Jazz Articles

like 369

Ned Rothenberg / Catherine Jauniaux / Barre Phillips: While You Were Out

by Kurt Gottschalk
January 11, 2010

Belgian vocalist Catherine Jauniaux is one the most underappreciated of a generation of free improv vocalists. Less a storyteller than Shelley Hirsch, more overtly musical than Phil Minton or Jaap Blonk, she falls somewhere between their spontaneous explorations and the avant art songs of Joan La Barbara. She has released only a handful of records with bands still loved by the few who recall (The Hat Shoes, Aksak Maboul and Vibraslaps, her duo with Ikue Mori) and is, perhaps, best ...

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Mike Mainieri: Man Behind Bars

by John Kelman
January 11, 2010

It's hard to imagine vibraphonist Mike Mainieri in his seventies. Not only does he look and sound like a man 10 years (or more) his junior, but a quick look at the projects he's been involved in over the past few years sound like anything but a septuagenarian resting on his not inconsiderable laurels. Mainieri may not have the instant name recognition of peers like Gary Burton, or even younger players like Joe Locke, Stefon Harris or Steve ...

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Kit Downes Trio: Golden

by Bruce Lindsay
January 10, 2010

Golden is the first album by the Kit Downes Trio--and it provides plenty of evidence to support the growing reputations of these three young musicians. The trio, led by pianist Kit Downes, has been together since 2005 when its members were in the early stages of their studies at the Royal Academy of Music. The quality of writing and performance on this album so soon after the players' graduation demonstrates their huge potential and ensures that the album itself is ...

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Vic Rawlings: Hardball

by Gordon Marshall
January 10, 2010

On a June night in 2009, Vic Rawlings was spinning 1950s LPs at a local record store in Central Square in Cambridge, Massachusetts. At his side, the “sound fountain"--a true period piece of a hi-fi tower (mono, of course). Buddy Holly started the party, segueing into Doris Day and The Ink Spots. Sometimes the records skipped and hissed. The extraneous noise put a smile on the evening DJ's face. “'40s, '50s, '60s--the fountain's good until about '65," ...

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Undivided: Exploring Consciousness in Ukraine

by Alex Martynov
January 10, 2010

UndividedPhilarmony Concert HallLviv, UkraineOctober 1, 2009

It's been a long time since head-solo-head was the only possible structure for jazz improvisation. Jazz symphonies, jazz operas, unprepared hour-long improvisations, recorded as well as performed live, frequently depart from the conventional formulaic pattern. Another popular form is the suite. The history of the extended jazz suite goes back to Duke Ellington's annual Carnegie Hall concerts with the premiere of Black, Brown and Beige in ...

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Royce Campbell: The Art of Chord Solo Guitar

by John Patten
January 10, 2010

Royce Campbell's The Art of Chord Solo Guitar extends his considerable collection of solo guitar releases, this time working on a series of standard tunes.

Campbell's extensive résumé includes stints with everyone from Marvin Gaye and Eddie Harris to Henry Mancini, and it's clear he's used his professional time to gain the skills necessary to create interesting and fresh arrangements on these tunes. Harmonizing such pearls as “In a Sentimental Mood" or “The Girl from Ipanema" requires an ...

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Rickie Lee Jones: Balm in Gilead

by Gina Vodegel
January 10, 2010

If a musical career spans a period of thirty years, there's bound to be ups and downs along the way. Rickie Lee Jones has always insisted on making her own choices, sometimes baffling her critics with yet another puzzle to work out. Here the Duchess of Coolsville combines her multiple talents as an artist, songwriter and producer with a little help from musical friends like Jon Brion, Bill Frisell, Brian Swartz, Pete Thomas and Reggie McBride.

The album ...

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Tail Dragger: Live at Rooster's Lounge

by John Barron
January 10, 2010

Tail Dragger Live at Rooster's Lounge Delmark Records 2009

For those prohibited by distance from experiencing authentic Chicago blues in a West Side club, Delmark Records provides a next-best-thing-to-being-there solution with Tail Dragger's DVD Live at Rooster's Lounge. A gravel-voiced mainstay on the Chicago scene since the 1960s, Tail Dragger belts out the blues with the phrasing and swagger of the late Howlin' Wolf. More than a mere blues stylist, Tail Dragger is an ...

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David Gibson: A Little Somethin'

by Dan Bilawsky
January 10, 2010

Trombonist David Gibson arrived in New York in 1999 and wasted no time making his presence felt. Work with the Dizzy Gillespie Alumni Big Band, Slide Hampton, the Hot Pants Funk Sextet and a string of leader dates for Nagel-Heyer Records helped to cement his reputation in the New York jazz community and beyond. A Little Somethin' is Gibson's recording debut for Posi-Tone Records and features his working band, with the unique instrumentation of trombone, alto saxophone, organ and drums. ...

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Hakon Kornstad: Dwell Time

by A. Henkin
January 10, 2010

32-year-old Norwegian saxophonist Håkon Kornstad continues to skirt the competing modern Scandinavian jazz aesthetics of Jan Garbarek and Mats Gustafsson. In 2008 he participated in the stunning Elise (Compuctio, 2008), a delicate acoustic duo exploration with bassist and countryman Ingebrigt Håker Flaten. Kornstad's Dwell Time is, in many ways, a companion piece to that disc in its sheer beauty and deliberateness. But where that album existed in the ether of resonating wood and metal, Dwell Time is unaccompanied, using live ...