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.

262

Extended Analysis

Blue Touch Paper: Stand Well Back

by John Kelman
November 4, 2011

Blue Paper Touch Stand Well Back Provocateur Records 2011 Based on his recent work, creating impressive big band tribute projects including Visions of Miles--The Electric Period of Miles Davis (In+Out, 2009) and John Lennon--In My Own Write (Provocateur, 2011), it might be understandable to think of Colin Towns as an arranger and bandleader rather than a composer and performer. But arranging, at least the way Towns does it, is really composition; the only difference ...

171

Album Review

Michael Pedicin: Ballads...Searching For Peace

Read "Ballads...Searching For Peace" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
November 4, 2011

Ballads are often consumed as one of many items on a musical tasting menu, but they can also serve as a satisfying meal on their own, when prepared by the right chef. On Ballads...Searching For Peace, tenor saxophonist Michael Pedicin serves up seven satisfying songs from the softer side of jazz, while also paying tribute to some tenors of note. John Coltrane's Ballads (Impulse!, 1963) was the inspiration behind this album, but the dearly departed icon is ...

138

Live Review

Ignasi Terraza Trio: Bangkok, October 12, 2011

by Ian Patterson
November 4, 2011

Ignasi Terazza TrioThe Living Room,BangkokOctober 12, 2011 Pianist/composer Ignasi Terraza knows what he likes and is not to be swayed by the dictates of fashion; so it was that this refined yet exciting pianist--supported by double bassist Pierre Boussaguet and drummer Esteve Pi--treated the Living Room to a high-class exhibition of swing and bop-infused virtuosity, honed from nearly thirty years immersed in the jazz tradition. It was also a return to the venue where ...

294

Contributor News

Rubber Meets the Road

by Michael Ricci
November 4, 2011

Dear fellow contributor, We made several refinements and additions to the website in October and we are looking for your feedback and assistance moving forward. Please read on...Index 1. Expansion Plans--We Need Your Help 2. Welcome Aboard!3. CD Reviews Wanted4. Books to Review5. Contributor-related Improvements6. Archiving Older Interviews and Columns7. Feedback wanted: How are we doing? 1. Expansion ...

174

Album Review

Erik Soderlind: Happening

Read "Happening" reviewed by Chris Mosey

by Chris Mosey
November 4, 2011

The sounds on Happening hark back nearly two decades before its creator, Swedish guitarist Erik Söderlind was born--in 1981. They stem from the mid-1960s, when Jimmy Smith revolutionized the way the Hammond B3 electric organ was played and created a new genre of hard bop featuring the Hammond with guitar as second instrument. The jazz guitarists who played with Smith included Wes Montgomery, Kenny Burrell, George Benson and Grant Green, all of whom have influenced Söderlind. The ...

148

Album Review

Motland / Lonberg-Holm / Solberg / Gjerstad: VCDC

by Eyal Hareuveni
November 4, 2011

This unconventional quartet is comprised of Frode Gjerstad, fellow Norwegians and citizens of the Norwegian reeds hero's hometown, Stavanger, vocalist Stine Janvin Motland and drummer Ståle Liavik Solberg (known also as the MotSol duo, for whom Gjerstad produced the debut, Strap on (FMR, 2006)). Frequent Gjerstad collaborator, Chicago-based cellist Fred Longberg-Holm, rounds out the quartet, his last collaboration with the reed player, Sugar Maple, together with Chicago drummer Michael Zerang, released by FMR in 2010. Even though ...

222

Album Review

Michael Cain: Solo

by Mark F. Turner
November 3, 2011

A yawn can spontaneously develop when hearing about another solo release in which the unaccompanied music can, at times, result in a monochrome listening experience. But in the case of Michael Cain's Solo, a savvy work of acoustic piano with electronic manipulations, the outcome is--to coin a very dated phrase--in Technicolor. Cain who was born in Los Angeles, California and serves on the faculty of Music at Brandon University in Manitoba, Canada, can be counted among the ...

133

Extended Analysis

Pablo Aslan Quintet: Piazzolla in Brooklyn

by Lawrence Peryer
November 3, 2011

Pablo Aslan QuintetPiazzolla In BrooklynSoundbrush Records2011 Thanks to artists like pianist Pablo Ziegler, woodwind multi-instrumentalist Paquito D'Rivera and bassist Pablo Aslan, the union of jazz and tango has been made complete over the last several decades. Tango music, which like jazz has had a long and complex history often entwined with issues of class, has been present in the Americas for well over 100 years. As popular music, tango was in many ...

163

Album Review

Jerry Gonzalez: Y el Comando de la Clave

Read "Y el Comando de la Clave" reviewed by Raul d'Gama Rose

by Raul d'Gama Rose
November 3, 2011

In considering living modern masters of the trumpet, Wynton Marsalis comes to mind first, not Jerry Gonzalez. This is a travesty, because in the warm, bronze glow of Gonzalez's sound there is a singular majesty that deserves much wider recognition than the trumpeter gets. Perhaps it is because he plays in an idiom slightly more insular than mainstream. Now that he resides for the large part in Spain, he is even less frequently recalled. Perhaps his extraordinarily beautiful album, Jerry ...

188

Multiple Reviews

Lonnie Smith and Johnny Hammond: Organ Explorers Of The Kudu Kind

by Dan Bilawsky
November 3, 2011

When the 40th Anniversary celebration of Creed Taylor's CTI Records began, the focus fell on the label's flagship artists and classic albums, but the final wave of releases shines a light on some neglected works that are only now seeing their first U.S. release on CD. The four CDs that bring this celebration to an end--which include organists Lonnie Smith's Mama Wailer and Johnny Hammond's Wild Horses Rock Steady, the subjects of this review--also differ from the other albums that ...