Jazz Articles about Greg Chako

Greg Chako: Standard Roots

by Edward Blanco
June 2, 2024

Cincinnati-based veteran jazz guitarist and composer Greg Chako presents his 17th album as leader with the light and tender Standard Roots, returning to his musical foundation of performing in the guitar trio format as he joins forces, once again, with two stalwart players of the Cincinnati jazz scene, bassist Mason Daugherty and drummer Michael Meloy. An international recording artist, with a major portion of his discography having been released throughout Asia, Japan and Singapore, Chako has always drawn on his ...

Greg Chako Trio: Life After 40

by Edward Blanco
November 9, 2023

Cincinnati-born jazz guitarist and international recording artist Greg Chako wears many hats including composer, arranger, educator and band leader. Chako has forged an extraordinary career spanning over thirty-five years in which he has recorded sixteen albums. Life After 40 is a follow-up to previous studio recordings Friends, Old & New (Mint 400 Records 2022) and A Place for Bass-Chamber Jazz Duets (Mint 400 Records 2022) marking a new chapter in his life, recording in the US after his return from ...

Greg Chako: Friends, Old & New

by Edward Blanco
November 16, 2022

Guitarist Greg Chako has always considered himself a composer and arranger first and foremost over his abilities as a player. After a long chapter in his life where he performed and produced music in Asia, his return to the states and coming back home to Cincinnati, has energized the guitarist and filled him with a new sense of purpose, resuming his prolific music career by signing with a new label (Mint 400 Records), re-releasing previously produced recordings and finally presenting ...

Greg Chako: Sudden Impact

by Edward Blanco
July 23, 2022

Cincinnati-based guitarist Greg Chako spent many years in Asia, living and performing in various countries including Japan, China and Singapore. He produced several albums during his time abroad, assembling a discography that has not been readily available to American jazz fans. Sudden Impact, originally released in 1996, is the first of several re-releases on the Mint 400 Records label designed to expose Chako's music to a wider audience. Staying within the straight-ahead tradition, the album presents seven re-imagined versions of ...

Greg Chako: Everybody's Got A Name

by Michael P. Gladstone
June 29, 2008

Guitarist/composer/bandleader Greg Chako has recorded in varied venues and formats—performing in duet, trio and here in quartet. Paint A Picture, Tell A Story (CPB, 2007) even made use of marquee names Don Byron and Delfeayo Marsalis. It remains a mystery why he hasn't achieved wider acclaim and better gigs. Perhaps the use of a creative album cover could make a difference.Chako and the members of his quartet make use of classic jazz album covers in which the fonts, ...

Everybody's Got A Name

by Edward Blanco
March 23, 2008

Greg Chako Everybody's Got A Name Self Published 2008

Guitarist and composer Greg Chako is the consummate musician who, despite personal hardships in his life, dedicates himself to the art of jazz with every fiber of his being, producing one fine album after another. Everybody's Got a Name is his ninth album overall, and fourth in a little over a two-year period. The music contained in his previous releases explored the expressive ...

Greg Chako: Paint A Picture, Tell A Story

by Michael P. Gladstone
December 10, 2007

Perhaps reviewing guitarist Greg Chako's Where We Find Ourselves (CPB, 2006) and Two's Company, Three's A Crowd Jazz Duets (CPB, 2006), explains why his adventures, both musical and otherwise, remain amazing.

From Boston's Berklee College of Music, Chako relocated to New York, where he discovered his talent for culinary arts. In Amherst, Massachusetts, working as a chef, Chako found that he had talent as a jazz promoter of concerts and festivals, which also gave him access ...