Jazz Articles about Carla Bley

About Carla Bley

Live Review

Big Ears Festival Knoxville, TN March 23-26, 2017 Knoxville's Big Ears Festival expanded to a full four days this year, giving it more time to go its expected merry, eclectic way. In a break with usual practice, there was no official Composer in Residence. That distinction could have gone to Gavin Bryars (with four concerts of his music)--or possibly Carla Bley (two concerts), Meredith Monk (two performances), or Henry Threadgill (who won the Pulitzer Prize for ...

Album Review

Charlie Haden Liberation Music Orchestra: Time / Life

Read "Time / Life" reviewed by Giuseppe Segala

by Giuseppe Segala
December 12, 2016

Due anni dopo la scomparsa di Charlie Haden si pubblica questo ultimo documento della sua Liberation Music Orchestra, un lavoro che il compianto contrabbassista progettò ma che non ebbe modo di portare a compiuta realizzazione. Vessillo del suo impegno civile e umano, l'orchestra era nata nel 1969 raccogliendo una pletora di musicisti straordinari, molti dei quali oggi non sono più con noi: Don Cherry, Gato Barbieri, Dewey Redman, Paul Motian. L'album è forse diverso da quello che sarebbe ...

Album Review

Carla Bley, Andy Sheppard, Steve Swallow: Andando el Tiempo

Read "Andando el Tiempo" reviewed by Angelo Leonardi

by Angelo Leonardi
September 26, 2016

Carla Bley ha festeggiato gli ottant'anni assieme ai partner a lei più vicini da quando ha smesso di condurre formazioni orchestrali. Oltre a essere suo compagno di vita, Steve Swallow collabora con la pianista e compositrice dalla fine degli anni settanta mentre Andy Sheppard ha iniziato la partnership un decennio dopo. Eppure questo trio, davvero sublime, non ha una ricca storia discografica: ha debuttato nel 1994 con Songs with Legs e solo nel 2013 ha inciso il secondo volume, Trios. ...

Live Review

Carla Bley Trio e Stefano Bollani Napoli Trip a Valdarno Jazz

by Neri Pollastri
August 3, 2016

Valdarno Jazz Terranova Bracciolini e San Giovanni Valdarno 11 e 18.7.2016 Giunto alla ventisettesima edizione, il festival Valdarno Jazz ha anche in quest'anno di crescenti ristrettezze finanziarie offerto un programma di altissimo profilo, curato da Daniele Malvisi, che ha visto la presenza di formazioni di prima scelta del panorama nazionale come la Riccardo Fassi Tankio Band 5tet in “Plays Frank Zappa" e il quintetto Frontal di Simone Graziano, con David Binney e Dan Kinzelman. Ma ...

Extended Analysis

Carla Bley: Andando el Tiempo

by John Kelman
May 6, 2016

A few months shy of three years following the release of Trios (ECM, 2013), composer/keyboardist and NEA Jazz Master Carla Bley returns with Andando el Tiempo, an album of largely introspective music that shares much with its predecessor, but also acts as a flip side of the same coin. Like Trios, Andando el Tiempo was recorded in Lugano, Italy (albeit in two different rooms) and brings back the same trio that first appeared on 1994's Songs With Legs ...

Album Review

Carla Bley/Andy Sheppard/Steve Swallow: Andando el Tiempo

Read "Andando el Tiempo" reviewed by Karl Ackermann

by Karl Ackermann
April 26, 2016

There are few figures in modern music that are truly more iconic than Carla Bley. Her list of accomplishments are impossible to chronicle in this limited space, but suffice to say that her influence traverses genres, styles and generations, in a way that perhaps no other artist has approached. Her early crowning jewel—the jazz opera Escalator Over The Hill (JCOA Records, 1971)—featured a who's-who of music including Jack Bruce, Linda Ronstadt, Don Cherry, Don Preston, Charlie Haden, Michael Mantler, Karen ...

Live Review

Tribute to Carla Bley: Mandala Octet and Mandala Orchestra

by Harry S. Pariser
June 16, 2015

Mandala Octet and Mandala Orchestra SFJAZZ San Francisco, CA June 5, 2015 Steve McQuarry had an epiphany last December. While on the phone with Karen Mantler, daughter of eminent avant-garde jazz composer Carla Bley, McQuarry realized that he would like to play some of her tunes onstage, and Mantler offered to send him the charts. A package containing the charts duly arrived, and McQuarry went about assembling a big band. The results ...