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

Portnoy - Sheehan - Macalpine - Sherinian: Live In Tokyo

Read "Live In Tokyo" reviewed by Glenn Astarita

by Glenn Astarita
February 15, 2014

This 2-CD set highlights the progressive rock super-group's performance at a Tokyo venue in 2012. The material is culled from the respective artists' songbooks, yet their prior collaborations in various ensembles also signify a nucleus for modern prog-rock fare. As one would anticipate, sparks are flying all over the place via a high-velocity and impacting program in front of a very receptive audience. It is chock full of blitzing time signatures amid soaring and uncompromising solo spots by all. The ...

Album Review

Scott Jeppesen: El Guapo

by Carlo Wolff
February 14, 2014

"Guapo" is Spanish for “sharp-dressed man" (or woman), and the title--and launch--track of Scott Jeppesen's exceptional solo debut sure conjures such an image. El Guapo is stylish, diverse and expert; released on Oct. 1, 2013, it is one of the best albums of that year. Jeppesen is a protean saxophonist who also plays bass clarinet. A restless, inventive player, he delivers eight memorable originals, a resonant, intimate version of Richie Beirach's “Elm" and an effervescent take of Cole ...

Multiple Reviews

The Founder Effect Signals That Treader Is Alive And Well!

by John Eyles
February 14, 2014

The Treader label released its first CDs in late 2004. The label's distinctive Frauke Stegmann-designed sleeves, featuring embossed gold pictures of animals on plain backgrounds, made them instantly recognisable and collectable design classics. Rather than singly, the label always put out releases in series of three, the animals of each series sometimes being connected--mammals or birds, for instance. The music was made by a close-knit group of musicians centred around the label's proprietors and producers, Ashley Wales and John Coxon ...

Album Review

Lajos Dudas: Live At Salzburger Jazzherbst

Read "Live At Salzburger Jazzherbst" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
February 14, 2014

Hungarian clarinetist Lajos Dudas seems to continually find inspiration through altered states of musical companionship. In a three year span, Dudas released four vastly different records that mark him as a bolder-than-the-norm reed man with an unquenchable thirst for something different: He played one-on-one with pianist Hubert Bergmann on What's Up Neighbor (JazzSick, 2011), delivered a wide-ranging, decades-spanning career retrospective in the same year, worked with guitar, bass and drums on Jazz And The City (JazzSick, 2012), and explored trio ...

Extended Analysis

Le Tricycle: Le Tricycle

by Phil Barnes
February 14, 2014

Like Matthew Halsall and the UK's Gondwana records, Momentanea from Strasbourg across La Manche are developing the bop template of the 1960s for a new younger audience. Whereas Halsall primarily looks to the spiritual jazz of that period, the core trio of Le Tricycle builds on the bop fundamentals from the eclectic musical palettes of its three core contributors. In jazz terms Le Tricycle are young musicians who bring an enjoyable collective ethos, verve and brio to the ...

Album Review

Beat Kaestli: Collage

Read "Collage" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey

by C. Michael Bailey
February 14, 2014

Swiss singer/composer/producer Beat Kaestli has four recordings as a leader since 2002. All are intelligently focused. Reasons (B&B Productions, 2002), Happy, Sad, and Satisfied (B&B Productions, 2005), Far from Home: A Tribute of European Song (B&B Productions, 2009) and Invitation (Chesky, 2010). Far From Home and Invitation are the most sharply focused, the former addressing European song and the later, the American Songbook. Kaestli possesses a sublimely sweet voice, one that Chet Baker would have coveted. But that is old ...

Album Review

Ran Blake: Plays Solo Piano

Read "Plays Solo Piano" reviewed by Mark Corroto

by Mark Corroto
February 14, 2014

ESP Disk's 50th anniversary reissue series continues to unearth valuable documents from the history of cutting edge music. Back in the 1960s, when jazz was becoming marginalized as popular music and disenfranchised by the rise of rock-and-roll, ESP chose to eliminate musical classifications that pigeonholed creative music. The label released music by Albert Ayler and Gato Barbieri at the same time it was producing The Fugs and Pearls Before Swine. This re-release of pianist Ran Blake's Plays Solo ...

Album Review

Ståhls Trio: Jag Skulle Bara Gå Ut

Read "Jag Skulle Bara Gå Ut" reviewed by Eyal Hareuveni

by Eyal Hareuveni
February 14, 2014

Swedish vibes player Mattias Ståhl is the prominent Scandinavian mallet explorer in recent years. He is a wise composer and articulate improviser, well versed in jazz history on both sides of the Atlantic with a distinct melodic and rhythmic approach and sound. The sounds of Ståhl's vibes are integral to some of the most exciting bands in Sweden and Norway, like those of reed player Martin Küchen, Eirik Hegdal's Team Hegdal, pianist Cecilia Persson and Trondheim Jazz Orchestra. ...

Album Review

Tom Wopat: I've Got Your Number

Read "I've Got Your Number" reviewed by Dr. Judith Schlesinger

by Dr. Judith Schlesinger
February 14, 2014

In recent years, there's been a cottage industry of celebrities from rock, pop, country and television who wander into the American Songbook in the sunset of their careers and try to put out “jazz" albums. This CD is a welcome exception. While Tom Wopat may be best-loved for playing “Luke Duke" on the Dukes of Hazzard TV show (1979 to 1985), he has serious country music bona fides as well as two Tony nominations for his Broadway efforts. For those ...

Interview

Cava Menzies and Nick Phillips: Their Moment

by Bob Kenselaar
February 13, 2014

Every once in a while, a couple of jazz musicians who've never played with each other before find themselves together on a bandstand, and something special really clicks. They just jell musically as if they've been playing together all their lives. Pianist Cava Menzies and trumpeter Nick Phillips experienced such an encounter not long ago, when Phillips got a call to sub on a regular local gig that Menzies had in Berkley, California. “From that gig, Nick and ...