Jazz Articles about Various Artists

Mali and the Sahara: Compilations

by AAJ Staff
May 26, 2005

West Africa is experiencing a musical golden age. The unbelievable diversity of the region's music, often rooted in centuries-old tradition--but just as often attuned to modern production and popular accessibility--has been piling up on record and in performance at a prodigious pace. So if you don't get a chance to visit Dakar, Bamako, or Lagos in person, you'll find hundreds of alternatives on the shelf in the record store.

The challenge, of course, is making sense of all ...

Various Artists: New School University Jazz Program 2004/2005

by AAJ Staff
May 17, 2005

The top-notch jazz program of New School University continues to play a significant role in consistently sending off mature sounding players to infiltrate the New York and global jazz scenes. With a faculty that boasts an impressive jazz veteran roster (trumpeters Charles Tolliver and Jimmy Owens; saxophonists Billy Harper and George Garzone; trombonist Benny Powell; pianists Joanne Brackeen and Junior Mance; bassists Reggie Workman and Buster Williams; and drummers Joe Chambers, Gerry Hemingway, Charli Persip, and Andrew Cyrille), it's no ...

Various Artists: Acoustic Brazil

by Woodrow Wilkins
May 16, 2005

Brazilians loathe to entertain the mere suggestion that their native music is jazz. However, the rhythms and melodies of traditional Brazilian music and some styles of North American jazz are so similar that a song from one genre can easily blend into the soundscape of the other--often without translation of lyrics or major changes in the instrumental arrangements. Gal Costa's “Aquele Frevo Axe is a perfect example. This elegant, easy-going selection is the first track on Acoustic Brazil, ...

Various Artists: Rump Comp Volume One

by Chris May
May 16, 2005

As a means to an end--the end being the creation of new sonorities and new approaches to composition and performance--electronica is an interesting technological development. Wibutee's Playmachine and Polar Bear's Held On The Tips Of Fingers, to take two very different recent examples, are rich and convincing evidence of its relevance to contemporary jazz.

As an end in itself--the look!-no-real-instruments!! syndrome--its relevance is much diminished, and the response is: so what?

This second album from Danish electronicist Jens Berents Christiansen's ...

Various Artists: Hot Club de France

by David Rickert
April 26, 2005

The Hot Club de France was a group of avid European jazz fans who swapped records, organized concerts, and sponsored radio broadcasts overseas. Their enthusiasm for jazz carried well into the sixties and seventies, when most people had moved onto other jazz styles and, later, rock 'n' roll. The organization thus served as a haven for jazz artists who were able to play before eager crowds during the lean years.

This CD compiles the best of the Hot ...

Various Artists: The Rough Guide to Boogaloo

by Chris May
April 22, 2005

Subtitled “Latin dance with New York attitude," this wonderful, wonderful album presents eighteen choice cuts from the boogaloo craze which ruled New York's barrios in the late '60s. They will make you feel good, feel strong, make your whole body want to dance and give you heart for tomorrow, just like they did for the kids on the West Side all those years ago.

The first truly Nu Yorican sound--a melange of soul, rock and mambo, usually (and ...

Various Artists: Mysterious Voyages - A Tribute to Weather Report

by John Kelman
April 22, 2005

Weather Report's fifteen-year tenure was not only the longest of the fusion groups that emerged from the post-Bitches Brew era--including John McLaughlin's Mahavishnu Orchestra, Chick Corea's Return to Forever, and Herbie Hancock's Headhunters--it was arguably the most broadly influential. Starting out as an electric free jazz collective but ultimately honing a sound that included world beat rhythms and a more orchestral approach defined by the distinctive sounds and compositions of saxophonist Wayne Shorter and keyboardist Joe Zawinul, Weather Report also ...