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Jazz Articles about Jeff Tain Watts
Michael Dease: City Life: Music of Gregg Hill
by Paul Rauch
Michigan-based composer Gregg Hill is on a remarkable roll, authoring an impressive run of compositions represented on eight albums released on the Origin Records label. Each has featured a bandleader associated with the top shelf staff at Rodney Whitaker's jazz program at Michigan State University. City Life (2025) is the third under the leadership of trombone great Michael Dease. The two-disc release includes 19 compositions from Hill, and features a cast of some of the most powerful voices in jazz ...
Continue ReadingMichael Dease: City Life: Music of Gregg Hill
by Dan McClenaghan
Jazz trios featuring a horn, bass and drums get right to the core of musical expression. With, most commonly, a saxophone--see Sonny Rollins' blueprint for the horn and trio setting, the 1957 Contemporary Records album Way Out West--the music flows freely. The players do not need to chase chords around. The result is a stretching of the melodies with freewheeling rhythmic finesse. Trombone, bass and drums outings are rare, but Michael Dease goes for it on CD 1 ...
Continue ReadingArt Baden: How Much of It Is Real
by Troy Dostert
Continuing its well-established mission of documenting some of the noteworthy Russian musicians in today's jazz, the Rainy Days label offers another up-and-comer, tenor saxophonist Art Baden. Joined by three seasoned veterans, Baden provides both fire and sensitivity on his debut disc, How Much of It Is Real--and it is a promising effort all-around. Bassist Jay Anderson, vibraphonist Joe Locke and drummer Jeff Tain Watts will need no introduction to serious followers of mainstream jazz, and they give Baden ...
Continue ReadingDoug Wamble: Blues in the Present Tense
by Vic Albani
I testi cantati del “Blues al presente" di Doug Wamble parlano degli americani “turlupinati" dal cinismo del signor Donald Trump: «Non leggere i loro giornali / Non guardare le loro news / Non cominciare a pensare, baby», canta Wamble in “Blues in the Present Tense," mettendosi proprio nei panni del discusso personaggio mettendo in qualche modo in guardia i connazionali in relazione alle prossime presidenziali. Trattandosi di una realtà quale quella statunitense, l'uso del blues quale “strumento di trasmissione," sembrerebbe ...
Continue ReadingDavid Kikoski: Surf's Up
by C. Andrew Hovan
It seems that the show tunes of the '30s, '40s, and '50s have served as fodder for several generations of jazz musicians, either providing their own melodies for subsequent development or lending their harmonic framework for the jazz writer to use as a basis for an original tune. Most recently, we've seen attention begin to shift to popular material of the current set with some interesting results. Pianist Kenny Barron has recorded a delicate version of Sting's “Fragile," Bob Belden ...
Continue ReadingConrad Herwig: Land of Shadow
by C. Andrew Hovan
In the spirit of Miles Davis and a select number of his followers, Conrad Herwig in the course of his musical endeavors spanning some 20 years has strived to keep the music inching forward to new and previously undiscovered vistas. His versatility as demonstrated by an ability to transcend genres, be it Eddie Palmieri's Afro-Cuban muse or the repertory bent of the Mingus Big Band, also raises its head in his outstanding series of Criss Cross recordings that began with ...
Continue ReadingMichael Feinberg: Hard Times
by Troy Dostert
Although the Covid pandemic has been devastating to the artistic community, and certainly jazz musicians are no exception, albums like Michael Feinberg's Hard Times point to the possibility of hopeful resilience. With a top-shelf bunch of colleagues and smart compositions with rhythmically crafty arrangements, the bassist's eighth release is a winner, with a plucky spirit and satisfying grooves in abundance. Feinberg pulled this band together in October 2020, and with folks like drummer Jeff “Tain" Watts and pianist ...
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