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.

127

Jazz Fiction

Bop Addict

by Wayne Wolfson
August 28, 2010

She clutched my hand deciding to worry about how to deny having done such a thing later. It was Sabbath's first time leaving Brooklyn and she was nervous. Of course I was all right, I had been until we were well under way and past the point of no return. Passing through customs had been fine as it could have been anyplace crowded by humanity for some kind of holiday sale or concert and did not feel of being somewhere ...

2,941

Live Review

Roxy Coss Quintet at Cecil's Jazz Club

by David A. Orthmann
August 27, 2010

Roxy Coss QuintetCecil's Jazz ClubWest Orange, NJJuly 23, 2010 During her April 2008 senior recital at William Paterson University, Roxy Coss was the epitome of an enterprising collegiate jazz musician. In addition to two of her own pieces, Coss presented material by composers ranging from the indie rock group Modest Mouse, to J.S. Bach, to John Coltrane. She employed various combinations of a seven piece band, and displayed an impressive command of the tenor, ...

287

Album Review

First Meeting: Cut the Rope

Read "Cut the Rope" reviewed by Raul d'Gama Rose

by Raul d'Gama Rose
August 27, 2010

Trumpeter Natsuki Tamura creates a vast expanse of sound on Cut the Rope, the first album recorded with his band First Meeting. Nothing is predictable on this wholly improvised album that ranges from aspects of a vision of being marooned on a desolate soundscape to the musicians ultimately finding their way into a melodic river of sound, after at first coming perilously close to losing all sense of direction. But Tamura is an expert guide: he wields his horn like ...

1,030

Extended Analysis

IQ: The Wake Deluxe Edition

by John Kelman
August 27, 2010

IQThe Wake: Deluxe EditionGiant Electric Pea2010 In the wake of punk/new wave's emergence in the mid-1970s, progressive rock underwent massive restructuring and a shift from mainstream popularity to niche status. By the latter half of the decade, Emerson, Lake & Palmer had already begun to implode in a flurry of bloated egos. Yes began a revolving-door personnel policy that would continue into the 21st century, resulting in minor classics like Drama (Atlantic, ...

432

Album Review

Danilo Rea: A Tribute To Fabrizio De André

Read "A Tribute To Fabrizio De André" reviewed by Bruce Lindsay

by Bruce Lindsay
August 27, 2010

Danilo Rea is one of Italy's finest jazz pianists--a beautifully lyrical player with a precise and delicate touch. On A Tribute To Fabrizio De André, he creates his own memorial to the work of his fellow Italian, the singer and songwriter who died in 1999 at just 58 years of age. De André was an extremely popular and, at times, controversial figure in Italy. Although his work was mainly rooted in a contemporary folk idiom, De André ...

638

Live Review

Matt Slocum Trio Live At The Saville Theater

by Robert Bush
August 27, 2010

Matt Slocum Trio Saville Theater, San Diego City College San Diego, CA August 10, 2010 Matt Slocum is a promising young drummer/composer who appears to be going places in jazz. A graduate of the prestigious Thornton School Of Music at USC, where he studied with Peter Erskine, (Weather Report, Stan Kenton), and Alan Pasqua, he has already performed with none other than Wynton Marsalis. Slocum resides in New Jersey and is working in New ...

499

Album Review

Nick Fiore: Nick Fiore 4

Read "Nick Fiore 4" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan

by Dan McClenaghan
August 27, 2010

Bassist Nick Fiore started his professional music life in Philadelphia back in 1949, then moved to Detroit in '52, where he spent a half a century playing the Motor City Jazz scene, including a three-year stint at the Rooster Tail Night Club, with The Johnny Trudell Band, backing up stars like Tony Bennett, Steve Allen, Dionne Warwick and Wayne Newton. Fiore also spent years working with his own piano/bass/drums trios. After a long and vibrant career, the ...

320

Album Review

Richard Thompson: Dream Attic

Read "Dream Attic" reviewed by John Kelman

by John Kelman
August 27, 2010

Few artists have maintained the unerring consistency of Richard Thompson's near-half century career. After leaving Fairport Convention in 1970--cofounded by the British singer/songwriter/guitarist and bringing electrified energy to music born of the British folk tradition--Thompson's own career grew from those innovations to incorporate an even broader range of stylistic references, all filtered through a particularly dark filter. Shoot Out the Lights (Hannibal, 1982) remains one of the most painful breakup records ever released, charting #9 on Rolling Stone's 100 Greatest ...

277

Album Review

Benny Sharoni: Eternal Elixir

Read "Eternal Elixir" reviewed by Jordan Richardson

by Jordan Richardson
August 27, 2010

Tenor saxophonist Benny Sharoni's debut as a leader, Eternal Elixir, mixes the vitality of a spiritual journey with the intelligence of an academic lesson, to come up with an intoxicating cocktail of brains and brawn. Sharoni is a precise and exciting player. His record is couched in the idea of music as salvation, and is largely culled from his experiences during a mandatory three-year term with the Israeli Army in the 1980s. Says Sharoni, “While I was in ...

925

Record Label Profile

Dreyfus Records: Crossing Continents with Music

by Jakob Baekgaard
August 26, 2010

Music, at its best, has the ability to reach across boundaries of nationality, gender and age. If there's a message in music, it's about communication, and about getting to the essence of everything: the beating pulse of a human heart. In an increasingly commercial market, where it has become more important to make music that opens wallets rather than hearts, it's vital to remember those people who all along were in it for the art. Francis Dreyfus (1940-2010), the founder ...