Jazz Articles

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Take Five With Jake Hanlon

by AAJ Staff
August 8, 2009

Meet Jake Hanlon: Performer, composer and educator, Jake Hanlon currently resides in Antigonish Nova Scotia, a Professor of Music at Saint Francis Xavier University.

A native of Nova Scotia Canada, Hanlon has had the opportunity to work some of the brightest and talented students and teachers in the world. In 2003 he graduated with Honors from Saint Francis Xavier University with a Bachelor of Music in Jazz Studies. In 2007 he was hired as a Graduate Teaching Fellow at the ...

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Fred Anderson: Staying in the Game

by Jerry D'Souza
August 8, 2009

Tenor saxophonist Fred Anderson, one of the founding members of the Associateion for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) has a spotty recording output. This creative force in free jazz has made amends over the last five years with strong CDs including Timeless: Live at the Velvet Lounge (Delmark, 2006), Back Together Again (Thrill Jockey, 2004) and From the River to the Ocean (Thrill Jockey, 2007), on which he showed that he could still play with creative energy. He continues ...

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Eric Mintel: Ground Breaker

by Hrayr Attarian
August 8, 2009

The title of a record may be misleading, and even when it promises more than it delivers, it doesn't necessarily mean that the music is of poor quality. Eric Mintel's Ground Breaker does no such thing but it is a solid, well above average effort in the post bop tradition.

The original tunes are all complex, intricate compositions by Mintel, allowing each musician plenty of solo space. The music has the loose swinging beat of 1950s Blue Note recordings, but ...

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Jack Reilly Trio: Live at Dean Clough

by Samuel Chell
August 7, 2009

Jack Reilly Trio Live At Dean Clough Dean Clough Unichrom 2007

After composing, performing and recording a work motivated by and patterned after a struggle with a life- threatening illness (Innocence: Green Spring Suite, Unichrom, 2007), Jack Reilly might be expected to lighten up on his sequel. Recorded in March 2007, even the cover of Live at Dean Clough, depicting the pianist in an English pub apparently enjoying a leisurely ...

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Donny McCaslin: Declaration

by Troy Collins
August 7, 2009

Venturing into unexplored territory, New York-based tenor saxophonist Donny McCaslin's third recording for Sunnyside Records is a marked departure from his previous release, the stripped-down trio session Recommended Tools (Greenleaf, 2008). Augmenting his working ensemble with an understated brass section, Declaration showcases McCaslin's stellar skills as an improviser while demonstrating his mettle as a burgeoning writer and arranger.

Renowned for his Olympian tenor solos, McCaslin's facile interpretive abilities were honed under the tutelage of George Garzone and Billy ...

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Davey Graham / Dave Evans / Duck Baker / Dan Ar Bras: Irish Reels, Jigs, Hornpipes, and Airs

by David Rickert
August 7, 2009

Irish Reels, Jigs, Hornpipes, and Airs is the rare acoustic guitar CD that isn't dominated by Leo Kottke-style wizardry or a John Fahey influence. It's also a rare example of Irish music played traditionally and not with the ethereal trappings of new age music. It's perhaps no surprise, then, that it's necessary to travel back to 1979 to find an album filled with modest pleasures such as this one.

Only two of the four guitarists on this album ...

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Eclectica: Streaming Video Soul

by John Kelman
August 7, 2009

After years building an audience one town at a time, banjoist Béla Fleck and the Flecktones no longer needs to record and tour incessantly, allowing its members to pursue other avenues. With Fleck off pursuing his Throw Down Your Heart, Tales from the Acoustic Planet, Vol. 3: Africa Sessions (Rounder, 2009), bassist Victor Wooten collaborating with fellow icons Stanley Clarke and Marcus Miller as S.M.V and woodwind multi-instrumentalist Jeff Coffin helping out the Dave Matthews Band on Big Whiskey and ...

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Jazz Orchestras

by Nick Catalano
August 7, 2009

This excerpt appears in New York Nights: Performing, Producing and Writing in Gotham (IUniverse, 2008). In addition to the productions of the dance band shows, being a Performing Arts producer meant that I had the opportunity to present artists from every genre imaginable. I steadfastly tried to adhere to some sense of objectivity listening carefully to comments and requests from students, faculty and patrons from the outside communities. Often, imaginative ideas arose out of discussions with these groups ...

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Max Nagl / Clemens Wenger / Herbert Pirker: Boulazac

by Glenn Astarita
August 7, 2009

Austrian reedman and multi-instrumentalist Max Nagle has recorded for several, prominent European modern jazz labels. He's a master craftsman who resides as one of the wittiest performers within the new music and progressive jazz realms. From album to album, Nagl pulls previously undetected tricks out of his bag as his artistry equates to a marvel of invention to coincide with this democratic trio engagement.

With Boulazac, Nagl seamlessly fuses disparate genres into a jazzy feast. On the opening ...

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Jeff Lashway: Reunion

by Nicholas F. Mondello
August 7, 2009

Throughout the decades, the bands of trumpet legend Maynard Ferguson were, by very nature, heavily brass and ensemble section oriented. Occasionally, Ferguson's pianists were given the opportunity to shine, launching into extended solo tune introductions or brief solos. Some of those pianists were (or would become) stars or leaders in their own right. They included Mike Abene, Allan Zavod, Pete Jackson, Jaki Byard, Bob James, Christian Jacob and others. Even Chick Corea did a short stint before returning to forever. ...