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Mark Corroto's Best Releases of 2019
2019, that was some trip around the sun, wasn't it? Every road trip requires good tunes and this past year we heard some great music. The list below is my top ten, well sixteen releases (in no particular order). I pared down a much larger list, three times this size and still believe there was more great music released in 2019 that I have yet to discover. Kris Davis Diatom Ribbons Pyroclastic Records
read moreSatoko Fujii & Tatsuya Yoshida: Baikamo
Among her vast catalog of formations of every size and shape, some of Satoko Fujii's most interesting work has been in duos, especially those with percussionists. Her most recent such outing was Confluence (Libra, 2019) with Spanish drummer Ramon Lopez, surprisingly melodic, especially compared to her previous drum and piano releases. Fujii reunites with Tatsuya Yoshida on Baikamo and the results are persistently fiery. A listener familiar with Yoshida's role in the alternative rock duo Ruins (with bassist/vocalist Sasaki Hisashi) ...
read moreJamile: If You Could See Me Now
Jamile grew up in Cachoeira do Sul (South Falls), a small town in Brazil towards the border with Uruguay. Her supportive family had no particular interest in music. Imagine her surprise, then, at finding her twenty-something self launching this debut album at Gianni Valenti's Birdland Theater in New York City. After completing her studies in Brazil, Jamile decided to do her masters in jazz in New York. “When I came to jny: New York City in 2017," she ...
read moreIngrid Laubrock, Aki Takase, Alexandra Grimal and More
This episode acknowledges a few of the outstanding and important female jazz improvisers who are becoming more and more prominent in the 21st century. You'll hear music from the mutual admiration duo of saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock and pianist Aki Takase, French saxophonist Alexandra Grimal displaying her talents on three differently focused albums, Estonian take-no-prisoners saxophonist Maria Faust, and Australia's much-heralded pianist Andrea Keller. The guys are also well-represented throughout this show. Two new debut recordings come from a ...
read moreMatt Ulery: Delicate Charms
Coming on the heels of 2019's outstanding trio outing Wonderment (Woolgathering Records) with violinist Zach Brock and drummer John Deitemyer, Delicate Charms is a four and a half star recording if ever one was. And it begins with a classical air, an almost chambered hush into which rush those last minute arrivals, each their own player in the “Coping" suite that emblematically ushers in bassist Matt Ulery's particularly distinctive work. Equal parts Charles Mingus ("Taciturn"), Paul Chambers, (his sense of ...
read moreAda Rovatti: True Artist
For Ada Rovatti, a saxophonist whose musical journey took her from her homeland of Italy, then inevitably to the United States, the road taken has not always been easy. A bright and sensitive artist, she can have misgivings about her work at times. But that work, with other bands or the leading voice on her own recordings, brings to light an artist who has something interesting to say and does so with style and very strong chops. And ...
read moreTwo commissioned pieces from Insub Meta Orchestra
Formed in September 2010, Switzerland's then 40-member Insub Meta Orchestra (IMO) issued its first album Archive #1 on the Insubordinations label in March 2012, closely followed by the digital release of Archive #2 in December 2012 and, by then 29-strong, Archive #3 on the new Insub label in February 2015. Following the release of 13 and 27 (Another Timbre, 2017) and the vinyl LP Choices and Melodies (Insub, 2018), the two albums below mark IMO's return to releasing CDs on ...
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