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.

353

Film Review

Chuck Anderson Trio: Live at Chaplin’s Music Cafe

by Victor L. Schermer
March 26, 2011

Chuck Anderson TrioLive at Chaplin's Music CafeSelf Produced2011 This self-produced DVD is a gem, with over an hour of straight ahead, guitar trio jazz featuring Chuck Anderson, a virtuoso player who is sheer pleasure to hear. The disc aims to recreate a live performance by showcasing Anderson's group in a nightclub setting, with high definition sound and clear, simply structured video imaging that gives a sense of “being there," without distracting ...

252

Album Review

Tommaso Starace Quartet: Blood & Champagne

Read "Blood & Champagne" reviewed by Bruce Lindsay

by Bruce Lindsay
March 26, 2011

Somewhere in a parallel universe far, far away Tommaso Starace is fêted as one of the finest saxophonists in contemporary jazz. It's the only way to explain why Starace remains so underrated on this little world. Blood & Champagne, his fourth album, should bring Planet Earth into line. Starace has a distinctive, hard-edged, tone and a style that brings together elements of the bop and post-bop greats right back to Charlie Parker. He creates an intense and exciting sound with, ...

422

Interview

Planeta Imaginario: Stretches in Spain

by Mark Redlefsen
March 26, 2011

Recently from Barcelona, Spain, members of the jazz/rock improv group Planeta Imaginario discussed their new recording Optical Delusions (Cuneiform Records, 2011) and the group's history. Keyboardist and group leader Marc Capel, who speaks Catalan, shared his thoughts through drummer and chief translator Vasco Trilla. Fretless bassist Dimitris Bikos also sat in for the interview. The various influences that can be heard in the music of Planeta Imaginario range from classic progressive rock groups such as Soft Machine, ...

131

Album Review

Soft Machine Legacy: Live Adventures

Read "Live Adventures" reviewed by Chris M. Slawecki

by Chris M. Slawecki
March 26, 2011

Many have found elements of jazz in the music of European progressive rock artists such as Gong, Can, King Crimson and even, to a certain improvisational extent, Yes. Soft Machine Legacy continues this...umm, legacy with an amoeba-like lineup (mostly) from alumni of the original progressive instrumental group Soft Machine: guitarist John Etheridge, bassist Roy Babbington and drummer John Marshall, joined by like-minded improviser and former Gong member Theo Travis on saxophones and flute. Recorded in Austria and Germany ...

300

Album Review

Stephan Crump & Steve Lehman: Kaleidoscope & Collage

Read "Kaleidoscope & Collage" reviewed by Nic Jones

by Nic Jones
March 26, 2011

Bassist Stephan Crump and alto saxophonist Steve Lehman are both musicians with little time for musical boundaries. Their CVs confirm this, but what they perhaps don't throw up so readily is that they are both closer to the future of this music than many of their contemporaries. In recent years, Crump has been an active member of pianist Vijay Iyer's small groups, while Lehman has been a member of Fieldwork, along with Iyer. This shared point of reference is of ...

139

Album Review

Michael Feinberg: With Many Hands

Read "With Many Hands" reviewed by Raul d'Gama Rose

by Raul d'Gama Rose
March 25, 2011

On With Many Hands, bassist/composer Michael Feinberg charts his epic journey across the topographic ocean of sound, every once in awhile plunging into its depths to stir up a vortex and emerge with a roar. His playing is that driven by a powerful natural energy. Thus, he disappears and explores the temples of tone and timbre, only to reappear with an ebullient fanfare of fat, round notes that are, at once, inspired and inspirational to those who accompany him on ...

257

Live Review

Marc Ribot Spiritual Unity: Cleveland, March 19, 2011

by Matt Marshall
March 25, 2011

Marc Ribot, Spiritual Unity: The Legacy and Music of Albert AylerThe Cleveland Museum of ArtCleveland, OHMarch 19, 2011 Guitarist Marc Ribot's performance with his Spiritual Unity quartet, at the Cleveland Museum of Art, was the culmination of a three-evening nod to celebrated avant-gardist, and Cleveland native, Albert Ayler. Two days earlier, the museum screened Kasper Collin's 2007 documentary film on the saxophonist, My Name is Albert Ayler, and a panel discussion on Ayler's music ...

288

Album Review

Avishai Cohen: Seven Seas

Read "Seven Seas" reviewed by Nenad Georgievski

by Nenad Georgievski
March 25, 2011

Over the past few years, bassist Avishai Cohen has become recognized as one of the most creative musicians of current times. A fertile composer of the highest rank, he has, among other things, enriched and expanded the genre he works in: a master of the upright bass, an improviser of not-so-often-seen genius, and a bandleader with a rich and kaleidoscopic history. Seven Seas is another exceptional chapter in the Cohen catalog, one that showcases a willingness to ...

256

Album Review

Danny Frankel with Nels Cline & Larry Goldings: The Interplanetary Note/Beat Conference

Read "The Interplanetary Note/Beat Conference" reviewed by Mark Corroto

by Mark Corroto
March 25, 2011

Enough is sometimes enough. Drummer/percussionist Danny Frankel presents a shortish (by modern CD standards), 34-minute collection of 11 compositions on The Interplanetary Note/Beat Conference. Then again, sometimes a sketch can speak louder than an entire painting.Frankel, a consummate player, has been a sideman to the likes of Laurie Anderson, Steven Bernstein, Lou Reed, Robin Holcomb, K.D. Lang, and Bebel Gilberto. Here, his musical vision is shared by guitar wizard Nels Cline, of Wilco fame, and Larry Goldings (Trio ...

268

Album Review

Animation: Asiento

Read "Asiento" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey

by C. Michael Bailey
March 25, 2011

Jam bands Phish and Gov't Mule have been making a cottage industry of covering a famous LP for their respective Halloween concerts (the bands' “costumes," so to speak). In 2010, we were treated to Little Feat's Waiting for Columbus (Warner Brothers, 1978) and The Who's Who's Next (MCA, 1975), respectively. It is not unheard of for jazz musicians to reimagine iconic recordings of the past. Phil Woods tipped his hat to Art Pepper + Eleven (Contemporary, 1959), ...