arizona November 4,2014 The sparkling piano style of Armand Boatman combined with the flashing mallets of longtime Chicago- area vibraphonist Jim Cooper in a quartet setting on Nov. 4 at the Phoenix Musicians Hall. From the opening lilt of “Almost Like Being in Love" to the closing Latin-flavored “Datura," both sets were a satisfying mix of standards and originals.

Album Review

Tubby Hayes: Without a Song – Rare Live Recordings 1954-73

Read "Without a Song – Rare Live Recordings 1954-73" reviewed by Roger Farbey

by Roger Farbey
November 18, 2014

This comprehensive 3-CD box set comprises 22 previously unissued live tracks constituting a veritable cornucopia for Tubby Hayes fans. It also benefits from 31 pages of extensive, informed and intelligent sleeve notes from the redoubtable Hayes biographer Simon Spillett, plus some previously unseen photographs. CD-1 opens with a rousing “Bark for Barksdale" by the Vic Lewis Orchestra from 1954 and a confident tenor solo from Hayes aged just nineteen. On the 1959 recording of “Swinging the Blues," compere ...

Album Review

Trio 3 + Vijay Iyer: Wiring

by John Sharpe
November 18, 2014

It really should be Trio 4 by now! For their previous four albums the threesome has added a pianist to the ranks, first Geri Allen, then Irene Schweizer, then Allen again, and lastly Jason Moran. Now on Wiring Vijay Iyer takes over the piano stool. You could argue that with their credentials saxophonist Oliver Lake (World Saxophone Quartet), bassist Reggie Workman (John Coltrane) and drummer Andrew Cyrille (Cecil Taylor) don't need assistance from anyone. But each guest subtly changes the ...

Live Review

Saskia Laroo Band at Cotton Club

by Phillip Woolever
November 18, 2014

Saskia Laroo Band Cotton Club Amsterdam, Netherlands October 18, 2014 Amsterdam's Saskia Laroo is one of the many hard working, far traveling players who make jazz, indeed, a global village. Laroo's afternoon gig at a venerable, center city pub took place during the Amsterdam Dance Event, a huge music mix focused on techno/dance gatherings that run past sunrise. For the approximately two hours Laroo's band played, Cotton Club was as crowded and cheerful ...

Film Review

Fred Hersch: My Coma Dreams

by Victor L. Schermer
November 18, 2014

My Coma Dreams Music composed by Fred Hersch Conceived, Written, and Directed by Herschel Garfein Palmetto Records 2014 If you were a composer, would you write a piece of music based on your experience of being unconscious for 40 days in a medically-induced coma? The answer is probably “No!" You'd want to forget the whole ordeal--unless you're a pioneering pianist and composer who is always expanding his reach and ...

Album Review

Black Milk Impulses: Manifesto

by John Eyles
November 17, 2014

Black Milk Impulses is a Berlin-based trio that describes itself as “a laboratory for improvised or roughly arranged electroacoustic jazz," a description which manages to incorporate a great deal into a short space, thus leaving the door open for many possibilities. The core members of the project are Australian pianist Leo Auri and Italian drummer Gianpaolo Camplese, who first met in 2009 and shortly afterwards formed the trio Wine for Breakfast. After forming Black Milk Impulses in 2011, they collaborated ...

Live Review

Belgrade Jazz Festival 2014

by Nenad Georgievski
November 17, 2014

Belgrade Jazz Festival 2014 Dom Omladine, Dom Sindikata Belgrade, Serbia October 24-27, 2014 When back in 2005, the Dom Omladine Beograda decided to revive the Belgrade Jazz Festival, which was abruptly discontinued due to happenings in the Balkan's region, the organization faced with two mounting tasks--in a very short time it had to create a festival that had to live up to the dizzying heights and reputation that the festival had in the past ...

Album Review

Assaf Kehati Trio: Naked

by Edward Blanco
November 17, 2014

A progressive jazz guitarist with a preference for the electric strings and a light touch, Assaf Kehati unveils his third album Naked since arriving from Israel in 2007 and establishing himself as a modern force to be reckoned with. Kehati offers an album of primarily original music conveying a story behind every piece beginning with the title track that refers to his feelings of being ..."emotionally naked-with no barriers, limits or mask," translating musically into a nine-minute slow burn. Accompanying ...

Album Review

Luca Ciarla: Violinair

Read "Violinair" reviewed by Duncan Heining

by Duncan Heining
November 17, 2014

"I would be interested to know what you think of my record." The reluctant reviewer takes the CD, heart sinking, thinking to themselves, “I very much doubt it." On this occasion, I am, however, grateful to Italian violinist, Luca Ciarla. He's certainly not without self-assurance but, fortunately, that confidence is well-matched by the genuine talent evident on Violinair. Given a line-up featuring such instruments as violin and accordion, comparisons with the likes of Richard Galliano, Astor Piazzolla and ...