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.

312

Album Review

Herbie Hancock: Maiden Voyage

Read "Maiden Voyage" reviewed by Greg Simmons

by Greg Simmons
February 15, 2011

There are few worse examples of a masterpiece performance being savaged by poor recording quality than Herbie Hancock's Maiden Voyage. This very expensive recent re-release on 45RPM vinyl by Analogue Productions only serves to highlight its engineering travesty.Rudy Van Gelder had the great fortune to record the best of the best in jazz for Prestige, Blue Note and other notable labels of the 1950s and '60s. The signature RVG stamped in the dead wax of these albums marks ...

239

Mix Tape

Jazz Violin

by Peter Sellars
February 15, 2011

A playlist from one of the sessions we discussed at our weekly U3A jazz appreciation sessions here in Bethnal Green, London. And incidentally an illustration of the vibrancy of the jazz violin tradition. TrackNameTimeArtistAlbum1Humoresque (1943)2:34Stuff SmithTime And Again2Take the “A" Train3:55Joe Venuti And Dave McKennaAlone At the Palace3Yellow House Stomp2:38Stephane GrappelliEarly American & European Bebop Violin4A Woman's Place Is In The Groove2:38Ginger SmockEarly American & European Bebop Violin5Improvisation J.S. Bach Part 2—Double Violin3:19Eddie SouthSwing Time—The World's Greatest ...

280

Mix Tape

Looking Forward, Falling Back in Love

by Gary Armstrong
February 14, 2011

A versatile collection of vocals, violins, vibes and vixens. TrackNameTimeArtistAlbum1Unsquare Dance1:59Dave BrubeckDave Brubeck's Greatest Hits2Hum Drum Blues2:15Sheila JordanPortrait of Sheila3Bring Me Sunshine2:11Willie NelsonThe Relaxing Album4Blue Skies2:08Killian Mansfield & Laurel MasseSomewhere Else5Bizarre Love Triangle3:49Tony DeSare & Jane MonheitRadio Show6Snowbird2:58Rani Arbo & Daisy MayhemCocktail Swing7Quand on s'aime3:41Nana Mouskouri & Michel Legrand8Route 662:58The Manhattan TransferThe Definitive Pop Collection9Fragile7:44Kenny Barron & Regina CarterFreefall10Mr. Kicks2:05Oscar Brown Jr.Sin & Soul... And Then Some11So In Love4:07Julie LondonAll Through the Night12Centerpiece4:47Curtis StigersBaby Plays Around13El Ciego5:58Charlie ...

787

Interview

Esperanza Spalding: The Intimate Balance

by Esther Berlanga-Ryan
February 14, 2011

To celebrate Esperanza Spalding's Grammy award win as “Best New Artist," we're rerunning this September 2010 interview. Enjoy!Fans of classical music and jazz have argued about music for years. If Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Duke Ellington had ever met, they may have looked at each other in awe--right before debating about bars and notes and solos... and, perhaps, the music would have been flowing just as easy as words. The time when classically trained musicians looked down on ...

191

Album Review

BANN: As You Like

Read "As You Like" reviewed by Bruce Lindsay

by Bruce Lindsay
February 14, 2011

BANN came together in 2007, combining the experienced rhythm section of bassist Jay Anderson and drummer Adam Nussbaum with the younger duo of guitarist Oz Noy and tenor player Seamus Blake. While the band has been busy playing live on the European scene it's taken almost four years for its debut album, recorded in May 2009, to appear. As You Like melds a fascinating blend of bop and post-bop jazz, rock, blues and country which gives all four members of ...

657

Interview

Robin Holcomb: Distinctive Mysteries

by Gordon Marshall
February 14, 2011

Robin Holcomb's songs are knotty like tumbleweeds, braided like roads on maps along which tumbleweeds roll. She lays her songs down like baskets that have the rustic grace of birds' nests, always on the verge of promising a truth, but brimming with natural mysteries. Mysteries accrue, creating a keen urge to get at the kernel of their solution, but the singer, poet and pianist keeps pushing it back, shuttling her audience back and forth between the search for that meaning, ...

302

Album Review

Free Fall: Gray Scale

Read "Gray Scale" reviewed by Charles Walker

by Charles Walker
February 14, 2011

For years now, multi-reed instrumentalist Ken Vandermark has been a consistent, if idiosyncratic, devotee of the jazz canon. Musically coming of age in the internet era, however, his taste reflects the widespread availability of previously neglected recordings and the resulting reorientation of what exactly that canon includes. Explicit dedication of Vandermark 5 tracks to Curtis Counce or John Carter have functioned as a rather oblique way of stating his case, but groups like his Joe Harriott Project or School Days ...

357

Jazz That Scratches, Swings and Pops

Turn Up Those Footnotes!

by Andrew J. Sammut
February 14, 2011

Even if the names William Shakespeare and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart ring some bells for contemporary audiences, chances are Thomas Marlowe or Giovanni Paisiello might not get a chime. Yet, Marlowe's plays drew droves of theatergoers in Elizabethan England, and Paisiello's operas packed 18th century houses. It doesn't take an English scholar or the Metropolitan Opera's management to explain what popular taste amounts to historically. Aside from being popular, Marlowe and Paisiello were also gifted. They just never ...

303

Book Review

Sun Ra: Interviews & Essays

by Florence Wetzel
February 14, 2011

Sun Ra: Interviews & EssaysJohn Sinclair, editorSoftcover; 256 pagesISBN: 9781900486729Headpress2010 In a jazz world full of colorful characters, nobody shines as brilliantly as keyboardist and bandleader Sun Ra (1914-93). Born Herman Blount in Alabama, Ra demonstrated musical talent and aptitude for hard work from an early age. Despite health problems and run-ins with the United States military, his jazz career slowly blossomed, and from 1947-49 he landed ...

241

Album Review

Ark Ovrutski: Sounds Of Brasil

Read "Sounds Of Brasil" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
February 14, 2011

What does a Ukrainian-born bassist, who spent the first four decades of his life based primarily in Eastern Europe, know about Brazilian music? This skepticism-filled question might run through the minds of people who hear of bassist Ark Ovrutski's background, but the music on Sounds Of Brasil will instantly squelch any doubt about his skills in this musical arena. Since moving to the United States in 2005, Ovrutski has had the opportunity to work with the crème ...