Jazz Articles

like 307

Reptet: Chicken or Beef?

by Elliott Simon
May 9, 2010

Remember in the high school band room, how the horn section would goof around like they were part of Parliament Funkadelic or James Brown or the Mothers of Invention? The super cool Mothers, with Napoleon Murphy Brock on sax, flute and vocals. And then the drums, all of them, would join in. Think if that horn section was actually as together and inventive as it thought it was, and bassist Bootsy Collins was in the neighborhood and dropped in to ...

like 231

Peter Van Huffel: Like the Rusted Key

by Stuart Broomer
May 9, 2010

Peter Van Huffel is a Canadian-born alto saxophonist who recently settled in Berlin after a six-year period in New York. His new quartet reflects all of those geographic connections, bringing together New York pianist Jesse Stacken, a mainstay of Van Huffel's New York quintet, Canadian bassist Miles Perkin, and the Swiss-born, Berlin-resident drummer Samuel Rohrer. To call Van Huffel a composer, in the casual parlance of jazz, is almost a misnomer. He really composes; almost every piece ...

like 464

Tom Harrell: Tom Harrell: Roman Nights

by Tom Greenland
May 9, 2010

Roman Nights, trumpeter Tom Harrell's third release with his hardworking quintet of saxophonist Wayne Escoffery, pianist Danny Grissett, bassist Ugonna Okegwo and drummer Johnathan Blake, is an all-original set that maintains the highest standards of composition, small-group arranging and improvisation. Harrell is a paragon of restraint, each note carefully chosen, each phrase finely balanced, seducing with the sheer magnetism of his melodies, while Escoffery lets loose torrents of ideas that topple over each other with brassy bluster.

On “Let the ...

like 331

Myrna Lake: Yesterdays

by Samuel Chell
May 8, 2010

Another album by a female vocalist, another familiar playlist. But hold the assumptions. This is the first and only commercial album by septuagenarian singer Myrna Lake, but that's not the real story here. The recording is noteworthy above all because it refuses to mistake youth for vitality, slickness for substance, or newness for originality.

Myrna Lake's Yesterdays (Jazzing Music, 2008) is less a trip down memory lane than an exploration of the power of memory itself, a musical ...

like 314

Krantz Carlock Lefebvre at Highline Ballroom NYC

by David Miller
May 8, 2010

Krantz Carlock LefebvreHighline BallroomNew York, NYApril 24, 2010In the music business, the term “crossover artist" usually refers to an artist who crosses over genres. For example, a rap artist whose album rockets to the top of the pop charts. However, since I couldn't readily identify what the heck was going on at the Krantz Carlock Lefebvre show at the Highline Ballroom, I'm going to refer to them as “crossover artists" as well. From jazz to ...

like 524

May 2010

by AAJ Staff
May 8, 2010

Adam Lane Brooklyn LyceumBrooklyn, NY April 14, 2010While bassist Adam Lane's Full Throttle Orchestra is named to conjure up great size and bombast, at present it's a compact sextet whose sonic inventory includes passages of nuance and overall calm. With a Bay Area lineup, Lane has released No(w) Music (Cadence, 2001) and New Magical Kingdom (Clean Feed, 2006). His New York edition has a two-disc item, Ashcan Rantings, on the way. At the Brooklyn ...

like 499

Sherman Irby Quartet: Live At The Otto Club

by Joshua Weiner
May 8, 2010

Live At The Otto Club is Sherman Irby's first live album with his quartet, and it would be hard to conjure up a more joyful example of seriously swinging jazz that sounds like a great lost classic from the heyday of hard bop. Though the liner notes seem to suggest that this was a bit of a pick-up quartet, it doesn't sound like it: the group, particularly Green on drums and Menci on piano, swing as one with Irby as ...

like 454

Grateful Dead: Crimson, White & Indigo - Philadelphia, July 7, 1989

by Doug Collette
May 8, 2010

Grateful Dead Crimson, White & Indigo: Philadelphia, July 7, 1989 Rhino 2010

Designed as if to represent a microcosm of its unique style of improvisation, Grateful Dead's Crimson White & Indigo, July 7, 1989 is a worthy companion piece to its predecessor--Truckin' Up to Buffalo: July 4, 1989 (Monterey Video, 2005). It not only reaffirms the band was at a pinnacle of strength and versatility at this late stage of its career, but in ...

like 288

Carrie Wicks: I'll Get Around to It

by Dan McClenaghan
May 8, 2010

In the crowded and talent-filled lady jazz vocalist field, standing apart is no small feat. Some natural vocal chops, combined with a bunch of hard work and a good backing band, can make for a very viable artistic effort, and there are a lot of those around. But a very workable artistic effort is not enough. The singer has to connect on a personal level by telling the stories of her songs in a convincing fashion--in her own vulnerable or ...

like 288

Matthew Charles Heulitt: Room to Run

by Ian Patterson
May 8, 2010

Guitarist Matthew Charles Heulitt's eclectic CV hints at something of his genre-defying style; a member of drummer Zigaboo Modeliste's band and sideman in former Mahavishnu Orchestra and Weather Report drummer Narada Michael Walden's group, he has also performed with Sting, Taj Mahal, Micky Hart and David Grisman, amongst others. This, his debut as leader, impresses on a number of levels. In what is essentially a trio setting, the compositions switch between electric and acoustic and explore elements of jazz, rock ...