Jazz Articles

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Take Five With Bill McBirnie

by AAJ Staff
November 3, 2009

Meet Bill McBirnie:Bill McBirnie is a jazz and Latin flute specialist and has studied with renowned American flutist, Samuel Baron, distinguished Canadian flutist and composer, Robert Aitken, and Cuban charanga legend, Richard Egues. He is recognized as a consummate technician and an accomplished improviser -notably in the bebop, swing and Latin idioms -as demonstrated by his recordings as a sideman with Junior Mance, Irakere, Memo Acevedo, Cache and Emilie-Claire Barlow. He has also produced two straight-ahead acoustic jazz recordings under ...

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Roberta Gambarini: Learning to Love Jazz

by Samuel Chell
November 3, 2009

Not long ago a veteran Chicago jazz disc jockey played a track from a female vocalist's new CD only after complaining on the air about the seemingly unending stream of new recordings by female singers sent to his notice each week. The exception to his policy not to play them was due, he explained, to the sender's being a close friend and loyal listener of the show.From the evidence, the radio announcer's observations about the number of vocal ...

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Ben Neill: Starting a Dub War

by James Taylor
November 3, 2009

To say that Ben Neill plays the trumpet--the instrument of such jazz legends as Miles Davis and Clifford Brown--is an epic understatement. “I think electronica is like a new form of jazz--it's an instrumental form of music that plays out in popular culture but has musical ideas that go beyond the expectations of pop music," says Neill, a student of the electro-acoustic innovations of Robert Moog and minimalist aesthetic of LaMonte Young. Neill specifically plays the mutantrumpet, a self-designed instrument ...

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1959: The Year Classic Albums Were Born

by R.J. DeLuke
November 2, 2009

When the year 1959 began, there were only 48 states. Alaska and Hawaii would became part of the United States during that annum, the third year of President Dwight D. Eisenhower's second term. It was the year Fidel Castro came to power in Cuba and took a goodwill tour of the U.S., two months after an interview with Edward R. Murrow on CBS television.

Mattel toy company launched the Barbie doll. In professional basketball, the Celtics beat the ...

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Matthew Halsall: Colour Yes

by Chris May
November 2, 2009

Just gorgeous. Manchester-based trumpeter Matthew Halsall's second album ploughs the same delicate, acoustic, modal jazz furrow as his debut, Sending My Love (Gondwana, 2008). The lineup of fellow Mancunians is much the same too, with flautist Roger Wickham replaced by harpist Rachael Gladwin on three of the six tracks. Just so there's no mistaking where Halsall is coming from, the cover art is also a near-clone of that used on the first disc. Colour Yes will delight fans ...

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David Widelock Trio: Skating on the Sidewalk

by Raul d'Gama Rose
November 2, 2009

Skating on the Sidewalk is a record where myriad disparate musically idiomatic journeys collide with dash and splash on the concrete of urban modernity. It is a musical journey that begins from so many directions --the spare blue sogginess of the Delta, multi-hued blue New Orleans, and blue and windy Chicago. There is also a trip and a sustained whirl in swinging New York and even the mysterious saudades of Brazil. All of this lands sliding, thumping, and grinding on ...

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Neal Miner: Happy Hour

by David A. Orthmann
November 2, 2009

A thirty-two measure intro to “Bye, Bye, Baby" typifies the traits which animate Happy Hour, bassist Neal Miner's recent release on his Gut String Records imprint. After drummer Joe Strasser's snapping fingers establish a firm, uncluttered pulse, pianist Michael Kanan and Miner play a single chorus of eight-, four-, two- and one-bar exchanges. Their flawless execution of courtly, bebop-oriented lines simulates a continuous chain of thought. Like all of the tracks on the record, this neat prelude to Jule Styne's ...

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Various Artists: Contemporary Ragtime Guitar

by David Rickert
November 2, 2009

Most people's knowledge of ragtime doesn't go past a few classic Scott Joplin compositions, and practitioners of the style today (not to mention composers) are few and far between. However, there has always been a small cadre of guitarists devoted to playing traditional and original ragtime tunes, and most of them are quite good at adapting the highly syncopated musical form to an unlikely instrument. Contemporary Ragtime Guitar is one of the few compilations devoted entirely to ragtime guitar and, ...

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Take Five With Jon O'Bergh

by AAJ Staff
November 2, 2009

Meet Jon O'Bergh: Known as the “Jedi of Cool," keyboardist Jon O'Bergh refuses to be pigeonholed in one genre of music. He is adept in a variety of styles including rock, jazz, funk, electronic lounge, ambient--the list goes on. During the past five years, Jon has performed and recorded with the nu-jazz/funk/fusion band Gemini Soul. His experience with Gemini Soul led him to fuse his various influences into a new style. The result is Specters of Twilight, his debut album ...

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Punkt in Mannheim: Enjoy Jazz Festival: Days 11-12, October 30-31, 2009

by John Kelman
November 2, 2009

Days 1-2 | Day 3-6 | Days 7-10 | Days 11-12Since its inception in 2005, the Norwegian Punkt festival has been gaining an international reputation for innovation and creativity. With a founding premise of Live Remix--where individual concerts, crossing the breadth of jazz but also beyond, are remixed immediately following the performance with other musicians interacting with the remixers- -Punkt is more than a music festival, it's a movable feast. All that's required is a venue that has ...