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

Jamie Reynolds Trio: Time With People

Read "Time With People" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
June 25, 2012

Pianist Jamie Reynolds completed his studies at the University of Toronto in 2004, but his work was hardly done at that point. Reynolds headed to New York a year later and, thanks to a grant from the Canada Council for the Arts, began studying with pianist Fred Hersch. A second grant afforded him the opportunity to study with Craig Taborn in 2007, giving him the chance to learn from another modern day master, but Reynolds' playing doesn't really bear the ...

Book Excerpts

The Jazz Standards: A Guide to the Repertoire

by Ted Gioia
June 25, 2012

This article appears in the prologue of The Jazz Standards A Guide to the Repertoire by Ted Gioia (Oxford Univ. Press, 2012).Introduction When I was learning how to play jazz during my teenage years, I kept encountering songs that the older musicians expected me to know. I eventually realized that there were around 200 or 300 of these compositions, and that they served as the cornerstone of the jazz repertoire. A jazz performer needed to learn ...

Extended Analysis

Wadada Leo Smith: Ten Freedom Summers

by Mark Redlefsen
June 25, 2012

Wadada Leo SmithTen Freedom SummersCuneiform Records2012Jazz music and the Civil Rights Movement in America have moved on parallel tracks from the 20th century up until the present. Freedom Suite (Riverside, 1958) by saxophonist Sonny Rollins, We Insist! Max Roach's Freedom Now Suite (Candid, 1960) by drummer Max Roach and also Attica Blues (Implulse, 1972) by saxophonist Archie Shepp are all strong statements that still retain their vital relevance and serve as period ...

Album Review

Ravi Coltrane: Spirit Fiction

Read "Spirit Fiction" reviewed by Greg Simmons

by Greg Simmons
June 25, 2012

It's easy to imagine the double-takes that must have occurred when introductions were being made around New York in the early 1990s. “What'd you say your last name is, son?" Let's face it, if you're walking around with the name of a God, your last name is Coltrane and your first name is not John, and you're going to play the tenor saxophone, same as your old man, people are going to want to know what that's all about.

Album Review

Curtis Fuller: Down Home

Read "Down Home" reviewed by Edward Blanco

by Edward Blanco
June 25, 2012

Legendary trombonist Curtis Fuller was 22 years old when he played on John Coltrane's landmark Blue Train (Blue Note, 1957), and the saxophonist remained best friends with Fuller during the 1950s and '60s. In 2005, the trombonist met saxophonist Keith Oxman, and has since developed a friendship leading to Fuller's favorable comparison of his new friend to Coltrane. For the past seven years, Fuller has been performing and recording with a sextet of players he now calls his “band of ...

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Album Review

Eple Trio: In the Clearing / In the Cavern

Read "In the Clearing / In the Cavern" reviewed by John Kelman

by John Kelman
June 25, 2012

With all the controversy over what jazz is--and, more to the point, what it isn't--proprietary ownership often seems more about seemingly insurmountable cultural concerns. It's difficult for those living in the relative hustle and bustle of North American cities to appreciate a different pace, a different vibe--the effect, for example, of winters where daylight diminishes to a few short hours in the south of a country, to the far north, where polar winter imposes darkness for upwards of four months. ...

Interview

Christian McBride: Knocking on the Door

by Bob Kenselaar
June 25, 2012

Christian McBride was talking about the Grammy he received in October, 2011 for his big band album, The Good Feeling (Mack Avenue, 2011)--his first Grammy as a leader and third overall. While the bassist certainly appreciated getting the nod from his peers and from the Recording Academy, he said he gets just as much of a reward--if not more of one--when he gets calls from musicians he admires asking him to work with them because they like what he does. ...

Behind the Lens With...

Behind the Lens With Bill Douthart

by Bill Douthart
June 25, 2012

Meet Bill Douthart: I am a New York-based photographer who shoots for many publications including Downbeat, Fader, Rolling Stone and the New York Times. I am a graduate of the University of North Texas, where I received a degree in Photojournalism. My work has been exhibited in US and Europe. Gear: The main camera I use is a Rollei 6008 AF with a 110 f/2.0 lens. I like the look of medium format film. ...

Album Review

Federico Ughi: Songs For Four Cities

Read "Songs For Four Cities" reviewed by Florence Wetzel

by Florence Wetzel
June 24, 2012

Drummer Federico Ughi's Songs for Four Cities is a poetic meditation on inner and outer geography that's filled with deliciously lyrical tunes. Ughi lived in Italy until age 21, and then spent almost a decade in London before moving to his current home in New York City in 2000. The eight compositions on the CD explore these cities as well as Montreal, Canada, offering highly personal statements that form a sonic autobiography, a personal map of both disquiet and contentment ...

Extended Analysis

Tedeschi Trucks Band: Live - Everybody's Talkin'

by Doug Collette
June 24, 2012

Tedeschi Trucks Band Live: Everybody's Talkin' Sony Masterworks 2012 Back in 2009, vocalist/guitarist Susan Tedeschi and guitarist Derek Trucks formed a band they dubbed Soul Stew Revival, devoted almost exclusively to vintage r&b material. The presence of cover material on Live Everybody's Talkin' hearkens to that side project which, in the interim, has become a full-time endeavor for its principals and an even greater labor of love. The title track, in fact, suggests ...