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.

Extended Analysis

Daniel Szabo: A Song From There

by Dan Bilawsky
February 8, 2014

Some musicians are late bloomers. Others start while most people their age are occupied with finger painting and play-doh; Daniel Szabo belongs to the latter category. The Hungarian-born, Los Angeles-based pianist was playing and composing at the age of four, but that's not so surprising since he grew up in a house with two musician- parents. Szabo had already taken top honors in several international piano competitions by the time he earned his B.A. from the Franz ...

Album Review

Luís Lopes: Noise Solo At ZDB Lisbon

Read "Noise Solo At ZDB Lisbon" reviewed by Mark Corroto

by Mark Corroto
February 8, 2014

If the feedback and heavy distortion segments of Jimi Hendrix's performance of “The Star Spangled Banner" at Woodstock 1969 were your favorite parts, you might be a noise connoisseur. The art of noise first described by the Italian futurists blossomed in the 1960s and was drawn heavily upon for the DIY and punk revolutions of the 1980s. Today, noise operates as its own separate genre but it is drawn upon by jazz musicians from the Brotzmanns (Peter and Caspar) to ...

Album Review

Big Head Todd and the Monsters: Black Beehive

Read "Black Beehive" reviewed by Doug Collette

by Doug Collette
February 8, 2014

Big Head Todd & The Monsters have maintained a solid and occasionally high profile since their formation in 1986. Regular studio and road work has produced a fairly extensive discography of albums and DVD's as well as authorized concert recordings, including their previous project under the pseudonym Big Head Blues Club, 100 Years of Robert Johnson, the flavor and style of which tribute to the seminal bluesman Robert Johnson carries over to Black Beehive. Produced by Steve Jordan, ...

Album Review

Jeremy Pelt: Face Forward, Jeremy

Read "Face Forward, Jeremy" reviewed by Glenn Astarita

by Glenn Astarita
February 8, 2014

Venerable trumpeter Jeremy Pelt takes another step out of the modern jazz schema, expanding upon Water and Earth (HighNote Records, 2013) with his young band by forging an acoustic- electric jazz wonderland, swarming with colorful fabrications and capacious sonic environs. Featuring works abetted with strings, electronics, vocals and free-flight jazz-based improvisations, the program is heightened by Pelt's sparkling bop lines occasionally treated with echo and reverb processes. Moreover, the ensemble projects great depth, complemented by prudent implementations of electronics along ...

Album Review

simakDialog: The 6th Story

Read "The 6th Story" reviewed by Ian Patterson

by Ian Patterson
February 8, 2014

The title, simple yet enigmatic, hints at the epic tale that is SimakDialog--the Indonesian prog-jazz band formed by keyboard player Riza Arshad in 1993. The band's international debut Patahan (MoonJune Records, 2007) served as a global calling card, with critics referencing jazz-fusion influences such as trumpeter Miles Davis, keyboardists Chick Corea and Joe Zawinul, The Pat Metheny Group et al. The foundation of the music, however, has always been the hypnotic Sundanese gamelan rhythms and this meeting between ritual/folkloric grooves ...

Book Review

David Sylvian: On the Periphery (The Solo Years)

by Nenad Georgievski
February 8, 2014

David Sylvian: On the Periphery (The Solo Years) Christopher E. Young 372 ISBN: 978-0-9927228-0-7 Malin Publishing Ltd 2013 With his songs of spiritual and emotional quest, and unspeakable yearning, singer and composer David Sylvian really occupies his own musical cosmos. Often viewed as the quiet man of popular music who through hushed stillness and subtle, delicate and sometimes disturbing sounds, has created a body of work which provided an important bridge between ...

Bailey's Bundles

Jazz Quanta: February

by C. Michael Bailey
February 7, 2014

February's Jazz Quanta is a beautifully mixed bag of blues, jazz instrumental and classical. There is never a dull moment. Renee' and the Walkaways--The Walkaway Sessions (Self Produced, 2013). Vocalist Renee' Cheek heads up the piquant gumbo talent of her very own band, the Walkaways. The Walkaway Sessions is a Louisiana grassroots affair produced by David Hyde, who also provides bass playing. The music is a rich roux drawing equally from the blues, country, zydeco, Tex-Mex and ...

Album Review

John Brown: Quiet Time

Read "Quiet Time" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey

by C. Michael Bailey
February 7, 2014

Bassist and bandleader John Brown was last heard backing Nneena Freelon on her Christmas (Brown Boulevard Records, 2013) release leading one of his decidedly larger ensembles. Quiet Time finds the bassist pared down to a classic trumpet-saxophone quintet size for a recital of after-hours tunes. Brown's fronting horns are trumpeter Ray Codrington and saxophonist Brian Miller. The disc is opened with a Miller spotlight, “Come Live With Me," presented haltedly reminiscent of the classic Saturday Night Live closing theme “ ...

Album Review

Jeremy Steig: Flute Fever

Read "Flute Fever" reviewed by Carlo Wolff

by Carlo Wolff
February 7, 2014

Jeremy Steig's astonishing, trailblazing debut finally gets its compact disk due, 50 years after Columbia released it on vinyl. It was also the debut of Denny Zeitlin, a Bay Area psychiatrist whose singularly imaginative jazz moonlighting has resulted in numerous fearless disks over the past five decades. Backed by veterans Ben Riley on drums and Ben Tucker on bass, the fervent Steig and the marginally less impulsive, if no less creative, Zeitlin alternate standards with classics- to-be by Thelonious Monk, ...

Live Review

Maria Rita at City Winery

by Ernest Barteldes
February 7, 2014

Maria Rita City Winery New York, NY February 2, 2014 During the first decade of her career, Brazilian singer Maria Rita stayed away from the catalogue of her late mother, the legendary Elis Regina, who died prematurely in 1982 at 36 years of age. When the 30-year anniversary of Regina's passing came along, she finally agreed to take on some of the music and give it her interpretation for Viva Elis, a ...