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.

168

Album Review

Francesco Turrisi: Fotografia

Read "Fotografia" reviewed by Ian Patterson

by Ian Patterson
August 31, 2011

It would be simplistic to call pianist Francesco Turrisi an experimenter, though his music embraces myriad cultural influences, from his native Italy through the length and breadth of the Mediterranean, straddling the centuries, and imbibing from sources as diverse as baroque, Moorish airs and jazz; simplistic, because his music flows as naturally as a river follows its bed--it is in Turrisi and of him, and it guides him. As on Turrisi's memorable debut, Si Dolce e il Tormento (Diatribe, 2009), ...

180

Album Review

Steve Coleman and Five Elements: The Mancy of Sound

Read "The Mancy of Sound" reviewed by Mark F. Turner

by Mark F. Turner
August 30, 2011

A saxophonist of a different order--part griot, theorist, numerologist, and incessant seeker of knowledge-- Steve Coleman continues to forge new paths in creative music. He's influenced more of today's forward thinking artists than almost anyone in recent memory with his proven M-Base concepts. His critically acclaimed 2010 recording, Harvesting Semblances and Affinities (Pi Recordings), was a welcome return to the spotlight, and the follow-up, The Mancy of Sound , is even more rewarding. To explain Coleman's music ...

180

Album Review

Claire Daly: Mary Joyce Project: Nothing To Lose

Read "Mary Joyce Project: Nothing To Lose" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
August 30, 2011

Saxophonist Claire Daly has always been a true original and, as it turns out, part of that is in her DNA. Mary Joyce Project: Nothing To Lose is a musical/genealogical journey through the life of Daly's father's first cousin, Mary Joyce, who lived her life the way she wanted to, rather than succumbing to societal expectations for women during the '30s and beyond. As the press materials note, “She satisfied a restless and courageous spirit with a wide range of ...

211

Extended Analysis

Ricardo Villalobos / Max Loderbauer: Re: ECM

by John Kelman
August 30, 2011

The concept of remix-- using studio technology to deconstruct, reshape and reconstruct extant recordings--is far from new, but the past decade has seen a considerable expansion of purview. Once more closely aligned with the club scene, remixes are no longer solely about relentless beats for dancing; instead, as Norway's Punkt Festival has been demonstrating for seven years, they can be about expanding sonic landscapes, sometimes taking but a single motif from a source performance--or even ideas from multiple performances--to create ...

149

Album Review

John Brown Trio: Dancing With Duke: An Homage To Duke Ellington

Read "Dancing With Duke: An Homage To Duke Ellington" reviewed by Edward Blanco

by Edward Blanco
August 30, 2011

The history of jazz would not be complete without an understanding of just how influential Duke Ellington was to its development. North Carolina bassist John Brown appreciates the impact Edward Kennedy Ellington has had on American music, especially jazz, and offers his own tribute to the icon on Dancing with Duke: An Homage to Duke Ellington. Along with New Orleans drumming sensation Adonis Rose and the incomparable pianist Cyrus Chestnut, the John Brown Trio delves deeply into the Ellington song ...

206

Album Review

Randy Weston: Blue Moses

Read "Blue Moses" reviewed by Eugene Holley, Jr.

by Eugene Holley, Jr.
August 30, 2011

Brooklyn-born, six-foot-seven octogenarian pianist/composer Randy Weston has literally been a larger-than-life jazz force for six decades: his percussive pianism was forged from a distinguished keyboard continuum, ranging from Duke Ellington and Thelonious Monk to John Lewis; his “Little Niles" and “Hi-Fly" are well-worn jazz standards; and the pianist may well be the greatest exponent of the African roots of America's classical music. Weston lived in Morocco in the 1960s and '70s, opened a jazz club there, and was virtually a ...

267

Interview

Jimmy Scott: Across the Universe

by Chris M. Slawecki
August 30, 2011

Listening to Little Jimmy Scott sing is different from listening to any other singer. His high-pitched voice carries more emotion than any instrument can reasonably bear, and seems to come from a special place deep within his heart. Yet that voice also seems to resound from a profound source far beyond any one man, a place where individuality no longer exists: The everlasting pulse of the universe. Jimmy Scott's voice soars in the heaven of romantic love, and burns in ...

206

Album Review

Jimmie Lunceford: The Complete Jimmie Lunceford Decca Sessions

Read "The Complete Jimmie Lunceford Decca Sessions" reviewed by David Rickert

by David Rickert
August 29, 2011

When saxophonist Jimmie Lunceford signed to the Decca label in 1934 he was running one of the best orchestras in the US. He had signed a deal to appear at the Cotton Club (where bandleaders Duke Ellington and Cab Calloway had recently launched into stardom) and was frequently beating others in battles of the bands, all the while leading an outfit with an uncanny amount of precision and professionalism. Even Glenn Miller claimed that when Lunceford's band was at its ...

204

Album Review

Claudio Roditi: Bons Amigos

Read "Bons Amigos" reviewed by Andrew J. Sammut

by Andrew J. Sammut
August 29, 2011

Bons Amigos is a collection of light, breezy compositions from several generations of Brazilian composers. Lilting sambas and gentle bossa novas make up the bulk of this disc, resulting in a relaxed but heartfelt jam for Brazilian trumpeter/flugelhornist Claudio Roditi and friends. Roditi admits to playing “a few more notes" than usual here, though he often equates “playing a lot of notes with 'showing off.'" Yet Roditi's double-time phrases on the brooding “Para Nada" plumb composer Eliane ...

202

Album Review

Stefon Harris / David Sanchez / Christian Scott: Ninety Miles

Read "Ninety Miles" reviewed by Ian Patterson

by Ian Patterson
August 29, 2011

On paper, Ninety Miles was a tantalizing project from the beginning; bringing together three of the most exciting voices in modern jazz--Puerto Rican-born tenor saxophonist David Sanchez, New Orleans trumpeter Christian Scott, and New York vibraphonist Stefon Harris-- and transport them to Havana to play with two outstanding, piano-led Cuban jazz quartets. The American red tape took a year to negotiate--which shows a dogged determination of sorts on all sides--but the musical connection that resulted was clearly instant, judging by ...