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

Lyn Stanley: Lost In Romance

Read "Lost In Romance" reviewed by Nicholas F. Mondello

by Nicholas F. Mondello
September 9, 2013

A hardened cynic might presume that the song royalty beneficiaries of the estates of Irving Berlin, Johnny Mercer, Harold Arlen, George and Ira Gershwin and other song giants would mercenarily welcome yet another Great American Songbook-rich recording by a female vocalist. However, when those warhorse ("wornhorse?") compositions--and a few shrewdly selected other ones--are sent up tails-and-gowns stylish as they are in this auspicious debut recording, our cynical friend would be somewhat inaccurate in that presumption.With Lost in Romance, ...

Interview

Kerry Politzer: Voice And Voicings

by George Colligan
September 9, 2013

The following interview is reprinted from George Colligan's blog, Jazztruth. Kerry Politzer is one of my favorite musicians, period. (Yeah, she's my wife, you gotta problem wit dat? No, I see the potential conflict of interest, but hey, it's all about who you know, right?) Seriously, Politzer is one of the most underrated musicians around. She has five amazing CDs to her name. She is a truly gifted jazz pianist and composer; however, a few years ...

What is Jazz?

Improvising Art: From Jam Bands to Jazz

by Jacob Hobson
September 9, 2013

The author Kurt Vonnegut once said, “Practicing an art, no matter how well or badly, is a way to make your soul grow." The art of improvisation does just that: it makes the soul grow. The soul of the improvising performer is constantly stretched and twisted in search of that unnamed spiritual experience in which lasting art is created in one passing moment. Improvisation allows a musician to take the risk and venture into dark waters in the hopes of ...

Album Review

Matt Mitchell: Fiction

by Mark Corroto
September 8, 2013

Pianist Matt Mitchell's debut solo recording, Fiction, is actually a duo recording. And while it is a performance of fifteen compositions, the music was originally conceived of as etudes, or short pieces--exercises to improve the pianist's ability to incorporate improvisation into composed music.Mitchell is quite the in-demand sideman. He can be heard in Tim Berne's Snakeoil, Dave Douglas' Quintet, Darius Jones' Quartet, John Hollenbeck's Claudia Quintet, and in the bands of Michael Attias and Rudresh Mahanthappa.This ...

Live Review

The Black Crowes at Lake Champlain Maritime Festival

by Doug Collette
September 8, 2013

The Black CrowesWaterfront ParkLake Champlain Maritime FestivalBurlington, VermontAugust 17, 2013Was the Black Crowes show August 17th Waterfront Park one of the best shows in Burlington's history? Perhaps, perhaps not, but there's no denying the band executed a dynamic set with a confidence and expertise that wholly belies its volatile history, not to mention their on-again, off-again activities of the last decade.All too often a victim of self-imposed stunted growth during their ...

Live Review

Brubeck Brothers Quartet: at Filoli Estate

by Bill Leikam
September 8, 2013

Brubeck Brothers QuartetFiloli EstateWoodside, CaliforniaAugust 23, 2013Six hundred fifty people streamed onto what had years before been a tennis court converted into an outdoor concert setting at the early 20th Century Filoli Estate, just south of San Francisco, California. Add to that the 50 volunteers and there were 700 people listening to the final, sold-out jazz concert of the season to hear the Brubeck Brothers Quartet. Accompanying the Brubeck brothers--Chris Brubeck on electric bass and ...

Album Review

Griffith Hiltz Trio: This Is What You Get...

Read "This Is What You Get..." reviewed by Dan McClenaghan

by Dan McClenaghan
September 8, 2013

Canada's Griffith Hiltz Trio opens its second album, This Is What You Get..., with “Strawman," which sounds like a cross between a theme song for a Secret Agent Man movie and crunchy guitar-style, 1960s-era surf rock, featuring saxophonist Johnny Griffith's crisp melody lines and drummer Sly Juhas' shuffling rhythm. Then guitarist Nathan Hiltz twangs toward an atmosphere of the movie Deliverance (1972) by plunking into a back country banjo groove. Strong sounds to open a strong recording.“The Kuleshascope" ...

Album Review

Kayhan Kalhor / Erdal Erzincan: Kula Kulluk Yakisir Mi

Read "Kula Kulluk Yakisir Mi" reviewed by John Kelman

by John Kelman
September 8, 2013

When Kayhan Kalhor and Erdal Erzincan released The Wind (ECM, 2004), it was often shockingly beautiful evidence that jazz doesn't own the concept of improvisation--already a millennial concept when jazz first emerged in recognizable form at the turn of the 20th century. There are academics who now assert that “America's classical music" actually dates farther back, its roots easily found in older cultures. Does that mean, then, that the music played by Kalhor--Iranian-born child prodigy and virtuoso of the kamencheh ...

Live Review

Andy Bell and Howard Jones at the Paramount

by Mike Perciaccante
September 8, 2013

Andy Bell and Howard Jones The Regeneration Tour The Paramount Huntington, NY August 21, 2013 On a pleasant August evening, the Regeneration Tour touched down in Huntington, New York and turned back the hands of time to the mid to late '80s and early '90s. Andy Bell (of the hit-making modern rock outfit Erasure) and Howard Jones treated the multi-generational crowd to an evening of dancing and singing along to hits that left ...

Album Review

Linda Oh: Sun Pictures

Read "Sun Pictures" reviewed by Hrayr Attarian

by Hrayr Attarian
September 8, 2013

Linda Oh arrived onto the jazz scene as a fully accomplished improviser with her introspective and free-flowing debut, Entry (Self Produced, 2010). On the follow-up, Initial Here(Greenleaf, 2012), she expanded her range, drawing upon both the western classical repertoire and eastern folk tradition, as well as experimenting with electric fusion-informed sounds. Oh's understated yet highly sophisticated style is the phenomenal bassist's singular mark that characterizes these records, as well as her third release as a leader on Sun Pictures.