Jazz Articles about Bob Mintzer

The Bob Mintzer Big Band: Live at MCG with Kurt Elling

by Jack Bowers
September 25, 2004

Bob Mintzer leads a superlative big band with seasoned pros in every chair, but what really gives the engine its get-up-and-go are the maestro's invariably admirable charts, unerring road maps that always ensure a smooth and delightful journey. This first-ever live album by the ensemble, recorded in May '02 at the Manchester Craftsmen's Guild in Pittsburgh, PA, is at its best on the half-dozen instrumentals, even though guest vocalist Kurt Elling does what he can to jump-start the other three. ...

The Abercrombie/Erskine/Mintzer/Patitucci Band: Live in New York City

by John Kelman
June 26, 2004

While Hudson Music is primarily known for their instructional videos and, more recently, DVDs, the fact is that many of their titles, while academically interesting for the student, are worthwhile to the non-musician for their exceptional concert footage. They have been reissuing some of their more popular video titles on DVD, and it's as good a time as any to take stock of what they have to offer. Case in point is the 1998 concert/clinic held by 'supergroup' guitarist John ...

Bob Mintzer: Gently

by Elliott Simon
December 6, 2003

There are instances as a guy gets older when he thinks he is turning into his father. I had just such a moment as I began to listen to Gently from tenor saxophonist Bob Mintzer's Big Band. I saw myself as my father, listening to his mood music that came in large boxes from Reader's Digest every month. Whereas I used to make light of this particular aspect of his musical taste, as the classical sounding “Gently" with its soft ...

The Bob Mintzer Big Band: Gently

by Jack Bowers
February 3, 2003

Bob Mintzer, who is known to favor fiery Latin rhythms and big-band charts with an abundance of punch and power, has a softer side too, one that is laid bare on this understated but no less invigorating new release, his fourteenth (or fifteenth? I've lost count) on the dmp label. 'I think I've... reached a point,' Mintzer writes, 'where I can appreciate the subtlety factor in music and in life, where I would just as soon be gently caressed rather ...

The Bob Mintzer Big Band: Homage to Count Basie

by Jack Bowers
January 1, 2001

Anyone who can take my least favorite Basie recording, “April in Paris,” and make it sound as captivating as Bob Mintzer does on Homage to Count Basie (no “one more time!” or “one more once!”) has earned an enthusiastic thumbs–up without taking another step. But the talented tenor overlord doesn’t stop there; he “Mintzerizes” four other tunes associated with the Basie band and blends in three of his own compositions to produce a banquet fit for (the ears of) a ...

The SWR Big Band Featuring Bob Mintzer: The Music of Duke Ellington and Bob Mintzer

by Jack Bowers
December 1, 2000

To celebrate the centenary of Duke Ellington’s birth, Germany’s SWR Big Band joined forces with American saxophonist / big band leader Bob Mintzer for a May ’99 concert performance in Stuttgart that includes half a dozen compositions by Ellington (or associates) and four others by Mintzer. While considerable resourcefulness is needed to transmute any of these timeworn Ellington–style warhorses into front–runners again, Mintzer and the SWR’s Jörg–Achim Keller, each of whom arranged three of them, manage easily to do so, ...

John Abercrombie, Peter Erskine, Bob Mintzer, John Patitucci: The Hudson Project

by Jim Santella
May 1, 2000

Recorded live at The Manhattan Center in New York on October 17, 1998 and produced by Rob Walls & Paul Siegel for Hudson Music, Ltd., under exclusive license to Stretch Records, Inc., this innovative quartet comes together with a wallop. Each of the foursome is an experienced leader, and each artist meets the criteria of Chick Corea’s Stretch label. The session is adventuresome, modern, and of high quality.

Each member of the quartet supplied two compositions for this performance. Bob ...