Articles by Jack Bowers
The Scott Silbert Quartet: Dream Dancing
by Jack Bowers
The year 2025 marks the centenary of the birth of John Haley Sims, known around the world by his singular nickname, Zoot, a colossus of the saxophone who left this world far too soon in March 1985. Yet even though Zoot's physical presence is absent, his insuperable spirit lives on via Dream Dancing, a marvelous tribute by saxophonist and Sims enthusiast Scott Silbert and his masterful quartet.While there is no debating that there was only one Zoot Sims, ...
Continue ReadingJosh Nelson / Kevin Van Den Elzen: West Coast Echoes
by Jack Bowers
Pianist Josh Nelson and drummer Kevin Van Den Elzen (with bassist Eric Sittner) revisit the glory days of West Coast jazz in the 1950s and '60s on West Coast Echoes, a generally smooth and pleasing glance backward at the “cool" school of jazz championed by such legendary artists as Shorty Rogers, Art Pepper, Stan Getz, Shelly Manne, Gerry Mulligan, Bob Cooper, Chet Baker, Chico Hamilton, Bud Shank, Russ Freeman and many others. The “echoes" become louder and more ...
Continue ReadingWycliffe Gordon: Holiday Fun!
by Jack Bowers
Trombonist Wycliffe Gordon takes listeners on a pleasurable trip to his childhood and invites them to summon their own precious memories of Holiday Fun! on this splendid new seasonal recording from Arbors Jazz. Gordon has enlisted an all-star ensemble of like-minded musicians and friends to heighten the fun, stepping merrily through a litany of holiday favorites from “Winter Wonderland" to “Frosty the Snowman," “Silent Night" to “Joy to the World," before closing with the venerable “Auld Lang ...
Continue ReadingLoren Schoenberg and His Jazz Orchestra: So Many Memories
by Jack Bowers
Jazz polymath Loren Schoenberg reverses the hands of time on So Many Memories, unveiling sixteen never-before- recorded charts written by the renowned melodist Eddie Sauter in the late 1930s for the Red Norvo-Mildred Bailey Orchestra. To paint his canvas, Schoenberg enlisted students and recent graduates of New York's Juilliard School of Music to be his orchestra, with guest artist Warren Wolf sitting in on xylophone for Norvo, the jazz world's acknowledged master of that instrument before he moved later in ...
Continue ReadingZurHub: Countryside Motorways
by Jack Bowers
Zurhub is an Israeli-American quintet formed in 2017 by flutist Mattan Klein and guitarist Ezequiel Hezi Jait. On Countryside Motorways, the group's impressive debut recording, they are ably supported by pianist Itay Simhovich, bassist Assaf Hakimi and drummer Dani Benedikt. The album consists of a dozen original compositions, five by Klein, four by Jait, and three co-written by the duo. The music is invariably bright and pleasant, humming smoothly along like an auto on an exurban thoroughfare, ...
Continue ReadingLinda Dachtyl: Full Steam Ahead
by Jack Bowers
Full Steam Ahead, Ohio-based organist Linda Dachtyl's fifth recording as leader of her own groups, is a largely upbeat studio session wherein she oversees a trio--guitarist Don Hales, drummer and husband Cary Dachtyl--on six of ten numbers. The threesome by itself is quite good, so much so that one might reasonably argue that no more help is needed. Nevertheless, saxophonist Mark Donavan makes it a quartet on three tracks, and joins two guests, trumpeter Ben Huntoon and ...
Continue ReadingAl Muirhead: Still Cookin' at 90: The Canada Sessions, Volume II
by Jack Bowers
"Twelve years ago," bassist Kodi Hutchinson writes in the liner notes to The Canada Sessions, Volume II, “I found myself on a bandstand with 78-year-old trumpeter Al Muirhead. I remember thinking, why has this amazing musician never recorded under his own name?" Fast forward a dozen years, to 2025, and Muirhead, still going strong at age 90, has not only released five albums under his own name, he earned a prestigious JUNO nomination for the first one while continuing to ...
Continue ReadingEshaan Sood/The Sonic Alchemists: Dream River
by Jack Bowers
Guitarist Eshaan Sood has come a long way--in more ways than one. Born and raised in New Delhi, India, he was a graphic artist who had never considered a career in music, let alone jazz, until a near-fatal auto accident in 2015 left him blind and forced him to rethink his plans. No longer able to pursue his dream, Sood turned to a second love, music, finally settling on the guitar as his instrument of choice. That brought him eventually ...
Continue ReadingCarl Schultz: The Road to Trantor
by Jack Bowers
Saxophonist Carl Schultz composed The Road to Trantor as the soundtrack to a science fiction film. The kicker is that the film exists only in Schultz's head. When writing each song, he tried to envision the scene in which it would be used. In that sense, the music is thematic, even though the themes are known only to Schultz. In charting his singular course, the California-based artist drew heavily on novels by Isaac Asimov. “Trantor" is one ...
Continue ReadingThe Afro-Caribbean Jazz Collective: Cortadito
by Jack Bowers
The Afro-Caribbean Collective is a high-energy nonet led by Puerto Rican-born guitarist Jose Guzman. On Cortadito, the ensemble's fourth album, the accent as always is on the lively rhythms and charming melodies of Guzman's home country and nearby equatorial locales. There is one immediate problem, as Guzman writes that his composition “Orchard Downs" is the opening number, whereas the album's jacket places his “Holande Pa Uste" in the lead-off spot and lists “Orchard Downs" as the finale. From ...
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