Jazz Articles about Chad Taylor

About Chad Taylor

Album Review

Tom Abbs & Frequency Response: Hawthorne

Read "Hawthorne" reviewed by Karl Ackermann

by Karl Ackermann
September 9, 2018

Bassist and multi-instrumentalist Tom Abbs began his Frequency Response series in 2003 with Conscription (CIMP Records). The group--then a quartet--included tenor saxophonist Brian Settles and drummer Chad Taylor. Alto saxophonist Jason Candler, violinists Jean Cook and Jenna Barvitski are later additions to Frequency Response. On their long-awaited fourth album Hawthorne, Abbs again stands in as a one-man orchestra, playing bass, cello, piano, and tuba. Abbs, primarily known as a free improvisational bassist is also an accomplished filmmaker, having ...

Album Review

Tom Abbs & Frequency Response: Hawthorne

by Don Phipps
August 23, 2018

On his album Hawthorne, Brooklyn-based Tom Abbs showcases his mastery of several instruments and writing styles. Combining free, hard bop, world, and blues styles, Abbs's compositions juxtapose explosive exposés of new music with idioms that hearken back to ancient times. Abbs is joined by Jean Cook and Jenna Barvitski on violin, Brian Settles on tenor, Chad Taylor on drums, and Jason Candler on bass clarinet and alto sax. Abbs handles the chores on bass, tuba, piano, and cello. ...

Album Review

Chad Taylor: Myths and Morals

Read "Myths and Morals" reviewed by Jakob Baekgaard

by Jakob Baekgaard
June 22, 2018

In the beginning of it all: one sound, one language, but then there was the fall of Babel. One tongue turned into many. Difference became a reality and a way of exclusion. A myth can both unite and exclude like morality can judge and misjudge. The past becomes separated from the present and the future is already on the horizon. How can one find a way back to that unity of space, music as the beating heart, the breathing lungs? ...

Interview

Chad Taylor: Myths and Music Education

by Jakob Baekgaard
April 9, 2018

Few drummers know how to use rhythms like Chad Taylor. He makes the drum set sing melodies and paints different hues and shades on the cymbals and skins. He can play inside and outside and has performed with musicians like saxophonists Fred Anderson, Pharoah Sanders and James Brandon Lewis, pianists Cooper-Moore and Angelica Sanchez, guitarists Jeff Parker and Marc Ribot, bassist Joshua Abrams and trumpeter Rob Mazurek, just to name a few. Back in 2009, Taylor released Circle ...

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Album Review

Chad Taylor: Circle Down

Read "Circle Down" reviewed by Troy Collins

by Troy Collins
October 23, 2009

In-demand indie rock session player (Sam Prekop, Iron and Wine) and co-founder of the Chicago Underground with Rob Mazurek, drummer Chad Taylor has quickly become an indispensable part of the New York scene since his relocation from Chicago in 2000. His recurrent collaborations with Cooper-Moore, Jemeel Moondoc, and Marc Ribot feature his talents in a wide variety of settings, but none quite as dynamic as the ensemble documented on Circle Down, the debut of his trio with pianist Angelica Sanchez ...

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Album Review

Chad Taylor: Circle Down

Read "Circle Down" reviewed by Mark F. Turner

by Mark F. Turner
October 20, 2009

With an insatiable appetite for music on the fringe, drummer Chad Taylor has been an active participant in the creative music environments of both Chicago and New York. In Chicago, he's been a member of Fred Anderson's trio, Sticks and Stones with Matana Roberts, and the Chicago Underground ensembles with Rob Mazurek. In New York, he's performed with Digital Primitives, known for its visceral abstract funk, as well as with Marc Ribot's Spiritual Unity. Taylor, who was ...

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Album Review

Tom Abbs & Frequency Response: Lost & Found

Read "Lost & Found" reviewed by Jerry D'Souza

by Jerry D'Souza
August 18, 2009

Tom Abbs is a multi-instrumentalist who, besides violin and didgeridoo, plays bass, tuba and cello on this CD. He has enlivened the free jazz scene in New York, not only through his collaborations with Cooper-Moore and Steve Swell among others, but with his music as well. He thinks with a vivid imagination and as such injects his compositions with melody, free falling notes, jazz harmony and a picturesque development. The last may well spring from his role as film-maker.