Home » Jazz Articles » Kim Cass
Jazz Articles about Kim Cass
Noah Preminger: Ballads
by Pierre Giroux
Noah Preminger has long been an artist who thrives at the intersection of tradition and innovation. On Ballads, the tenor saxophonist delves into the depths of lyricism with a quartet that exudes understated intensity: pianist Julian Shore, bassist Kim Cass, and drummer Allan Mednard. This release communicates in whispers rather than shouts, yet it never loses its sense of adventure. Preminger's tone -warm, breathy, elastic, guides the listener through a charming set of originals, carefully selected ...
Continue ReadingStan Harrison: Some Poor Soul Has a Fire
by Jack Bowers
As befits someone who has spent years in the pop/rock arena performing with name acts from David Bowie, Radiohead and Stevie Ray Vaughan to Duran Duran, Bruce Springsteen, Laurie Anderson and many others, composer and saxophonist Stan Harrison sees jazz through an extremely wide lens. While there are a few moments of clean straight-ahead blowing on Harrrison's album Some Poor Soul Has a Fire, there are many others that emulate more closely his kinship to and respect for the kind ...
Continue ReadingNoah Preminger: Ballads
by Dan Bilawsky
Balladry becomes Noah Preminger. And that may come as a surprise to some. Over the past seventeen years and about as many releases, this critically-acclaimed tenor saxophonist has often made his mark going the opposite way--in myriad bold-and-beyond settings where he's thrown haymakers with precision, explored duo dynamism with bassist Kim Cass, pushed the envelope through the demanding music of Steve Lampert, or investigated the gravity of the delta blues with a probing mindset. Yet there's something about his softer ...
Continue ReadingNoah Preminger: Ballads
by Alberto Bazzurro
Il ritorno a casa. Col suo bellissimo suono di tenore, Noah Preminger inanella in meno di trentotto minuti sette sue composizioni ispirate--anzi totalmente concepite--nel segno del titolo, molto semplicemente Ballads. E qui naturalmente si apre la querelle: i tradizionalisti andranno in brodo di giuggiole (evocando magari l'omonimo album di John Coltrane), perché il disco è assolutamente perfetto (o lì nei pressi), altri--come chi scrive--conoscendo, e apprezzando, la curiosità creativa del trentottenne sassofonista del Connecticut, la sua capacità di mettere il ...
Continue ReadingNoah Preminger: Ballads
by Jack Kenny
Noah Preminger is a philosophical, thought-through artist who can gauge the impact of his playing and his thinking on his intended audience. It is interesting to compare Preminger's Ballads to John Coltrane's Ballads (Impulse!, 1963), an illuminating set of familiar tunes that was reputedly instigated after his quartet's first tour of Europe, with Eric Dolphy in tow. Accusations of “anti-jazz" flew. It was hoped that this step back into the Standards on his Ballads album would answer the"anti- jazz" accusations. ...
Continue ReadingPatricia Brennan: Breaking Stretch
by Dan McClenaghan
On her first two albums, vibraphonist Patricia Brennan worked with a quartet comprised of three percussion instruments, herself on vibes and marimba, joined by percussionist Mauricio Herrera and drummer Marcus Gilmore, with a bassist Kim Cass. Momentum in large part, is the name of the game. For Breaking Stretch she expands her musical universe, adding trumpeter Adam O'Farrill and saxophonists Mark Shim and Jon Irabagon. This proved a good move; her musical universe in this septet setting has an energy ...
Continue ReadingPatricia Brennan: Breaking Stretch
by Mike Jurkovic
Wild-willed vibraphonist Patricia Brennan gets straight down to business without any fanciful mission declaration with the Afro-Cuban, effusively powered, clear-the-dancefloor and blow-the-ceiling-off this joint “Los Otros Yo (The Other Selves)," the opening cut of her third album Breaking Stretch. She does so in a captivatingly, wickedly good way. Brennan--who has added much vitality to music by such other big thinkers as Vijay Iyer, Mary Halvorson, Anna Webber, Michael Formanek--began her musical education at 4 years old listening to ...
Continue Reading
