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Emmet Cohen: Uptown In Orbit
by Mike Jurkovic
Pianist/composer/educator/impresario Emmet Cohen has proven himself time and time again to be one of the guiding lights of 21st century jazz. And he may have/could have single-handedly saved our collective sanity and jazz's continued rise and relevance when, in the face of a world plague, he began streaming Live From Emmet's Place from his apartment in Harlem. First it was Cohen and his trusty trio mates, bassist Russell Hall and drummer Kyle Poole. Then the sessions expanded to include such ...
Continue ReadingChad Lefkowitz-Brown and the Global Big Band: Open World
by Jack Bowers
There are times, thanks to the indestructible human spirit, when even the most horrendous scourge--say, a global pandemic that has claimed millions of lives in countries around the world--can lead to the occasional silver lining, a small yet persistent light at the end of a very dark tunnel. Case in point: Open World, a superlative new album by saxophonist Chad Lefkowitz-Brown (commonly known as Chad LB) and the Global Big Band, whose name describes exactly what it is: an ensemble ...
Continue ReadingAnaïs Reno: Lovesome Thing: Anaïs Reno sings Ellington & Strayhorn featuring Emmet Cohen
by Richard J Salvucci
The first time someone told me that Billy Strayhorn was a teenager when he wrote “Lush Life," I didn't believe it. Not so much because of the harmonic gymnastics, which were daunting enough, but because of the lyrics. “Romance is mush stifling those who strive, I'll live out a lush life in some small dive." No, someone had to have lived quite a bit to write something like that. No-one at eighteen could know that, so I thought, because I ...
Continue ReadingAnaïs Reno: Lovesome Thing: Anaïs Reno sings Ellington & Strayhorn featuring Emmet Cohen
by Pierre Giroux
Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn were collaborators for several decades beginning in the late 1930s. They became so closely intertwined musically that it was frequently impossible to distinguish their work. Anaïs Reno a young and promising singer has chosen to use their compositions as the basis for her debut release Lovesome Thing: Anaïs Reno Sings Ellington & Strayhorn. This choice was not without risk as the harmonic structure and lyrics of some of the compositions are better suited to a ...
Continue ReadingEmmet Cohen: Future Stride
by Mike Jurkovic
As proven onstage as well as on such percolating, locomotive recordings as 2018's self released Dirty In Detroit, Masters Legacy Series Vol 1 with Jimmy Cobb (Cellar Live, 2016), 2018's Masters Legacy Series Vol 2 with Ron Carter (Cellar Live), and his regular Monday Night Quarantine Jams on Facebook, pianist Emmet Cohen makes his music with an unabashed, heart-on-you-sleeve exuberance and love for the future as past and vice versa. So it should come as no surprise to anyone that ...
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