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Jazz Articles about Rafi Malkiel
Rachel Therrien: Mi Hogar II
by Richard J Salvucci
Rachel Therrien is a Canadian composer and trumpet player who has been around for some time, though her name may be unfamiliar. Therrien's musical journey has taken her from Rimouski, Quebec to Havana, Cuba via New York City and Colombia. Her Latin Jazz Project is nothing if not arresting, and probably merits a name like avant-garde Latin jazz, although labels inevitably just confuse matters. Listen very carefully, because if Jerry Gonzalez, Freddie Hubbard and Chicago all seem to stroll through ...
Continue ReadingArturo O'Farrill & The Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra: Mundoagua: Celebrating Carla Bley
by Angelo Leonardi
Scoperto da Carla Bley nel 1979, quand'era ancora studente diciannovenne, e rimasto nei suoi gruppi per tre anni, Arturo O'Farrill ne celebra la memoria con quest'album ambizioso, che raccoglie due sue suites ed una ("Blue Palestine") che lui stesso commissionò alla grande autrice e bandleader nel 2019, quattro anni prima della sua morte. “Mundoagua" la composizione che apre il disco è stata scritta per commemorare l'Anno dell'acqua ed ha avuto la sua anteprima al Miller Theater di New ...
Continue ReadingArturo O'Farrill: Mundoagua: Celebrating Carla Bley
by Jack Bowers
Mundoagua, the latest album by composer and pianist Arturo O'Farrill's Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra, is subdivided into three suites, the second of which is the four-movement “Blue Palestine," written and arranged by another celebrated composer and pianist, Carla Bley, a leading light in the avant-garde free jazz movement of the mid-twentieth century, who died of cancer in October 2023. The opening suite, “Mundoagua," commissioned by the Columbia University School of the Arts in 2018 to commemorate the ...
Continue ReadingArturo O'Farrill & The Afro-Latin Jazz Ensemble: Dreaming In Lions
by Chris May
Music for dance comes in a variety of forms. At one end of the spectrum are abstract soundscapes composed without reference to the choreography with which they share the stage; an example being John Cage's work with the choreographer Merce Cunningham. At the other end of the spectrum is music written in close collaboration with the choreographer; an example being Igor Stravinsky's work for Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes, which reached its peak in 1910 with The Firebird, jointly realized by ...
Continue ReadingArturo O'Farrill: Virtual Birdland
by Jack Bowers
Whenever an obstacle presents itself--even one as devastating and disruptive as a global pandemic--it's a sure bet that musicians will find a way around it, a way to keep making music even in the most grievous circumstances. Jazz musicians have been especially creative during the Covid-19 scourge, using social media, the internet and any other means at their disposal to share their music with the world. True, the paychecks aren't as large or as regular as once they were, but ...
Continue ReadingArturo O'Farrill: Four Questions
by Jerome Wilson
Surprisingly this set marks the first time Arturo O'Farrill has recorded a set of solely his own compositions. It was worth the wait because this music, played by his Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra, really demonstrates the cinematic sweep and variety of his writing. The set is constructed around two topical extended works. The first, “Four Questions," is based on four questions about the struggle for human rights and personal dignity first posed by African-American author W.E.B. DuBois in ...
Continue ReadingArturo O'Farrill and the Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra: Four Questions
by Jack Bowers
The Four Questions addressed by composer / pianist Arturo O'Farrill's Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra on its latest album were first posed in 1903 by W.E.B. DuBois in his book The Souls of Black Folk and are answered herein by the esteemed educator / historian / social activist Dr. Cornel West. For the record, the questions are “what does integrity do in the face of adversity and oppression, what does honesty do in the face of lies and deception, what does ...
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