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Rez Abbasi: When Everything Else Fades, Sound Remains
by Lawrence Peryer
Today, the Spotlight shines on guitarist and composer Rez Abbasi.Rez's new album with his Acoustic Quintet, Sound Remains (Whirlwind Recordings), puts steel-string acoustic guitar at the center of a deeply personal meditation on presence and impermanence. The album adds master percussionist Hasan Bakr to Rez's long-standing quartet with Bill Ware, Stephan Crump, and Eric McPherson, creating what Rez calls music where “often the only thing that remains is sound."The 2021 Guggenheim Fellow has spent decades finding ...
Continue ReadingSamo Salamon Ra Kalam Bob Moses Orchestra: Dream Suites vol. 1
by Alberto Bazzurro
Basta scorrere i nomi dei musicisti coinvolti nell'operazione per capire di quale rappresentatività per una data scena della più creativa e verace attualità jazzistica “unga" questo assolutamente notevole album cofirmato dal chitarrista sloveno Samo Salamon e dal batterista newyorchese Bob Moses. Lo compongono tre soli ampi brani (dai tredici minuti alla mezz'ora appena scarsa) incisi nel novembre 2023 e fondati sulla pratica della libera improvvisazione (non si parla neppure di conduction, in questo caso), raggiungendo una dimensione formale assolutamente invidiabile, ...
Continue ReadingRez Abbasi: Charm
by David Bixler
Guitarist Rez Abbasi's recordings illustrate an artist that is pressing on, going for something new, rather than making alterations to what he has already done. So when sitarist Josh Feinberg approached him about a possible Indian-jazz collaboration he initially declined, as he already had several successful recordings of this nature with pianist Vijay Iyer and saxophonist Rudresh Mahanthappa. However, he fortunately reconsidered and they recorded Charm, a recording that is fresh and likely unlike anything that you have heard before. ...
Continue ReadingAlternative Guitar Summit: Honoring Pat Martino, Volume 1
by Jack Bowers
Each year the Alternative Guitar Summit, led by Joel Harrison, presents a concert to honor a living jazz composer/guitarist. That wasn't possible in 2021, however, as venues in and around New York City were shuttered tight by the Covid-19 pandemic. Meanwhile, it was clear that the chosen honoree, the great Pat Martino, was gravely ill and might not have another year to live. With that in mind, members of the Summit took their guitars straight to a studio to record ...
Continue ReadingAmina Figarova: Persistence
by Maurizio Zerbo
Il pregio della varietà sostanzia la cifra artistica della pianista Amina Figarova, non circoscritta entro i soli confini del jazz. Dopo il progetto orchestrale del penultimo CD, la musicista azera residente a New York apre la finestra del suo etereo pensiero compositivo verso i territori della fusion, del funk, del rap. Da queste premesse discende un disco ibrido nella sua eccellente realizzazione, che testimonia la continua evoluzione del jazz e la nobiltà dei suoi migliori protagonisti. A far da tessuto ...
Continue ReadingRez Abbasi: A Throw of Dice by The Silent Ensemble
by Alberto Bazzurro
Rez Abbasi, classe 1965, pakistano di nascita ma californiano d'adozione fin dalla più tenera età, è il principale protagonista di questo album (che del resto reca la sua firma in calce), giocato nel segno di una musica di sicuro referente jazzistico, però con forti infiltrazioni etniche, com'è del resto usuale nel chitarrista (del quale, en passant, segnaliamo anche Oasis, a doppia firma con l'arpista francese Isabelle Olivier, inciso in quartetto su Enja l'anno dopo questo A Throw of Dice, 2018 ...
Continue ReadingRez Abbasi: On balancing picture with music and shifting into Django mode
by Friedrich Kunzmann
To really distinguish oneself in today's vast universe of guitarists, even within the confines of jazz, more and more resembles a Sisyphus task. When so much has been said and done, a specific tone or distinctive vocabulary alone no longer suffice to set an artist apart from the crowd. It is only through the sum of the different parts--various technical, aesthetic and even philosophical ones--that a musician is able to claim a place among the original voices on the instrument. ...
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