Jazz Articles about Michael Eaton

About Michael Eaton

Album Review

Symbiotique Nonet is a unique and noble beast, living in a suburb situated somewhere in the unsung wilds between modern chamber music and free jazz. The group is co-led by NYC-based saxophonist-composer, Michael Eaton and Kansas City-based electro-acoustic improviser-guitarist, Seth Andrew Davis. Stygian Gates, penned by Eaton, is a multi-movement suite loosely themed around characters and scenes from Greek mythology, especially the underworld and its various rivers. While the concept may sound dry at first read, even an initial exploration reveals an ...

Album Review

Seth Andrew Davis, Michael Eaton, Kyle Quass and Damon Smith: Ghost Tantras

Read "Ghost Tantras" reviewed by Troy Dostert

by Troy Dostert
May 30, 2022

In 2020, saxophonist Michael Eaton and electronic improviser & guitarist Seth Andrew Davis together formed Mother Brain Records, designed to highlight some of the more experimental music coming out of the Midwest. The label has headquarters in Kansas City, Missouri but, if Ghost Tantras is any indication, we will not be hearing much that connects directly to that city's roots in early jazz. Those craving new avenues for adventurous free improvisation will find much to like, however. Combining ...

Album Review

Michael Eaton: Dialogical

Read "Dialogical" reviewed by Jerome Wilson

by Jerome Wilson
September 28, 2019

Saxophonist Michael Eaton covers a lot of ground on this CD, using several different configurations of musicians in a program that encompasses angular, funk-laced fusion, airy sax and flute duets, a multi-saxophone workout and minimalism in the Philip Glass style. A key sideman here is guitarist Lionel Loueke whose unique style of playing and singing appears on four tracks. His clipped Morse-code vocals and guitar thread through the angular rhythms of “Juno" and “Aphoristic," complementing the swirling, choppy ...

Album Review

Michael Eaton: Dialogical

Read "Dialogical" reviewed by Troy Dostert

by Troy Dostert
July 1, 2019

A saxophonist and composer with uncommon ambition, Michael Eaton seems to recognize no limits whatsoever on his craft. He's played in virtually every style imaginable: free improvisation, Latin jazz, post-bop, classical, reggae and rock, just to scratch the surface--and he keeps company with a cross-section of today's cutting-edge players, including James Brandon Lewis, Michael Attias and Jonathan Finlayson, all of whom appeared in a much-feted concert he put together with Adam Minkoff in 2015 to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of ...

Album Review

Michael Eaton: Individuation

Read "Individuation" reviewed by Ben Scholz

by Ben Scholz
March 28, 2015

On his debut album as a leader, saxophonist Michael Eaton presents a collection of original material featuring a rotating group of New York City based musicians including Jon Crowley on Trumpet, David Liebman on Saxophone, Brad Whiteley on piano, bassists Daniel Ori and Scott Colberg, and Shareef Taher on drums. Exhibiting his artistic and personal development while ambitiously bridging the worlds of lyrical themes, Eaton intricately combines rhythmic minimalistic vamps, free-bop, Cageian prepared piano, and multi-layered open terrains. ...

Album Review

Michael Eaton: Individuation

Read "Individuation" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
March 27, 2015

Individuation, as a concept, can be seen as a parallel to the process of making music. In speaking one's own voice through an instrument and/or through composition, individuals manage to direct their imagination and unconscious into something tangible. Saxophonist Michael Eaton knows a thing or two about this, as demonstrated on his aptly-titled debut. On Individuation, Eaton delivers a program of distinctive originals. Cycling thoughts, sharp twists in direction, scissoring lines, fervent expressions, fenced-in passages, open pastures, ...