Jazz Articles

like 513

Jeb Patton: New Strides

by Dan McClenaghan
November 22, 2009

MAXJAZZ's ongoing Piano Series has featured some very heavy hitters in the keyboard arena: Mulgrew Miller, Geoffrey Keezer, Eric Reed, Denny Zeitlin and the inimitable Jessica Williams. Add Jeb Patton to the group, a young piano man that holds his own in marvelous company with the release of New Strides.He doesn't play Jerome Kern's time-tested standard, “I'm Old Fashioned" on this set, but it could be his theme song. Patton and his trio-mates--drummer Pete Van Nostrand and bassist ...

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Andreas Tophøj: A Snapshot of Denmark

by Nicolas Large
November 22, 2009

To preserve a tradition in music, one must pique the interest of the up-and-comers out in the field. For folk music in Denmark this process would seem to be well under way; there is a steady stream of working musicians coming out of the conservatories there who have embraced their traditional folk music and adapted it into other realms. Take, for instance, Zar, a top-notch example of this trend: a band that has come forth with a polished ...

like 235

Michaela Rae: Blues with a Backbone

by Woodrow Wilkins
November 22, 2009

There are many who believe the blues is dying, a feeling reinforced by the fact that many of the major icons in this genre are over 80, like B.B. King, Pinetop Perkins and David “Honeyboy" Edwards. However, there is youth in the blues, like Homemade Jamz and now, Michaela Rae Knox. This 14-year-old Colorado guitarist has been playing for 10 years. During her development, she has performed at the Mile High Blues Festival and the International Blues Challenge. ...

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The OtherTet: The OtherTet

by Raul d'Gama Rose
November 22, 2009

The seemingly innocuously titled The OtherTet is far from an exercise in making-music in a modern idiom. A generation ago, speculation would be rife about minimalism and atonalism, terms that are laughable in today's context of existential angst. Therefore, when contemporary musical compositions delve into the macabre and the irony of contemporary existence a new idiom is born. One that combines the lament of the blues with the expressive rhythmic riches of Afro- centricity and the reinvention of music on ...

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George Garzone: Among Friends

by Jakob Baekgaard
November 21, 2009

George Garzone is one of the unsung heroes of the saxophone, who is known for playing fast and hard. Anyone who has heard his legendary group, The Fringe, whether live or on record, can testify to his ability to blow any competition off the stand, but there is also a softer side to his playing and it is this other aspect of Garzone's art that comes into full fruition on Among Friends, which finds him exploring the mood and aesthetic ...

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Charles Tyler: Charles Tyler Ensemble

by Raul d'Gama Rose
November 21, 2009

Charles Tyler Ensemble possesses a profound quality. Unlike many records of the mid-1960s, it burns with a quiet blue flame, eschewing the intellectual posturing that characterized much new music in the avant-garde era. Tyler, a baritone saxophonist who became an acolyte of Albert Ayler--following him to New York in the early part of the movement--transposes Ayler's famous gravitas to the horn of a higher register, the alto. This act alone gives his spare and deeply spiritual compositions ...

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Gov't Mule Marches On: Live in Hampton Beach, NH

by Doug Collette
November 21, 2009

Gov't Mule Casino Ballroom Hampton Beach, New Hampshire October 30th, 2009

Gov't Mule have long been savvy enough to invite like-minded artists on tour with them, ranging from Xavier Rudd to Back Door Slam to Robert Randolph. Few co-bills, however, have been so potent on paper as this 2009 fall jaunt with Jackie Greene. In Hampton Beach, the individual attractions were more successful collaboratively than playing on their own.

Jackie Greene ...

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Rudi Mahall / Axel Dorner / Jan Roder / Uli Jennessen: Die Enttausschung

by Nic Jones
November 21, 2009

It's only right that the whole membership of this quartet gets equal billing, as this is a group that sublimates the individual in the interest of collective identity. Given the instrumental line-up--two horns, bass and drums--there are, of course, countless precedents for music in this form. The group proves itself to be abundantly aware of them, but the degree to which it transcends them is ultimately a matter for debate.

In choosing to concentrate on bass clarinet Rudi Mahall--whose work ...

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Fay Victor Ensemble: The Freesong Suite

by John Kelman
November 21, 2009

It's a tough time to be a singer. With an excessive plethora of vocalists mining the Great American Songbook ad nauseum, or trying their hands at songwriting with less than distinctive results, it's harder than ever to be heard. Even once-innovative singers like Cassandra Wilson--now a Grammy Award-winning “star"--have deserted experimentation, resting instead on their not inconsiderable laurels in pursuit of consistent record sales, but losing the edge that got them where they are in the first place. ...

like 132

Jon Irabagon with Mike Pride: I Don't Hear Nothin' But the Blues

by Eyal Hareuveni
November 21, 2009

Sometimes you don't need more than a sax and a drum set. Tenor saxophonist Jon Irabagon--winner of the 2008 Thelonious Monk Saxophone Competition and a potent and articulate front man of the post-modern be-bop quartet Mostly Others Do The Killing--and versatile drummer Mike Pride--a collaborator of Anthony Braxton and punk outfits such as Millions of Dead Cops--prove this point on their first recorded duet. It is a powerful and dynamic exhibition of flowing improvisation that does not bind itself to ...