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.

Interview

Hanna Paulsberg: Home Grown Concept

by Ian Patterson
October 29, 2014

Norwegian saxophonist Hanna Paulsberg is slowly but surely building a reputation as one of the brightest young jazz musicians to have emerged from Norway in recent years. Her debut at the head of the Hanna Paulsberg Concept, Waltz for Lilli (Ora Fonogram, 2012) introduced a composer/musician with strong melodic and rhythmic sensibilities and made a convincing case for the HPC as a quartet worthy of wider international attention. Paulsberg's quartet is arguably more inclined towards the American tradition ...

Album Review

Charles Lloyd: Manhattan Stories

Read "Manhattan Stories" reviewed by Hrayr Attarian

by Hrayr Attarian
October 29, 2014

Since 2008 the non-for-profit label Resonance has put out a number rare historic, previously unreleased, recordings. Saxophonist John Coltrane's 1966 Temple University concert Offering: Live at Temple University (Resonance, 2014) and pianists Tommy Flanagan and Jaki Byard's 1982 duet at Keystone Korner The Magic of 2 (Resonance, 2011) are a couple examples from this treasure trove. Similarly Manhattan Stories is saxophonist Charles Lloyd's two live dates from 1965 the first at Judson Hall and the second at Slugs' Saloon.

Live Review

Jost Project Performs at Jazz Near You House Concert

by Victor L. Schermer
October 28, 2014

The Jost Project Jazz Near You Inaugural House Concert Lansdale, PA October 24, 2014 All About Jazz Founder and Publisher Michael Ricci recently innovated a world-wide program to facilitate and co-create musical events in the intimate setting of people's homes where the householders serve as hosts, hiring musicians to provide a day or evening of performance. The program will utilize the resources of Jazz Near You--an offshoot of All About Jazz ...

Album Review

Jon Batiste/Chad Smith/Bill Laswell: The Process

Read "The Process" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
October 28, 2014

If anybody saw this coming, they must to be clairvoyant. The Process brings together drummer Chad Smith, the hard-hitting, groove-making force that drives the Red Hot Chili Peppers, pianist Jon Batiste, the oft-cheery personality who bridges the NOLA-New York divide with his crowd-pleasing, accessible brand of jazz, and bassist-producer Bill Laswell, a prolific, genre-blind force with a mile-long list of credits who's straddled and erased the divide between pan-African styles, dub, funk, jazz, various strains of rock, electronica, and avant-garde ...

Album Review

Emilio Solla Y La Inestable De Brooklyn: Second Half

Read "Second Half" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan

by Dan McClenaghan
October 28, 2014

Argentine-born pianist {Emilio Solla has moved around the globe a bit to find perfection in his art: studies in the National Conservatory of Music in Buenos Aires, then to New York for more immersion at the Aaron Copland School of Music, and a move to Barcelona, Spain, where he recorded the marvelous Suite Piazzollana (Fresh sound New Talent, 2001) with a mostly Spanish ten piece ensemble. Ten years after his move to Spain, Solla pulled up roots once more, to ...

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Album Review

Fini Bearman: Porgy And Bess

Read "Porgy And Bess" reviewed by Bruce Lindsay

by Bruce Lindsay
October 28, 2014

For her second album, singer and songwriter Fini Bearman moves away from the original songs of her debut, Step Up (Feenz Beenz Records, 2011). She chooses instead to delve into one of the best-known operas of the twentieth century--George Gershwin's Porgy And Bess. It's a work that has inspired some major jazz performers, including vocal greats like Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holiday. Tough acts to follow, but these interpretations hold their own particular magic. The London-based Bearman makes ...

Live Review

Craig Taborn Trio at Gent Jazz Club

by John Sharpe
October 28, 2014

Craig Taborn Trio Belfort Café Gent, Belgium October 13, 2014 For some an enforced line up change mid tour might have spelled disaster. But pianist Craig Taborn's trio rode their fortune and delivered a, likely adrenaline-fuelled, wonderful performance. When drummer Gerald Cleaver, Taborn's most longstanding accomplice, pulled out for medical reasons, the pianist called up reinforcement in the shape of hometown stickman JT Bates. He flew in from Minneapolis, arriving just half ...

Album Review

Steve Lacy: Cycles (1976 – 1980)

Read "Cycles (1976 – 1980)" reviewed by John Eyles

by John Eyles
October 28, 2014

The autumn 2014 releases from Emanem brought a double dose of good news for admirers of the late, great soprano saxophonist Steve Lacy. Firstly, the label's excellent 2011 reissue of the classic School Days album is available again, now that wrangles over some of its content have been amicably resolved. Secondly, and remarkably, this twenty-track double CD set, Cycles contains fifteen previously unissued tracks of solo Lacy in peak form, recorded between 1976 and 1980--a total of some 111 minutes ...

Live Review

Ann Hampton Callaway at Dizzy's Club Coca-Cola

by Ernest Barteldes
October 28, 2014

Ann Hampton Callaway Dizzy's Club Coca-Cola October 23, 2014 New York, NY On the CD release event for her album Sarah Vaughan Project (Shanachie, 2014)--captured live at this very venue--Ann Hampton Callaway kicked off the set with a very up-tempo take on “I'm Gonna Live Till I Die" that swung hard, setting the tone for the evening. She then talked a little about what the show and album were about--honoring “the divine" ...

Album Review

Anthony Pirog: Palo Colorado Dream

Read "Palo Colorado Dream" reviewed by Jeffrey Uhrich

by Jeffrey Uhrich
October 28, 2014

Guitarist Anthony Pirog fearlessly pushes boundaries with his provocative debut album, Palo Colorado Dream. Pirog's unabashed and inventive use of effects and loops, in combination with his dazzling knowledge of the various sounds his guitar is capable of creating, draws the listener into his own unique and expressive musical world. Palo Colorado Dream is not for the faint of heart. Pirog can quickly move from a seductive and tranquil atmosphere of chime-like echoes to the sonic bombast of a finely ...