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Jazz Articles about Alex Skolnick
PAKT at ShapeShifter Lab
by Mark Sullivan
PAKT ShapeShifter Lab Brooklyn, New York August 15, 2020 For their live stream concert from Brooklyn's ShapeShifter Lab, guitarists Alex Skolnick and Tim Motzer, fretless bass guitarist Percy Jones and drummer Kenny Grohowski followed New York's pandemic guidelines: they wore masks and maintained a six-foot social distance. So retroactively, organizer Leonardo Pavkovic dubbed the group PAKT. They are all very experienced players. Skolnick is best known as the lead guitarist in the thrash metal band ...
Continue ReadingAlex Skolnick: Transformation
by Andrey Henkin
Despite his best efforts, guitarist Alex Skolnick remains a novelty in the exclusive jazz community. Why he should care though is another question, given that as a thrash metal guitarist, he probably sold more records than Miles Davis. His decision to be reborn as a jazz player has been well documented, as has his movement to create a new set of standards based on the hard rock oeuvre. His second album continues this effort with the inclusion of material by ...
Continue ReadingAlex Skolnick Trio: Transformation
by John Kelman
Call me a jazz bigot. When I received Transformation by Alex Skolnick, apparently the ex-guitarist for thrash metal-heads Testament, my first thought was, “Great, another rocker trying to be a jazzer." Things didn't get better when I saw that Skolnick was interpreting material by Judas Priest, Pink Floyd, Deep Purple, Scorpions, Iron Maiden and--yes--Ronnie James Dio. Sure, plenty of serious jazz artists have approached contemporary singer/songwriters in recent years--Brad Mehldau, Charlie Hunter, even Herbie Hancock. But metal bands? I mean, ...
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