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

Erik Norlander - The Galactic Collective: Live in Gettysburg

Read "Live in Gettysburg" reviewed by Glenn Astarita

by Glenn Astarita
July 21, 2012

Moog synthesizer engineer and performer Erik Norlander continues his plight, melding classic '70s progressive rock stylizations via the wholesome sounds emanating from his arsenal of analog synths and keys. With concurrent DVD/2CD releases including the studio set The Galactic Collective: Definitive Edition (Gonzo Multimedia, 2012), the artist's live experience transfers to disc in luminous splendor on Live in Gettysburg. Sheened by immaculate audio engineering processes, the program boasts a crisp and impacting soundstage, as Norlander elevates the ...

Live Review

Ximena Sariñana: New York, NY, July 11, 2012

by Ernest Barteldes
July 21, 2012

Ximena Sariñana + The Sconekt Ensemble Latin Alternative Music Conference at Central Park Summerstage New York, NYJuly 11, 2012On the first night of the 2012 Latin Alternative Music Conference, Mexico-based Skonect Ensemble took the stage with its clever musical blend of Latin, rock and classical music. The quartet--electric violin, electric viola, electric cello and percussion--performed personal arrangements of songs by bands like System of a Down and Argentina's Los Fabulosos Cadillacs, which brought to mind ...

Future Jazz

Booking Jazz: A Subjective Guide

by Bruce Klauber
July 21, 2012

There is no rule book, reference work or formal set of regulations that club and restaurant owners can consult about how to book and present jazz.There was a quasi-model of sorts in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s, given the proliferation of cafés, boites, bistros, bars, ballrooms, and all types of nightspots that used live jazz, whether local or national. Whatever the template was back then, if there even was one, it no longer applies.However, a rather ...

Album Review

David Bowie: The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars (40th Anniversary Remaster)

Read "The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars (40th Anniversary Remaster)" reviewed by Nenad Georgievski

by Nenad Georgievski
July 21, 2012

Only a handful of musicians have embraced the countless changes of style, character and musical directions that singer David Bowie has. In a career that spans over four decades, he managed to retain the essential ingredients that have made him what he is today: a legend. No wonder he is seen as part of the Holy Trinity with The Beatles and the Rolling Stones. Despite his vast influence and perennial popularity, Bowie still remains one of the most elusive figures ...

Album Review

Tom Teasley: All The World's A Stage

Read "All The World's A Stage" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
July 20, 2012

Percussion is often treated as rhythmic garnish but, in the right hands, it can be the meal itself. Light spices, meaty grooves and flavorful accents can provide more than enough sustenance for the ear if they're blended in the right proportions and percussionist Tom Teasley proves that this hypothesis holds water on this, his eighth recording. All The World's A Stage is an overdubbed discourse on the art of tearing down cultural boundaries in the world of ...

Album Review

Denny Zeitlin: Wherever You Are--Midnight Moods for Solo Piano

Read "Wherever You Are--Midnight Moods for Solo Piano" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan

by Dan McClenaghan
July 20, 2012

There's something magnificent about a top-level artist alone with a piano, immersed in a mood of quiet nights, under quiet stars. Denny Zeitlin, a versatile music maker who wrote the electro-acoustic symphonic soundtrack for the 1978 remake of the science fiction classic Invasion of the Body Snatchers, has released a handful of excellent trio albums on the MaxJazz and Sunnyside labels, but since 2010, has concentrated on solo perforomances.Precipice (Sunnyside Records, 2010) and Labyrinth (Sunnyside Records, 2011) are ...

Multiple Reviews

Van Dyke Parks: First three solo albums reissued

by John Eyles
July 20, 2012

Songwriter, singer and pianist Van Dyke Parks has so many claims to fame that together they would form the basis of an excellent “true or false" quiz. Consider the following: as a child actor, he appeared with such legendary figures as Lillian Gish, Grace Kelly and Alec Guinness; his first arranging job was “The Bare Necessities" for the Disney film Jungle Book; he wrote the lyrics for The Beach Boys' infamous masterpiece SMiLE, recorded 1966-67; he produced the debut albums ...

Album Review

Kenneth Dahl Knudsen: Clockstopper

Read "Clockstopper" reviewed by Edward Blanco

by Edward Blanco
July 20, 2012

Not much is known about Danish bassist Kenneth Dahl Knudsen, even his own website reveals little about his personal story, only that he has won several awards, including being voted “Jazz musician of 2010 in northern Denmark," has been fortunate to have performed the music he loves for most of his life and claims inspiration from the music of John Coltrane and Igor Stravinsky. Delivering his second album as leader on Clockstopper, Knudsen leads a core quintet of international players, ...

Extended Analysis

Steve Smith and Vital Information: Live! One Great Night

by Jeff Winbush
July 20, 2012

Steve Smith and Vital InformationLive! One Great NightBFM2012Even now, the two questions probably most asked of Steve Smith go something like, “Hey, are you the Steve Smith who played drums in Journey?" and “What's Steve Perry like?"This is clearly unfair to Smith, who spent ten years in Journey but 30 years in his own band, Vital Information, and One Great Night is a live CD/DVD celebration of its high energy, ...

Bailey's Bundles

Marc Copland in Love

by C. Michael Bailey
July 20, 2012

Pianist Marc Copland has previously released popular and well-received trio recordings in series, most recently New York Trio Recordings Vol. 1: Modinha (Pirouet, 2006), New York Trio Recordings Vol. 2: Voices (Pirouet, 2008) and New York Trio Recordings Vol. 3: Night Whispers (Pirouet, 2009). But he has an ensemble association with bassist Drew Gress and drummer Jochen Rueckert that has produced another impressive trio of recordings since the new millennium, if creative assembly is allowed for. The ...