Jazz Articles about Ben Allison

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Ben Allison: Peace Pipe

by C. Michael Bailey
October 2, 2002

This is a novelty jazz recording. That does not make it a bad recording. It simply makes it a marketing and listening challenge for the more conservative jazz listener. It is a tough sell to introduce obscure instruments into the mainstream of jazz much less those foreign to anglophilic ears. The kora is an established African stringed instrument that enjoys a widespread popularity in Africa and has been used in crossover to Western popular music. When played, the sound recalls ...

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Ben Allison: Peace Pipe

by Jack Bowers
October 1, 2002

The kora, an African stringed instrument that sounds much like an Indian sitar or Persian santour, lends a tantalizing exotic flavor to bassist Ben Allison’s latest album, Peace Pipe, his fourth as leader for Palmetto Records. In the capable hands of Malian virtuoso Mamadou Diabate, the kora is more than a novelty but an integral part of Allison’s vision, one that illuminates and enchants whenever it appears, which is often (Diabate steps aside only on “Peace Pipe” and “Realization”). Drummer ...

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Ben Allison: Peace Pipe

by Mark Corroto
August 7, 2002

Enough already with labeling bassist Ben Allison in the “talent-deserving-wider- recognition" classification. He has certainly arrived, or at least he has made it without all the young lion baggage.

His carry on luggage includes establishing the Jazz Composers Collective ten years ago, a musician-run, non-profit dedicated to creative musicians new and inventive endeavors. Along with Frank Kimbrough, he has resurrected the somewhat lost music of the genius composer Herbie Nichols. Allison's Riding The Nuclear Tiger and the Herbie ...

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Michael Blake: Drift

by AAJ Staff
February 1, 2002

Blake is an improvising saxophonist who, because of his personal interests and the label he’s on, is often mistakenly relegated to the Worldbeat sections. To be honest, this disc only grabbed me halfway through, but when it did, it grabbed hard, and has sustained repeated listening.

The title cut, “Drift,” is echoed à la old ECM, and has lots of little percussion making the mournful tune very world-weary. Kimbrough, listed as playing only piano, is on an electric model. Scherr’s ...

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The Herbie Nichols Project: Strange City

by C. Andrew Hovan
December 1, 2001

Since 1992, the Herbie Nichols Project has been dedicated to performing the music of a gentleman who in his lifetime was sadly neglected but who left behind a body of work just as idiosyncratic and distinctive as that of Thelonious Monk. Following their two previous releases, Dr. Cyclop’s Dream and Love Is Proximity, the group now makes their debut on the Palmetto label with Strange City, a program made up almost exclusively by tunes that Nichols never recorded himself. Arguably, ...

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The Herbie Nichols Project: Strange City

by Mark Corroto
November 1, 2001

The Herbie Nichols Project releases its third recording of the one-time lost genius, Herbie Nichols. Co-led by bassist Ben Allison and pianist Frank Kimbrough, the HNP was created as part of the Jazz Composers Collective, a non-profit musician-run organization, to present original music. By choosing the work of Nichols, Allison and Kimbrough have re-ignited interest in a true genius of modern music.Herbie Nichols, born in 1919 in New York of immigrant parent from St. Kitt and Trinidad, was ...

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Ben Allison and Medicine Wheel: Riding the Nuclear Tiger

by Scott Andrews
June 1, 2001

Bassist Ben Allison founded the Jazz Composers Collective in New York City in 1992, and has been a centerpiece of that non-profit organization and the local jazz scene ever since. Allison leads his septet Medicine Wheel through nine shifty, modern jazz tunes on their third record Riding the Nuclear Tiger.The non-traditional instrumentation of Medicine Wheel, with a cellist and a versatile horn section, creates a spicy sonic palette to present Allison's tunes, as one of the saxophonists also ...