Jazz Articles about Lou Grassi

Marshall Allen / Lou Grassi: Live At The Guelph Festival

by Budd Kopman
January 4, 2008

Marshall Allen and Lou Grassi make quite a duo. On Live At The Guelph Festival, they play unprepared and unrehearsed music which, due to their skill, has a remarkable degree of coherence. Admittedly, this is free or avant-garde jazz, requiring coherence to be understood within that framework. Allen is currently leading the Sun Ra Arkestra, after both Sun Ra (1993) and John Gilmore (1995) died, while Grassi has become something of the house percussionist at the CIMP ...

The Nu Band: The Dope And The Ghost

by Mark Corroto
December 3, 2007

Not easily pigeonholed, the music of The Nu Band negotiates the boundaries of free-bop, improvisation, chamber, and traditional jazz with bias toward none. That cannot be said of the band's politics. Giving no quarter to the current Bush administration, they take our 'king' to task from the opening notes of the disc's centerpiece--"BushWhacked.

Saxophonist Mark Whitecage originally recorded BushWhacked: A Spoken Opera (Acoustics ELE, 2005), a Dubya denunciation with his Bi-Coastal Orchestra, a band he leads with ...

Martin Speicher - Georg Wolf - Lou Grassi: Shapes and Shadows

by AAJ Italy Staff
September 21, 2007

“Please, Confirm!“, il lungo brano iniziale, possiede la lucida e geometrica architettura del classico trio di Ornette Coleman e la visionarietà espressiva del primo Ayler, e determina le coordinate entro le quali si muove l’intero Shapes and Shadows. Il disco licenziato dal trio Speicher/Wolf/Grassi è fedele al credo della libera improvvisazione e, inutile a dirsi, basa gran parte della propria forza attrattiva sull’interplay serrato e telepatico dei musicisti e sulla natura selvaggia delle improvvisazioni. Senza dimenticare la capacità di sorprendere ...

Lou Grassi's PoBand: Infinite POtential

by AAJ Italy Staff
May 29, 2007

Questa band ha ormai superato i dieci anni di attivita' e ha purtroppo anche cambiato personale a causa della scomparsa del grande contrabbassista Wilbur Morris, qui sostituito da Adam Lane. Su una serie di incisioni per la CIMP si sono alternati degli ospiti importanti, tutti sassofonisti: Marshall Allen, Joseph Jarman e John Tchicai. Dopo anni di silenzio la band si è di nuovo ricostituita con il ritorno dall'Europa del trombettista Herb Robertson e con il trombonista Dave Taylor al posto ...

Lou Grassi's Po Band: Infinite POtential

by Robert Iannapollo
October 16, 2006

Drummer-for-all-seasons Lou Grassi can do it all. But when left to his own devices with his PO band, he seems to prefer sessions that are mostly improvised. Grassi's latest PO Band project, Infinite POtential (the group's sixth release), finds Grassi and company going back to free improvisation as their MO, with a couple of new members--bassist Adam Lane and bass trombonist David Taylor, both no strangers to the band's methodology. Add two band veterans, trumpeter Herb Robertson and clarinetist Perry ...

Lou Grassi Quartet: Avanti Galoppi

by Germein Linares
April 30, 2005

With over thirty years of dedication to jazz, drummer Lou Grassi should be better known. In the netherworld of jazz, though, and its even darker region of free jazz, no one seems capable of escaping obscurity, a sort of reverse vampire state. Avanti Galoppi brings Grassi closer to the light, closer to the recognition he deserves via the album's seven engaging tunes. Employing the skilled services of Herb Robertson on trumpet, cornet and flugelhorn, Rob Brown on alto saxophone, and ...

Ken Wessel, Ken Filiano & Lou Grassi: Jawboning

by Derek Taylor
February 12, 2005

Matriculation from sideman to frontman can be a stressful process. Guitarist Ken Wessel makes the long due move with aplomb. A short string of CIMP dates supporting saxophonist William Gagliardi and violinist Sam Bardfield, as well as a long-standing slot in Ornette Coleman's Prime Time band, solidified the clout. Wessel chose Lou Grassi, his colleague in the Gagliardi group, and the drummer in turn suggested the participation of bassist Ken Filiano.

Wessel's easygoing, unassuming approach jibes well with ...