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.

Live Review

Wayne Shorter Quartet at Philharmonie Essen

by Phillip Woolever
November 22, 2013

Wayne Shorter Quartet Philharmonie Essen Essen, Germany November 8, 2013 Whatever waning stage of his career Wayne Shorter may occupy these days, a concert by his quartet remains one of jazz's premier performance attractions. It would be a stretch to say the senior statesman Shorter is playing better than ever or even equal to earlier eras, but at 80 years old, he is still consistently capable of brilliance. Maybe that's what makes his ...

Album Review

Dafne Vicente-Sandoval & Klaus Filip: Remoto

by Mark Corroto
November 22, 2013

What are the expectations minimalist musical artists have for their audience? The live experience aside, what presumptions are set forth for the listening experience of a consumer of a CD? Will the listener's happening be on a bus (via headphones) or in a sterile sound room? And what part will background noise and visual distraction play? A recording like Remoto by Klaus Filip (sinewaves) and bassoonist Dafne Vicente-Sandoval elicits such questions. Their minimalist improvisations presented in two tracks ...

Live Review

Sergio Mendes with Eliane Elias at New Jersey Performing Arts Center

by Ernest Barteldes
November 22, 2013

Jazz Meets Samba Sergio Mendes with Eliane Elias, Lee Ritenour and Joe Lovano New Jersey Performing Arts Center Newark, New Jersey November 8, 2013 On a double-billed evening dedicated to the music of Brazil, pianist Eliane Elias kicked off the first set with an up-tempo take on Antonio Carlos Jobim's “Só Danço Samba" backed by her touring band, which was rounded out by Marc Johnson (bass), Mauricio Zottarelli (drums) and ...

Album Review

Billie Davies: 12 Volt

Read "12 Volt" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey

by C. Michael Bailey
November 22, 2013

Drummer Billie Davies' previous recording, All About Love (Self Produced, 2012) was novel and compelling, a trombone trio with the drummer lead. Davies assembled original and standard works, achieving both educational and artistic endpoints. The present recording, 12 Volt, retains the trio format, substituting the guitar for the trombone and pushes the trio envelope out with a moody collection of eight originals, when considered together comprise an avant-garde suite possibly conceived by Grant Green and John Coltrane. ...

Album Review

Stefan Aeby Trio: Utopia

by Anthony Shaw
November 22, 2013

Despite its ambitious, other-worldly title, this album by the young Swiss piano trio is a very grounded product, highlighting the compositional skills of its leader Stefan Aeby. On this his second album with the trio, Aeby continues his relaxed, sometimes lugubrious style of tune, making for a selection of tracks that meander along well trodden routes but also can bring the listener up short. “Bruine," the sixth track, epitomises this with a languorous fade out that tempts ...

Album Review

Phil Woods & the Festival Orchestra: New Celebration

Read "New Celebration" reviewed by Jack Bowers

by Jack Bowers
November 21, 2013

Any album with the renowned Phil Woods leading a big band (or jazz orchestra) is cause for celebration, especially so when he has written all but one of the charts and takes the bulk of the alto solos. More than fifteen years have passed since Woods last recorded with the COTA Festival Orchestra from his home precinct in Delaware Gap, PA, and that earlier album (Celebration!, Concord 4770) was nominated for a Grammy Award. This New Celebration, Woods' second recording ...

Profile

Iva Bittova: Knowing, Feeling...

by Ian Patterson
November 21, 2013

[Note: This article was first published in Music & Literature, a North American magazine dedicated to promoting artists worthy of wider attention] Iva Bittová is a rare talent. She has developed a personal idiom and vocabulary that is almost entirely her own. Her sound, her very personal language, forged from the union of violin and voice, cannot be categorized yet is immediately recognizable. Bittová is, quite simply, inimitable. Though she is not the first artist ...

Album Review

Kallio Slaaki: Polymania for percussion

Read "Polymania for percussion" reviewed by Anthony Shaw

by Anthony Shaw
November 21, 2013

As its name suggests,this album is aimed at an audience familiar with gamelan and tuned percussion, as opposed to the year's other drum trio release by Zach Hill, Janet Weiss and Matt Cameron, a 40 minute rolling improvisation. Here each piece is highly scripted by leader Mika Kallio, and mainly follows lines he lays down on his numerous tuned gongs. Not that unimpeded and even raucous jamming play no part, but it is small compared to the ...

Extended Analysis

The Whammies: Play The Music Of Steve Lacy

by John Ephland
November 21, 2013

It's a Lacy sandwich. Sort of. Between the opening and closing slices of “Bone" and Monk's “Locomotive," we get to hear some real free-range chicken, so to speak, said tunes played relatively straight, with clearly recognizable heads and a unity swing. (Throw them into the lunch bucket, too.) And, except for the lurching closer “Locomotive," the remaining seven Steve Lacy cuts have dedications, the bouncy “Bone" going to Lester Young. Selected cuts are part of something larger, based on poems ...

Album Review

Resurgence: Duende

Read "Duende" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey

by C. Michael Bailey
November 21, 2013

Australian pianist Mark Isaacs has hit a long stride with his band Resurgence, releasing the band's fourth recording Duende. His three previous recordings with Resurgence: Resurgence (ABC Jazz, 2007), Tell It Like It Is (ABC Jazz, 2010), and Aurora Aurora (Gracemusic, 2011) have progressively probed the edges of contemporary jazz, filling out the sound that one might consider “contemporary mainstream jazz." While lyrically and harmonically progressive, Isaac's music is immediately accessible. This is what separates it from a good deal ...