Jazz Articles about Cliff Korman

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Carlos Malta and Cliff Korman: Saudade do Paulo

by Katchie Cartwright
April 23, 2026

Like many mid-20th-century jazz albums, Saudade do Paulo was recorded live in the studio (Biscoito Fino studios in Rio de Janeiro), without the sort of overdubs and retakes more typical of 21st-century projects. The release is digital-only, but what it lacks in physicality it makes up for in substantial liner notes and a sound that is intimate and conversational. Independently, the Brazilian flutist and saxophonist Carlos Malta and the American-born Brazil-based pianist and scholar Cliff Korman each had ...

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Cliff Korman: Urban Tracks

by Richard J Salvucci
March 2, 2025

An avid listener of Brazilian music could go crazy trying to figure out exactly where Cliff Korman comes down musicially. His opening track , “Cheio de Malicia" could almost be taken for some sort of stride-bossa--the same feel pops up on “Canhoto" too--with allusions to Kenny Barron, Vince Guaraldi, McCoy Tyner even. Paired with bassist Harvie S, who seems to top himself on each successive track, Korman's creativity and sheer musicianship is a delight, the “sound of surprise" if there ...

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Cliff Korman: Urban Tracks

by Katchie Cartwright
December 10, 2024

As ever, Urban Tracks finds pianist, arranger-composer and scholar Cliff Korman alchemizing, jazzifying choros and Brasilifying jazz tunes to create his own distinctive arrangements. Mood Ingênuo: Pixinguinha Meets Duke Ellington with Paulo Moura (Jazzheads, 1999), Brasilified (Tiger Turn, 2022) and Bossas and Ballads (Tiger Turn, 2024) are among other examples in his discography. He recorded Urban Tracks in his hometown, New York, with Brazilian drummer Rafael Barata and NYC bassist Harvie S, but these days Korman lives in Rio de ...

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Cliff Korman: Bossas and Ballads

by Katchie Cartwright
March 21, 2024

Pianist-composer Cliff Korman lives and works in Rio de Janeiro, where he serves on the faculty of the Instituto Villa Lobos at the Federal University. A New Yorker with a jazz degree from City College of New York, he trained under Roland Hanna, Ron Carter and Kenny Barron. His “musical journey," as he put it, began years earlier at the innovative Creative Music Studio in Woodstock founded by Karl Berger, Ingrid Sertso and Ornette Coleman. There, he encountered Brazilian clarinetist ...

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Thiago de Mello & Dexter Payne: Another Feeling

by Chris M. Slawecki
January 18, 2007

Have you ever walked alone through a quiet beautiful woodland and stepped into an open space full of nothing but warm and growing brightness, and felt like nature was a cathedral and you were seated in its front row? Another Feeling sounds just like that: completely, naturally, immaculate and beautiful.

Dexter Payne on clarinet and alto saxophone creates this Feeling with writer/ arranger Thiago de Mello on acoustic piano, guitar and “organic percussion, handmade instruments personally crafted from ...