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.

190

Book Excerpts

George Russell: The Story of an American Composer

by Duncan Heining
October 27, 2011

This article, adapted by the author, appears in Chapter 4 of George Russell: The Story of an American Composer, by Duncan Heining (Scarecrow Press, 2010). New York, NY It was May 1945, the war was still on, Bebop was at its height in New York and George Russell and his two friends, Little Bird and Little Diz, had just arrived in the city. With fifteen dollars in their collective pocket, they faced a simple choice. ...

105

Album Review

Joey DeFrancesco: 40

by Jack Bowers
October 27, 2011

With 40, Joey DeFrancesco--the world's foremost contemporary jazz organist--heralds his fortieth birthday by presiding over a trio session that is typically dexterous and engaging from start to finish. As good as it is, however, a DVD would be even more persuasive, as DeFrancesco's consummate mastery of his chosen instrument should really be seen as well as heard to be thoroughly appreciated. His right hand is so virtuosic that he seldom has need for the left, using it sparingly to append ...

166

Album Review

Yoko Miwa Trio: Live at Scullers Jazz Club

Read "Live at Scullers Jazz Club" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan

by Dan McClenaghan
October 27, 2011

Is live always better? Does the no second takes, out-on-a-limb aspect of playing in front of a live audience, and feeding off its energy result in the best recordings? It seems to work that way for Boston-based pianist Yoko Miwa on Live At Scullers Jazz Club, a mix of tunes from The Great American Songbook and the world of rock, shuffled in with her own outstanding compositions. An original pressing of a hundred copies of the show--done as a memento ...

162

Mix Tape

Alice Coltrane's Divine Ferocity

by Lawrence Peryer
October 27, 2011

Alice Coltrane's death in 2007 did not bring about the critical reassessment her work deserves. Nothing less than a trailblazer in free and spiritual jazz, the pianist and harpist was a deeply sensitive blues player and top-rate composer. Working in the shadow of her husband, saxophonist John Coltrane, through his controversial, late-period work and her erratic recording career later in her own life have not helped her legacy but Alice Coltrane's work is Important with a capital “I." If you ...

163

Multiple Reviews

Alice Coltrane: The Flowering of Astral Jazz

by Chris May
October 27, 2011

The launch of Impulse! Records' 2-on-1 reissue series--which packages two original LPs on one CD--includes six key albums from the glorious first flowering of the astral jazz forged by pianist and harpist Alice Coltrane and saxophonist Pharoah Sanders on Impulse! towards the end of the 1960s.The style emerged following saxophonist John Coltrane's passing in 1967, when Alice Coltrane and Sanders--both members of John Coltrane's later groups--repositioned at center stage the African and Indian percussion instruments and song forms ...

176

Live Review

Shawn Baltazor New York, NY September 17, 2011

by David A. Orthmann
October 26, 2011

Shawn Baltazor Quartet:New York, NYSeptember 17, 2011 It's always night time at Smalls. Thirty minutes prior to a Saturday afternoon showcase of drummer Shawn Baltazor's Quartet, the basement club was a virtual world of its own, devoid of natural light and removed from the hustle and bustle of the West Village. Operating seven days a week, ten to twelve hours a day, Smalls is a no frills environment ideally suited to serious performance and equally serious listening. ...

157

Album Review

Jonas Knutsson: Blaslatar

Read "Blaslatar" reviewed by Raul d'Gama Rose

by Raul d'Gama Rose
October 26, 2011

To the English-speaking world, the titles of Blaslatar's songs may be daunting to pronounce, but it's strongly advised to get over it because that is when the true majesty and breathtaking beauty of Jonas Knutsson's playing can be truly appreciated. The saxophonist was raised in Umea, Sweden by parents who hosted the annual jazz festival there. Knutsson's first instrument was the alto, and he played mainly in the jazz idiom until he met vocalist Lena Willemark, who persuaded him to ...

151

Book Excerpts

Keystone Korner: Portrait of a Jazz Club

by Sascha Feinstein
October 26, 2011

This article appears in the preface of Keystone Korner: Portrait of a Jazz Club by Kathy Sloane (Indiana Univ. Press, 2011). The Keystone Legacy I enjoy imagining jazz clubs as I listen to live recordings, and if those sessions took place at venues I've known, I find it downright difficult not to recreate (and sometimes relive) the setting. I'm thinking now of Bradley's in New York, with its long bar to the right and the portrait ...

115

Album Review

Sao Paulo Underground: Tres Cabecas Loucuras

Read "Tres Cabecas Loucuras" reviewed by Troy Collins

by Troy Collins
October 26, 2011

Três Cabeças Loucuras (Portuguese for “three crazy heads") is the third release from São Paulo Underground to explore the furthest fringes of Brazil's revolutionary Tropicalia movement. Updating the renowned genre's patented psychedelia with free improvisation, laptop-driven electronica and musique concrete, the album unveils a spectrum of kaleidoscopic sound that pushes the bounds of each style to its limits, creating a new, unclassifiable amalgam in the process.The group was originally co-founded by Chicago-based cornetist Rob Mazurek (Chicago Underground, Exploding ...

169

Album Review

Ken Fowser and Behn Gillece: Duotone

Read "Duotone" reviewed by Bruce Lindsay

by Bruce Lindsay
October 26, 2011

The tenor and vibes partnership of Ken Fowser and Behn Gillece has already established its credentials as an imaginative and innovative creator of cool-swinging straight-ahead jazz. Duotone, the duo's third album, reinforces those credentials with a fresh set of original tunes. As with their previous Posi-Tone releases--Full View (2009) and Little Echo (2010)--Duotone is a quintet recording. Each albums features a different rhythm section, and whether this is a deliberate strategy or not, it gives them variation ...