Home » Jazz Musicians » Zwelakhe-Duma Bell le Pere
Zwelakhe-Duma Bell le Pere
Linda Sikhakhane: Iladi
by Mike Jurkovic
The music of South African saxophonist Linda Sikhakhane does not so much originate from a particular point in time or space or history as much as it expands and accelerates forth from the sub-Sahara's heady mists. Billowing, charging. Seething, soothing. So ease back and let Iladi (a Zulu wisdom ritual) happen. Let the moves of diaspora move you. Let Iladi trace its heritage and bring all listeners home. Let it engulf the room like a fog. On his first ...
Continue ReadingLinda Sikhakhane: Iladi
by Chris May
It is beyond coincidence that the two most uplifting albums released by male saxophonists so far in 2024 were made by players who use their music, in part, to celebrate female wisdom. The albums are Linda Sikhakhane's Iladi and Oded Tzur's My Prophet (ECM). New York-based Tzur's My Prophet, like its immediate predecessor, Isabela (ECM, 2022), was inspired by Tzur's wife and is a semi-mystical portrait of her as, in Tzur's words, an all-powerful deity and the ...
Continue ReadingNduduzo Makhathini: uNomkhubulwane
by Mike Jurkovic
Abundantly, beatifically, and beautifully ebullient, uNomkhubulwane, Nduduzo Makhathini's eleventh overall effort but third masterwork for Blue Note (his 2020 Blue Note first, Modes of Communication: Letters From the Underworlds and 2022's In the Spirit of Ntu still shimmer and transcend) is, as is the South African pianist's quickly evolving tradition, radiant and revelatory. Emerging from a mother song gifted to Makhathini during his initiation process to become a healer, (the pianist was immersed in water in order to encounter the Zulu ...
Continue ReadingMusic
Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson
