Jazz Articles about Jen Shyu

About Jen Shyu

Live Review

Jen Shyu, Luke Stewart, and Konjur Collective at Vision Festival 2026

by Fran Kursztejn
July 3, 2026

Jen Shyu, Luke Stewart, Konjur Collective Abrons Arts Center Vision FestivalNew York, NY June 24, 2026 The inaugural night of Vision Festival, despite the massive variety of musicians and instruments on display, did not feature any vocalists. During night two, vocalists made up a strong majority. Jen Shyu's “Fertile Bodies, Fertile Lands" conducted an ensemble of three string artists, a percussionist, a flautist, and the multi-instrumentalist Shyu herself, all of which double as vocalists. ...

Album Review

Lucian Ban, Mat Maneri: Oedipe Redux

Read "Oedipe Redux" reviewed by Neri Pollastri

by Neri Pollastri
August 5, 2024

Pur se da venticinque anni residente negli U.S.A., il pianista Lucian Ban non ha mai smesso di coltivare le sue radici rumene, che spesso anzi caratterizzano sottilmente la sua prolifica produzione artistica. In particolare, assieme al violista Mat Maneri --con il quale collabora assai spesso, contribuendo recentemente al suo album Ash --ha più volte proposto apprezzati lavori ispirati alla tradizione popolare rumena (Transilvanian Dance (ECM 2013), Transilvanian Folk Songs (Sunnyside 2020), mentre già nel 2010 aveva presentato sempre per Sunnyside ...

Album Review

Miles Okazaki: Miniature America

Read "Miniature America" reviewed by Alberto Bazzurro

by Alberto Bazzurro
July 31, 2024

Ventidue miniature svarianti da uno a sei minuti, con impegnati sottoinsiemi (o microgruppi, se preferite) estrapolati dal totale dei dieci elementi, sette strumentisti e tre cantanti, coinvolti nell'operazione, è quanto ci offre questo nuovo lavoro discografico (il dodicesimo, ci viene detto) a nome del cinquantenne chitarrista Miles Okazaki, con la partecipazione di svariati musicisti di punta dell'attuale scena newyorchese (e non). Ogni episodio possiede--fisiologicamente, verrebbe da dire--un aplomb cameristico di sicuro fascino, anche se è inevitabile che il ...

Live Review

Other Minds Festival 2021

by Roy Strassman
October 31, 2021

The Other Minds organization is the musical brain child of Charles Amirkhanian, who himself is a musician in addition to composer—and since 1993, also a producer. Other Minds is devoted to bringing both experimental and avant-garde music to a wider audience. What they often present falls most closely into the modern experimental (classical) music and free jazz realms. The OM 'association' presents an annual festival, which is always exciting and cutting edge. “Moment's Notice," the title this of year's festival, ...

Live Review

Other Minds 25, Day 1

by John Chacona
October 20, 2021

Day 1 | Day 2 | Day 3 | Day 4 Taube Atrium Theater Other Minds Festival San Francisco, CA October 14, 2021 When the organizers of San Francisco's Other Minds Festival chose Moment's Notice as the name of its 25th edition, it might have been with the hope that the difficulties of making pandemic-dictated snap decisions were behind them. Things didn't quite turn out that way. Travel plans for Wadada ...

Album Review

Jen Shyu and Jade Tongue: Zero Grasses: Ritual for The Losses

Read "Zero Grasses: Ritual for The Losses" reviewed by Hrayr Attarian

by Hrayr Attarian
July 28, 2021

Calling vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Jen Shyu brilliant, and her style unique, underestimates both her ingenuity as a composer and the distinctiveness of her oeuvre. Shyu has forged her own path in creative music with an intrepid spirit and restless innovation. Her eighth release as a leader is the intensely personal Zero Grasses: Ritual For The Losses. A cycle of songs which is equally about bereavement and injustice as it is about solace and hope, its message transcends the individual, reaching ...

Album Review

Jen Shyu: Song of the Silver Geese

Read "Song of the Silver Geese" reviewed by Angelo Leonardi

by Angelo Leonardi
June 18, 2018

Viene spesso definita una vocalist sperimentale Jen Shyu, ma questo disco conferma che è molto di più. Dopo aver collaborato stabilmente con Steve Coleman e ancora con Anthony Braxton, Bobby Previte, Mark Dresser, Chris Potter e altri grandi, la cantante americana di genitori orientali (Taiwan e Timor Est) ha compiuto negli anni scorsi ricerche etnomusicologiche, recandosi a Cuba, in Brasile e per lungo tempo in estremo oriente (Taiwan, Corea del Sud, Indonesia, Cina, Timor Est) per indagare sulle musiche tradizionali ...