Jazz Articles about Roscoe Mitchell

About Roscoe Mitchell

Album Review

Roscoe Mitchell & Nicole Mitchell's Black Earth Ensemble: Three Compositions

Read "Three Compositions" reviewed by AAJ Italy Staff

by AAJ Italy Staff
February 25, 2013

Registrato dal vivo durante l'edizione 2009 di Ai Confini tra Sardegna e Jazz, il festival di Sant'Anna Arresi, Three Compositions è la testimonianza assai riuscita di come le doti di compositore del veterano sassofonista Roscoe Mitchell (qui impegnato solamente nella conduction) abbiano trovato un perfetto fil-rouge interpretativo nel Black Earth Ensemble di un'altra rappresentante doc della scena di Chicago come la flautista Nicole Mitchell. Questo connubio raggiunge i risultati più emozionanti in “Cards for Orchestra," brano nel quale ciascun musicista ...

Album Review

Roscoe Mitchell: Three Compositions

Read "Three Compositions" reviewed by John Sharpe

by John Sharpe
February 17, 2013

On Three Compositions, veteran Chicago saxophonist Roscoe Mitchell's scores are interpreted by an established grouping with an AACM lineage, namesake flautist Nicole Mitchell's Black Earth Ensemble, unlike his previous album of written material, Numbers (Rogue Art, 2011), which featured a varied cast of contemporary players. It makes all the difference. This performance was one of three by the flautist's band at the 2009 edition of Sardinia's Sant' Anna Arresi jazz festival, and is captured here in sparkling clarity. Mitchell's subtle ...

Album Review

Roscoe Mitchell: Numbers

Read "Numbers" reviewed by AAJ Italy Staff

by AAJ Italy Staff
May 22, 2012

La carriera solista di Roscoe Mitchell senza l'Art Ensemble è stata prolifica sin dal 1966, quando esordì con l'album Sound. Proprio quel titolo sembra indicativo di un aspetto centrale nella storia di questo musicista complesso da decifrare: lo studio del suono e del sassofono indagato nelle sue molteplici possibilità. Una sorta di rovescio della stessa medaglia, e della stessa personalità, sembra essere l'attività di compositore, ancora più che di sassofonista e di ricercatore del suono, a cui Mitchell si è ...

Album Review

Roscoe Mitchell: Numbers

by John Sharpe
April 23, 2012

What's the difference between composition and improvisation once the music has been committed to disc? At that point even the wildest flights of fancy become fixed and immutable, able to be reheated and pored over at leisure. One difference may lie in the notation-defying musical characteristics integral to the finest improvisations: continual variation of tone and timbre and a high degree of rhythmic complexity. This distinction could apply to expositions by reeds or strings, but it becomes less pertinent for ...

Live Review

Roscoe Mitchell: London, England, March 9, 2012

by John Sharpe
March 24, 2012

Roscoe MitchellCafé OtoLondonMarch 9, 2012 Saxophonist Roscoe Mitchell followed an increasingly well trod path. Dalston's Cafe Oto has a strong track record in bringing great names from the free jazz past to the north London stage, with previous guest artists including trumpeters Wadada Leo Smith and Ted Daniel, and saxophonists Joe McPhee, John Tchicai, Sonny Simmons and Arthur Doyle. Now added to that illustrious roster was a two-day residency for the reedman and ...

Album Review

Mike Reed's Loose Empathy feat. Roscoe Mitchell: Empathetic Parts

by AAJ Italy Staff
February 28, 2011

Mike Reed, insieme a Rob Mazurek, rappresenta oggi uno dei nomi di riferimento della new wave chicagoana, scena collegata a filo doppio con la storica AACM che, della musica moderna, è una delle perle artistiche più luminose ed interessanti. Il trentaseienne batterista, pianista e compositore americano (benché nato in Germania) ha ben chiara in mente la possibilità della transizione - attraverso una corretta rielaborazione critica - che partendo dalla tradizione creativa dei “padri fondatori" di un suono che ha enormemente ...

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Album Review

Roscoe Mitchell and The Note Factory: Far Side

Read "Far Side" reviewed by Charles Walker

by Charles Walker
January 25, 2011

In his recent book about the AACM, A Power Stronger Than Itself (University of Chicago, 2007), trombonist/composer/critic George Lewis makes a serious, thoroughly researched argument for its members creating their own lineage of American “experimental music," influenced as much by pan-African musics or juke joint jam sessions as by European high art music, and yet beholden to none of those idioms exclusively. As a result, for the critic or historian, it has always been difficult to even know how to ...