Jazz Articles about Ben Wittman

About Ben Wittman

Album Review

Whitney Ross-Barris: Curtains of Light

Read "Curtains of Light" reviewed by Pierre Giroux

by Pierre Giroux
March 1, 2026

On Curtains of Light, Whitney Ross-Barris offers a subtly ambitious work that resists easy classification while remaining deeply grounded in songwriting, tone, and emotional honesty. Blending jazz phrasing with a range of musical and non-musical forms, this 13-track cycle feels less like a collection of songs and more like a thoughtfully curated journal of recent years, shaped by the sensitive musicianship of Michael Shand and Drew Jurecka. The opening moments establish a reflective tone, soon brightened by “Bourgeois ...

Album Review

Laila Biali: Wintersongs

Read "Wintersongs" reviewed by Pierre Giroux

by Pierre Giroux
November 10, 2024

Laila Biali is an award-winning Canadian singer-songwriter and pianist whose recording Wintersongs offers an immersive journey into the delicate beauty and serene power of winter all through the lens of her jazz and classical roots. With two exceptions, all tracks were composed by Biali in a cabin surrounded by snow-capped mountains in the heart of Canada's Rocky Mountains. Many of Biali's usual collaborators participated in this production, including drummer Ben Wittman, renowned flutist and soprano saxophonist Jane Bunnett, accomplished trumpeter ...

Album Review

Laila Biali: Your Requests

Read "Your Requests" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
May 16, 2023

While the jazz pipeline produces plenty of artists who pay no mind to an audience's interests, those types--figures with tunnel vision, in many if not most ways--rarely reach their full potential. Instead, it's the musicians who make it a point to communicate who tend to forge the strongest bonds with those on the receiving end. Laila Biali is one such figure. This JUNO-winning gem of a vocalist, pianist, arranger and songwriter always manages to connect. Biali has a keen awareness ...

Album Review

Linda Carone: So Many Beautiful Men, So Little Time

Read "So Many Beautiful Men, So Little Time" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey

by C. Michael Bailey
July 7, 2020

Canadian vocalist Linda Carone specializes in what she calls “vintage" jazz and blues. The sound is that of the music originally emerging from New Orleans Dixieland or traditional jazz as it headed upriver to Chicago before catching a train for Prohibition-era New York City. Her debut recording, Black Moonlight (Self Produced, 2017) is a historically-informed collection of speakeasy music, organically rendered and enjoyed. Carone returns three years later with a single release to brighten our time of COVID-19 ...

Album Review

9 Horses: Perfectest Herald

Read "Perfectest Herald" reviewed by Budd Kopman

by Budd Kopman
October 13, 2015

Perfectest Herald is another release that stretches the label “jazz" or even that of “creative improvised music" as it casts its spell and ultimately becomes completely enveloping. 9 Horses, the trio put together by composer and mandolin virtuoso Joseph Brent, consists of two other extraordinary players: violinist Sara Caswell and bassist Shawn Conley who seem just perfect for Brent's music. What is heard is a wonderful mixing of many styles and genres, including classical, jazz and folk which ...