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.

185

Album Review

Joachim Kühn / Majid Bekkas / Ramon Lopez: Chalaba

Read "Chalaba" reviewed by Bruce Lindsay

by Bruce Lindsay
February 16, 2011

The sleeve notes to Chalaba describe German pianist and alto saxophonist Joachim Kühn as a veteran “of the conscious avant-garde." This is certainly accurate--he's worked with Archie Shepp and Ornette Coleman, among others--but the description sounds rather forbidding, a portent of some serious and complex sounds for the mind but not the body. Thankfully it misleads: for while Kühn, vocalist and guembri player Majid Bekkas, and percussionist Ramon Lopez do produce some serious music, they also create some splendidly joyous ...

283

Album Review

Taylor Ho Bynum / John Hebert / Gerald Cleaver: Book Of Three

Read "Book Of Three" reviewed by John Sharpe

by John Sharpe
February 16, 2011

While trumpet plus rhythm trios are not a dime a dozen, they are becoming increasingly common currency. Following after Stephen Haynes' Parrhesia (Engine, 2011) and Kirk Knuffke's Chew Your Food (No Business Records, 2010), arrives an entry by the adventurous threesome of cornetist Taylor Ho Bynum, bassist John Hébert and drummer Gerald Cleaver. Though the title references Lloyd Alexander's children's favorite, it also neatly fits the ethos of three clearly separate authors who nevertheless meld their ideas into nine unified ...

232

Album Review

Chalgia Sound System: Chalgia Sound System

Read "Chalgia Sound System" reviewed by Nenad Georgievski

by Nenad Georgievski
February 16, 2011

Despite becoming a genre of its own in these modern times, folk music goes deeper than that. Folk music of any culture is the music of the common people--their voice, a medium where thoughts and emotions have been tightly knit. It is music by the people, about the people and for the people. In a modern context, it is a well from which modern music has drawn to establish its foundation. The tradition of chalgia music is at the root ...

828

Live Review

Thailand International Jazz Conference, January 28-30, 2011

by Ian Patterson
February 16, 2011

Thailand International Jazz Conference Mahidol University School of Music Bangkok, Thailand January 28-30, 2011It's almost impossible to go anywhere in Thailand without hearing music at all hours: people sing for their own enjoyment as they go about their daily business, displaying a lack of inhibition generally absent in the West; at every turn youth strum guitars, and more often than not, bars, restaurants and clubs offer live music. Jazz admittedly, accounts for ...

611

Interview

Joan Jeanrenaud: The Beat of the Moment

by Anil Prasad
February 15, 2011

Playing it safe is a concept in which cellist Joan Jeanrenaud has total disinterest. Her deep, varied career reflects a restless creative spirit that most recently manifested itself on Pop-Pop (Deconet, 2010), her duo album with producer and percussionist PC Muñoz. The disc seamlessly blends cello, classical, electronica, and hip-hop influences. But, perhaps, the most important element is fun, something Jeanrenaud and Muñoz clearly had a lot of when making the disc. Unlike Jeanrenaud's carefully-architected previous albums, Pop-Pop found her ...

327

Album Review

Paolo Fresu / A Filetta Corsican Voices / Daniele di Bonaventura: Mistico Mediterraneo

Read "Mistico Mediterraneo" reviewed by John Kelman

by John Kelman
February 15, 2011

At a time when cross-pollination has become the new musical evolution, ECM Records remains at the vanguard. Whether blending music of Tunisian origins with European impressionistic concerns and hints of New World groove on oudist Anouar Brahem's The Astounding Eyes of Rita (2009), or marrying Persian percussion with Baroque instrumentation and Fourth World improvisation on keyboardist Jon Balke's Siwan (2009), few labels (if any) can boast such an impressive catalogue of constant innovation, where unfailing respect for tradition is matched ...

349

Live From New York

The Carolina Chocolate Drops, Roomful Of Blues & Buckwheat Zydeco

by Martin Longley
February 15, 2011

The Carolina Chocolate Drops The Allen Room February 2, 2011 What's the difference between country blues and country country? How do we separate hillbilly clunking from Delta sliding? Does the banjo solely descend from the West African n'goni? The Carolina Chocolate Drops engaged with certain aspects of these questions at strategic points throughout its set. The ethnicity of its performers did, admittedly, place a different slant on the presentation of particular ...

344

Album Review

Abdullah Ibrahim & Ekaya: Sotho Blue

Read "Sotho Blue" reviewed by Ian Patterson

by Ian Patterson
February 15, 2011

Pianist Abdullah Ibrahim's Ekaya is more an expression of the South African's musical philosophy than a fixed combo; musicians have come and gone and his collaborators have changed completely since its inception in 1983. Ekaya is not about personalities, but about music born of South Africa and the Afro-American experience. Speaking of Ekaya, Ibrahim states, “Its center is a universal code; regardless of where you go you remain at home." The septet clearly feels right at home with this reworking ...

326

Album Review

John Medeski & Lee Shaw: Together Again: Live At The Egg

Read "Together Again: Live At The Egg" reviewed by Bruce Lindsay

by Bruce Lindsay
February 15, 2011

John Medeski is one of the jazz world's best-known and most accomplished keyboard players--but he had to begin learning jazz somewhere. That somewhere was with pianist, composer and teacher Lee Shaw, in late '70s Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Over 30 years later, as the title of their album makes plain, Medeski and Shaw are Together Again: Live At The Egg on a joyously musical date from the Albany, New York venue recorded on April 5, 2009. It's a date made possible ...

169

Album Review

Samir Zarif: Starting Point

Read "Starting Point" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
February 15, 2011

Saxophonist Samir Zarif has experienced a wide cross section of the cultural landscape of the United States. Zarif grew up in Texas, spent his college years learning and performing in New Orleans, and then traveled north to New York for his studies at the Manhattan School of Music. While all of this isn't necessarily remarkable for a budding musician to take in, these experiences contrast sharply with the aural images that Zarif presents on Starting Point. Starting ...