Jazz Articles about Tardo Hammer

About Tardo Hammer

Album Review

It is always a treat to hear a singer who trusts the song. On Hey Love!, recorded at Van Gelder Studios in October 2025, Lucy Yeghiazaryan takes the direct route, usually the most forgiving. There are no conceptual detours here, no attempts to modernize the Great American Songbook by dismantling it. Instead, Yeghiazaryan takes control of the tradition, accompanied by musicians who understand its swing. And it is a great group of players. Tenor saxophonist Grant Stewart, who also co-arranged ...

Album Review

Lucy Yeghiazaryan: Hey Love!

Read "Hey Love!" reviewed by Katchie Cartwright

by Katchie Cartwright
June 19, 2026

The excellent New York-based singer Lucy Yeghiazaryan and her stellar band may have you thinking back to Carmen McRae in the 1950s as you listen to Hey Love!--groups with Wendell Marshall, Kenny Clarke, and other hard bop-era musicians. On her 2026 release, Yeghiazaryan has the ubiquitous Peter Washington on bass and Kenny Washington on drums, with Tardo Hammer at the piano, Grant Stewart on tenor saxophone, and Bruce Harris on trumpet. Johnny O'Neal sings with her at the piano on ...

Album Review

Grant Stewart: Next Spring

Read "Next Spring" reviewed by Pierre Giroux

by Pierre Giroux
November 29, 2025

Grant Stewart's Next Spring reaffirms his position as a leading figure in the current mainstream jazz scene. With his strong tone and deeply swinging phrasing, Stewart again channels the legacies of Sonny Rollins, Charlie Parker, and Joe Henderson, yet his voice remains distinctly his own. Recorded at the iconic Van Gelder Studios in Englewood Cliffs, NJ, and supported by his longtime collaborators pianist Tardo Hammer, bassist Paul Sikivie, and drummer Phil Stewart, he crafts a set that feels both fresh ...

Album Review

Grant Stewart: Next Spring

Read "Next Spring" reviewed by Jack Bowers

by Jack Bowers
November 16, 2025

There aren't many jazz saxophonists who can hold the floor and the listener's ear through an entire album without ever sounding banal or redundant. Here is one who can. Next Spring is renowned tenor saxophonist Grant Stewart's fifth recording for Cory Weeds' Cellar Music Group, and if it includes any moments that are less than engaging, they are all but impossible to discern. Stewart's personal ingredient is consistency, an ability to conceive and convey fresh ideas in ...

Liner Notes

Grant Stewart: Rise and Shine

by C. Andrew Hovan
January 30, 2023

Over the past twenty-five years, the jazz world has seen its share of stylistic ups and downs. Often changing with chameleon-like character, the music's popularity has come and gone based on the trends of the time and the success of musicians capable of connecting with broader audiences beyond the established cognoscenti. In looking back at the year 1992, when Grant Stewart's debut release Downtown Sounds hit the streets, the range of material being offered by his peers spanned from Uri ...

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Album Review

Tardo Hammer: Look Stop & Listen: The Music of Tadd Dameron

Read "Look Stop & Listen: The Music of Tadd Dameron" reviewed by Jack Bowers

by Jack Bowers
July 1, 2008

Nearly a decade ago I had the pleasure of reviewing Hammer Time, the impressive debut album by (as I wrote then) an “enormously talented" young pianist, Tardo Hammer. While we've both grown older since then, I am happy to report that at least one of us (guess who) has continued on an upward path. Hammer's latest album for Sharp Nine Records (his fourth) is another handsome feather in his cap. The lively and engaging session is devoted entirely to music ...

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Album Review

Tardo Hammer: Look Stop & Listen

Read "Look Stop & Listen" reviewed by J Hunter

by J Hunter
December 13, 2007

A teacher at Cambridge, Massachusetts' New School of Music when he's not leading singer Annie Ross' band, pianist Tardo Hammer has backed up stalwarts including Lou Donaldson and Abbey Lincoln, and was a member of the Art Farmer-Clifford Jordan Quintet. The last credit is the key here, because Jordan played on Live at the Theatre Boulogne--the 1994 Soul Note release by Dameronia, Don Sickler and Philly Jo Jones' big-band tribute to legendary composer/arranger Tadd Dameron. How much influence Jordan had ...