Jazz Articles about Django Bates

About Django Bates

Album Review

Oud-master Anouar Brahem's instantly intoxicating, Blue Maqams, caps off a truly remarkable year for ECM Records. Just think, the label's release schedule this year included essential recordings by Benedikt Jahnel Trio's The Invariant, Django Bates' breakthrough The Study of Touch, Colin Vallon Trio's Danse, Vijay Iyer Sextet's Far From Over, and Gary Peacock's Tangents, all of them at once mysterious, challenging, and ultimately rewarding upon each listen. A magam defines traditional Arab musical phrases, tones, notes and melodies ...

Album Review

Anouar Brahem: Blue Maqams

Read "Blue Maqams" reviewed by Mark Sullivan

by Mark Sullivan
November 3, 2017

Tunisian oudist/composer Anouar Brahem has been playing with jazz improvisers since the 1980s. But his earliest ECM recordings, Barzakh (1991) and Conte de l'Incroyable Amour (1992) stayed firmly in the Arabic music tradition. His recordings with jazz players began with Madar (1994) with saxophonist Jan Garbarek and tabla player Shaukat Hussain; Thimar (1997) with bassist Dave Holland and saxophonist John Surman made a fuller synthesis of both traditions. Blue Maqams takes the approach further, bringing Brahem's Arabic music to a ...

Album Review

Django Bates: The Study of Touch

Read "The Study of Touch" reviewed by Karl Ackermann

by Karl Ackermann
October 20, 2017

Pianist, horn player, composer, and all-around musical disruptor, Django Bates brings back his Belovèd Trio for a third go-round, this time with The Study of Touch, his ECM leader debut. Bates--over his renowned career--has recorded in a full range of scenarios; a solo pianist on Autumn Fires (and Green Shoots) (JMT, 1994) and recently, a musician/arranger/conductor of the Frankfurt Radio Big Band on Saluting Sgt. Pepper (Edition Records, 2017), Bates is at home in any setting. As the ...

Album Review

Anouar Brahem: Blue Maqams

Read "Blue Maqams" reviewed by John Kelman

by John Kelman
October 13, 2017

Following an unusually long, five-year gap between 2009's low register-driven The Astounding Eyes of Rita and 2014's particularly ambitious orchestral collaboration, Souvenance, Tunisian oudist Anouar Brahem returns with Blue Maqams, another game-changing release on ECM Records. Change--or, in some cases, natural evolution--has never been hard to find on Brahem's previous nine albums for the label, the oudist's consistent home (barring his soundtrack to The Silences of the Palace, release in 1994 by Caroline) since his ethno-centric trio date, Barzakh (1991). ...

Album Review

Django Bates: Beloved

Read "Beloved" reviewed by Mike Jurkovic

by Mike Jurkovic
October 10, 2017

With boundless humor and flexible grace, pianist Django Bates offers us The Study of Touch the perfect piano trio music for the significant other who absolutely hates piano trio music. This is the first I have heard of Django Bates though he has been making shrewd music since 1979. He has played with a host of names, including former Yes and King Crimson drummer Bill Bruford; fellow free thinking percussionist George Russell, and musical chaos master and ECM ...

Album Review

Anouar Brahem: Blue Maqams

Read "Blue Maqams" reviewed by Mario Calvitti

by Mario Calvitti
October 9, 2017

Fin dal suo disco d'esordio (Barzakh del 1991, pubblicato, come tutti i successivi lavori, dalla ECM e preceduto solo da alcune cassette autoprodotte) il compositore e suonatore di oud tunisino Anouar Brahem è stato tra i principali esponenti di una musica a cavallo tra Medio Oriente e Occidente, cercando una fusione tra musica araba, improvvisazione jazzistica e musica classica europea, insieme al coetaneo collega libanese Rabih Abou-Khalil che lo ha preceduto di qualche anno. Il suo ultimo lavoro, Blue Maqams, ...

Album Review

Django Bates: Saluting Sgt. Pepper

Read "Saluting Sgt. Pepper" reviewed by Roger Farbey

by Roger Farbey
June 23, 2017

This was always going to be a tall order, even for the likes of the ever-resourceful Django Bates. But it had to be done. The Beatles masterwork passed its fiftieth birthday this year and is arguably the most influential album of popular music recorded to date. Some of the many anniversary celebrations revealed that Pepper should have included “Strawberry Fields Forever" and “Penny Lane" but due to the need for a hit single to tied the band over during the ...