Jazz Articles about Matt Pivec

About Matt Pivec

Album Review

Sean Imboden Large Ensemble: Communal Heart

Read "Communal Heart" reviewed by Jack Bowers

by Jack Bowers
June 17, 2026

Communal Heart is the first album by saxophonist and composer Sean Imboden's superb Indiana-based Large Ensemble, recorded about a year before his second recording, Uncharted Realms (Self Produced, 2026). As before, all the compositions and arrangements are Imboden's, while the personnel in the eighteen-member orchestra remains virtually intact. If there is a difference between the two, it is that Imboden's themes are even more intriguing and intense the first time around, which is saying a lot, as Uncharted ...

Album Review

Sean Imboden: Communal Heart

Read "Communal Heart" reviewed by Dean Nardi

by Dean Nardi
June 8, 2025

Sean Imboden's Large Ensemble Has a Communal Heart Sean Imboden was bitten by the big band bug early on. It is understandable. Both his parents were musicians, and his father taught him to play clarinet when he was in sixth grade. As a teenager, besides playing in middle school and high school bands, he sometimes sat in on gigs with his father's ensemble. After college, he moved to New York City and became involved with the touring Broadway show circuit, ...

Album Review

Dave Rivello Ensemble: Facing the Mirror

Read "Facing the Mirror" reviewed by AAJ Italy Staff

by AAJ Italy Staff
December 1, 2009

Deve essere stato frustrante per Rivello incidere questo splendido CD nel 2002 e vederlo pubblicato solo sette anni dopo. Da parte del recensore, è triste constatare l'asfissia di un mercato discografico che del jazz accetta a braccia aperte solo bop ed hard-bop. Ma ci sono casi in cui la forza delle idee vince sul conformismo ed ecco quindi all'opera uno straordinario compositore/arrangiatore, allievo di Bob Brookmeyer. Rivello eccelle nel rinnovare con autonomia la lezione del suo mentore, Gil Evans e ...