Jazz Articles about Kitt Lyles

About Kitt Lyles

Album Review

Entre Amigos: Joyful Foundation

Read "Joyful Foundation" reviewed by Jack Bowers

by Jack Bowers
April 15, 2026

Joyful Foundation is a near-perfect name for the third album by Entre Amigos, wherein the Chicago-based quartet welcomes aboard one of the jazz world's rising stars, trumpeter Justin Copeland, to play--naturally--The Music of Justin Copeland on an album whose upbeat posture and sunny disposition help make it utterly charming and highly listenable. There is, of course, much more here than cheerfulness alone to digest and appreciate. For one thing, Copeland's compositions--he wrote four of the album's eight numbers--are ...

Album Review

Juanjo López: Above, Beyond, Within

Read "Above, Beyond, Within" reviewed by Troy Dostert

by Troy Dostert
August 24, 2025

In our troubling national moment of intensified nativism and ethnic fearmongering, it can be edifying to encounter the stories of people whose lives are directly affected by the current climate. One of them is Juanjo López, a guitarist now well-established in the Chicago scene but who came years ago to the United States with his family from Mexico. His story, reflected in his second release, Above, Beyond, Within, is about much more than geographic relocation, however. There is a strong ...

Album Review

Gustavo Cortinas: Live in Chicago

Read "Live in Chicago" reviewed by Hrayr Attarian

by Hrayr Attarian
April 30, 2024

Chicago composer and drummer Gustavo Cortinas is a musician with a message, one of social justice. He delivers it in a style that fuses the melodic sensibilities of his ancestral Mexico with the complex syncopations of jazz. The exciting Live in Chicago documents an unedited, two-set concert that was recorded at Constellation Chicago on December 15, 2022. The quintet interprets ten Cortinas originals, some of which appeared on his magnum opus, the multifaceted and provocative Desafío Candente (Woolgathering, 2021).

Album Review

Emily Kuhn: Ghosts of Us

Read "Ghosts of Us" reviewed by Jerome Wilson

by Jerome Wilson
August 30, 2023

Emily Kuhn is a trumpet player from Chicago with a calm, lyrical tone whose music is influenced by the folk and classical worlds as well as jazz. That shows up strongly on the track “In Lieu of Certainty, Movement" here, where pianist Meghan Stagl keeps a rippling neo-classical melody going while Kuhn and guitarist Erik Skov solo in front of her with ever-increasing force and purpose. “When The World Is Young" begins with lovely drifting Spanish guitar from Skov before ...

Album Review

Matt Peterson: Better Worlds

Read "Better Worlds" reviewed by Hrayr Attarian

by Hrayr Attarian
July 1, 2023

Chicago pianist Matt Peterson is a versatile artist who defies genres. He is both an accomplished, bop-based improviser as well as a sensitive interpreter of the Western classical tradition. Both elements of his style come together on the exuberant and captivating Better Worlds, a collection of 10 of his originals as well as a unique arrangement of The Beatles' “Blackbird." One of the highlights of the uniformly superb album is “Petrichor," which opens with Peterson's smoldering chords that ...

Album Review

Kitt Lyles: Real Talk

Read "Real Talk" reviewed by Edward Blanco

by Edward Blanco
May 23, 2016

An active performer and educator in the Chicago jazz community, young bassist Kitt Lyles is a graduate of Northwestern University with a degree in Jazz Studies and has performed in venues throughout North America, Latin America and Asia. A sideman on various other recordings, Lyles introduces his debut recording as leader on Real Talk presenting eight original compositions of the contemporary nature. The bassist surrounds himself with a core quintet of Chicago-area musicians, all educators and leaders in ...

Album Review

Kitt Lyles: Real Talk

Read "Real Talk" reviewed by Mark Sullivan

by Mark Sullivan
May 20, 2016

For his debut recording bassist/composer Kitt Lyles draws on his love for the jazz tradition, as well as southern folk and blues. A South Carolina native now residing in Chicago, he leads a working sextet (with one additional player on two tracks) through a varied program of originals. The title tune is built on a vamp, with guitarist Hans Luchs and tenor saxophonist Roy McGrath opening, joined by the trumpeter Justin Copeland. “Snowfall On Carolina" is an upbeat swing tune, ...