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.

217

Profile

Manfred Eicher: Through the Lens

by John Kelman
October 31, 2011

It begins in silence, always silence. Since the 1990s, all ECM recordings begin with five seconds of silence, and so, too, do directors Norbert Wiedmer and Peter Guyer open their feature film on the heralded German record label and its enigmatic founder, Sounds and Silence: Travels with Manfred Eicher. As longtime ECM recording artist Keith Jarrett's performance of G.I. Gurdjieff's “Reading of Sacred Books," from the pianist's Sacred Hymns (1980), begins in the background, the film fades in on Eicher, ...

190

Interview

Brian Adler: A World of Percussion

by Dave Wayne
October 31, 2011

Brian Adler is truly both a drummer and a percussionist--in his world, the drum set coexists peacefully with a dizzying array of ethnic percussion instruments as equal partners in a myriad of musical possibilities. His work with vocalist Sunny Kim in the Prana Trio--which also includes a rotating cast of guest artists such as Frank Carlberg, Stomu Takeshi, Carmen Staaf, and Jeremy Udden--is a case in point. His nimble, sensitive approach to the drum set is matched only by his ...

222

Book Review

Tad Hershorn: Norman Granz - The Man Who Used Jazz for Justice

by Lewis J Whittington
October 30, 2011

Norman Granz: The Man Who Used Jazz for Justice Tad Hershorn Hardcover, 488 pages University of California Press ISBN: 9780520267824 2011 Impresario Norman Granz changed the course of jazz in so many ways, as creator of the Jazz At The Philharmonic (JATP) tour package and as founder of Verve and other labels. His most indelible contribution may be, as biographer Tad Hershorn recounts, that he used jazz as a vehicle to advance civil ...

125

Album Review

Shirley Crabbe: Home

by Edward Blanco
October 30, 2011

In 2006, jazz singer Shirley Crabbe suffered from a vocal cord injury, not knowing if she would ever be able to sing again. Home is her long-awaited debut, documenting a successful return appropriately acknowledged in the opening Leonard Bernstein piece “Lucky To Be Me." Her remarkable performance gives no clue to the nature of her prior condition, revealing instead a voice that caresses lyrics of ballads with emotion and projects swinging tunes with power. Inspired by the singing of the ...

226

Book Review

Steve Dalachinsky: Weaving Poetry with Jazz

by Florence Wetzel
October 30, 2011

Poet Steve Dalachinsky occupies a unique place in the jazz firmament. Actually, he occupies several places: he writes poetry inspired by jazz, he performs and records with jazz musicians and he has supplied liner notes for numerous artists including multi-intrumentalist Anthony Braxton, drummer Rashied Ali and pianist Matthew Shipp. Dalachinsky is an avid supporter of the music, one of those people who needs jazz like they need air. In fact, if you go hear avant-garde music in New York City ...

Album Review

Indigo Trio and Michel Edelin: The Ethiopian Princess Meets The Tantric Priest

Read "The Ethiopian Princess Meets The Tantric Priest" reviewed by Bob Hatteau

by Bob Hatteau
October 30, 2011

Key musicians from the Chicago scene, Nicole Mitchell, Harrison Bankhead and Hamid Drake, created the Indigo Trio about six years ago. Since then, they've been exploring a musical field that faces the avant-garde of the improvisation. Indigo Trio has produced some noticeable records, including Live In Montreal (Greenleaf, 2007), Anaya (RogueArt, 2008). For The Ethiopian Princess Meets The Tantric Priest, Indigo Trio invites French flautist Michel Édelin to share in the music. The Ethiopian ...

103

Album Review

Szilard Mezei Wind Quartet: Innen

by Eyal Hareuveni
October 30, 2011

Serbian violaist Szilárd Mezei has gained a reputation as a composer/musician that rarely fits into ordinary definitions and conventions. Throughout his career, he has systematically blurred the boundaries between modern chamber contemporary music, European folk-based themes and jazz and free improvisation. His second release with his Wind Quartet, following We Were Watching the Rain (Leo, 2009), is no exception. With this unique quartet Mezei explores dark and deep-toned textures-- playing viola and composing for trombone, tuba and ...

170

Take Five With...

Take Five With Graham Ling

by AAJ Staff
October 30, 2011

Meet Graham Ling: Classically trained from an early age, I wondered through the '80s not knowing what to listen to or play. Grunge happened to me in a big way, and I rocked throughout my twenties, but come my thirties I was looking for something as challenging as classical but with the raw emotion of rock music. It was then I discovered jazz, or rather, when a stranger approached me after a gig in Stonehaven and said that ...

Album Review

Jeff Williams: Another Time

Read "Another Time" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
October 29, 2011

The catch-all term “playing time" is often used as a descriptor for drummers that find a steady, supportive pattern and play it ad infinitum, whether to the benefit or detriment of a band, but that definition has always been limiting. Drummer Jeff Williams, for example, has and plays impeccable time, but he paints around the lines and shifts patterns to accent and highlight what's happening in the music at any given moment. He's the rare drummer who understands and conceptualizes ...

Live Review

Tom Hambridge and George Thorogood: New York, NY, September 27, 2011

by Mike Perciaccante
October 29, 2011

Tom Hambridge and George Thorogood B.B. King's Blues Club & Grill New York, New York September 27, 2011 It was a cool Tuesday evening in New York city. Inside B.B. King's Blues Club & Grill, there were no signs of the so-called recession evident as the cash registers behind the bar rang again and again. The wait staff was kept equally busy as they ran back and forth between the kitchen and their stations.