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.

239

Album Review

Sandrine Piau / Sara Mingardo / Concerto Italiano, Rinaldo Alessandrini: Handel

Read "Handel" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey

by C. Michael Bailey
September 13, 2010

Poro, re dell'Indie (Porus, King of the Indians) is an opera seria composed by George Frideric Handel in 1719 for the Royal Academy of Music. Handel's 1731 premiere was conducted by the composer, and cast the great castrato Senesino (Francesco Bernardi) in the roll of Porus, and Anna Maria Strada as Cleofide. In this recording, Rinaldo Alessandrini and Concerto Italiano host contralto Sara Mingardo and soprano Sandrine Pia in these respective roles, on the duet collection, Handel. ...

274

Take Five With...

Take Five With John Tatum

by AAJ Staff
September 13, 2010

Meet John Tatum: Went though tutoring at North Texas State University, with Vaughn Roberts, and had a few lessons with JQ Whitcomb of Shanghai. I'm mostly self-taught and using the goal note theory of Shelly Berg. It works!Instruments Trumpet, flueglehorn, guitar, drums.Teachers and/or influences? Vaughn and JQ. I love Chris Botti's sweet tone and overall control. Arturo Sandoval, Miles Davis,Clifford Brown and Tom Browne of Jamaican funk fame. Main inspiration: “Feels so Good," by Chuck Mangione.

657

Live Review

Kurt Elling Highlights Tanglewood Jazz Festival

by R.J. DeLuke
September 12, 2010

Tanglewood Jazz FestivalLenox, MASeptember 5-6, 2010 The Tanglewood Jazz Festival in Lenox, Massachusetts, is a Labor Day weekend tradition, and while it was scaled back somewhat this year, the event at the scenic Berkshire Mountains came off quite well again, highlighted by the outstanding Kurt Elling, and featuring again a live taping of the radio program Radio Deluxe, hosted by John Pizzarelli and his wife, Jessica Molaskey.The festival also continued to showcase young talent. ...

249

Album Review

Scott Amendola Trio: Lift

by Nick Millevoi
September 12, 2010

Scott Amendola is probably best known as the drummer with the Nels Cline Singers, a guitar trio with detailed compositions, high-energy improvisations, and an oft-exhibited ability to shift gears at a moment's notice. On Lift, his first album since 2005's Believe (Cryptogramophone), Amendola debuts his own take on the guitar trio format, with guitarist Jeff Parker and bassist John Shifflett. Most of his compositions follow standard jazz structures built upon mid-tempo grooves, with unique melodies that sit deep in the ...

608

Live Review

T.C. the 3rd: A Diamond in the Rough

by Leonard Epstein
September 12, 2010

T.C. the 3rdSt. Nick's PubHarlem, NYSeptember 5, 2010 Known among jazz insiders for well over five years, T.C. the 3rd has been leading his weekly Harlem Jazz Vocalist Workshop at St. Nick's Pub each Sunday. St. Nick's, located at 149th and St. Nicholas Ave, is one of the last “juke joints" left in New York City. It is definitely not a tourist trap by any standpoint and most of its regulars are neighborhood residents ...

365

Album Review

William Parker: I Plan To Stay A Believer

Read "I Plan To Stay A Believer" reviewed by Nic Jones

by Nic Jones
September 12, 2010

On the surface of it there might not seem to be much continuity between the music of William Parker's and Curtis Mayfield, but scratch away at it and the overlap is revealed. On a social level both men were/are activists, conscious of rights human as well as merely social and, on the basis of the evidence caught in this double live set, both men were/are capable of galvanizing bands to a level of spontaneous joy that's uplifting as well as ...

160

Take Five With...

Take Five With Erik Jekabson

by AAJ Staff
September 12, 2010

Meet Erik Jekabson: Erik Jekabson is a freelance trumpet player, composer and educator who has recorded or performed with Illinois Jacquet, the Woody Herman Big Band, John Mayer, Galactic, Mark Turner, Brian Blade, and Nicholas Payton, among others. He has a Bachelor's of Music from Oberlin Conservatory of Music and a Master's of Music from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. Erik has two solo albums out: Intersection, which was recorded in New York and released in the fall of ...

259

Album Review

George Brooks: Spirit and Spice

Read "Spirit and Spice" reviewed by Glenn Astarita

by Glenn Astarita
September 12, 2010

Tenor saxophonist George Brooks equalizes the union of Indian classical music and jazz, abetted by an all-universe rhythm section and East Indian instrumentalists. With Spirit and Spice, Brooks projects a distinct voice as he poignantly merges the core attributes of both genres, and it's a happy marriage, indeed. Brooks' authoritative presence looms on high-impact funk, and thrusting Indo-fusion pieces. On “Spirit," the saxophonist's yearning lines are designed with positive implications atop bassist Kai Eckhardt's resonating harmonics and ...

256

Album Review

Punch Brothers: Antifogmatic

Read "Antifogmatic" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey

by C. Michael Bailey
September 12, 2010

The bluegrass/newgrass envelope was updated and pushed by Nickel Creek. Mandolinist extraordinaire Chris Thile broke away for some solo excursions, returning with a quintet called The Punch Brothers, circa 2006. The group's third recording, Antifogmatic, shows their expansion of wooden music to not be slowing down. “Rye Whiskey" is a song in the tradition, but updated with a more complex harmonic structure. In the broad spectrum of bluegrass, this song would be considered neo- traditional; not pushing the envelope further ...

146

Album Review

Jure Pukl: EARchitecture

Read "EARchitecture" reviewed by Jerry D'Souza

by Jerry D'Souza
September 12, 2010

Saxophonist and composer Juri Pukl is a man of many parts. He has ensconced himself in jazz, but he is also involved with pop, rock and hip hop. His compositions are strongly ingrained in the written note but he views a distant horizon as he and his band mates set out on the road to improvisation. All of this serves him well on EARchitecture.Pukl balances muscularity with gentleness on this well selected passel of tunes. As an improviser ...