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35
Album Review

Jason Kush: Finally Friday

Read "Finally Friday" reviewed by Jack Bowers


Simply narrating the resume of saxophonist/educator/writer/composer Jason Kush would require more space than is usually devoted to an entire review. For someone his age--or even someone older--Kush, currently an associate professor at Slippery Rock (PA) University, has had an exceptionally wide and productive career as a performer, teacher and author in a multitude of genres in the U.S. and around the world. What matters here, of course, is how well Kush fares on Finally Friday, the third ...

42
Album Review

Craig Davis: Tone Paintings

Read "Tone Paintings" reviewed by Jack Bowers


The subtitle of pianist Craig Davis' second album, Tone Paintings, is “The Music of Dodo Marmarosa." For those who may be inclined to ask, “Dodo who?" the album offers a mini-biography of Pittsburgh-born Michael (Dodo) Marmarosa, an exceptionally talented pianist whose promising early career was cut short by the crushing weight of mental and emotional problems that proved too unbearable for him to overcome. At his peak, in the decade from 1940-50, Marmarosa was a member of big bands led ...

5
Album Review

Deanna Witkowski: Force of Nature

Read "Force of Nature" reviewed by Jerome Wilson


Pianist Deanna Witkowski has been studying the life and work of pianist and composer Mary Lou Williams for twenty years. This has resulted in her writing a biography of the artist, Mary Lou Williams; Music For The Soul (Liturgical Press, 2021) and making this companion album of her interpretations of Williams' music. Working in a trio format with occasional trumpet from Clay Jenkins, Witkowski covers all phases of Williams' musical career, her time writing for Andy Kirk in ...

4
Album Review

Bob Mintzer: Soundscapes

Read "Soundscapes" reviewed by Richard J Salvucci


Well, what is your pleasure? Swinging charts? You have them. A tight big band? Yes, that certainly, and more. Terrific soloists? In abundance. A blend of genres that go from straight ahead to Latin to funk? That is all here too. The only thing absent, and all respect to Bob Mintzer, is excitement. To be honest, many contemporary big bands doing studio recordings have a similar issue. The level of musicianship is astronomical, but something is not there. You wonder ...

18
Album Review

Bob Mintzer & WDR Big Band Cologne: Soundscapes

Read "Soundscapes" reviewed by Jack Bowers


Saxophonist Bob Mintzer, a New Yorker who left home long ago to see the world, is a professor of Jazz Studies at the University of Southern California's Thornton School of Music and chief conductor of the world-class WDR Big Band in Cologne, Germany, with whom he has recorded Soundscapes, a luminous showcase for his singular talents as composer, arranger and soloist. As anyone who is familiar with Mintzer--through big-band recordings, his quartet the Yellowjackets or other avenues--clearly understands, he will ...

7
Album Review

Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra: Bernstein Reimagined

Read "Bernstein Reimagined" reviewed by Jack Bowers


This impressive anthology by the superb Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra is not so much Bernstein Reimagined as Bernstein Unleashed. The jazz component in Leonard Bernstein's memorable compositions for symphony orchestra, Broadway shows, films and even liturgical works always lay simmering just below the surface. As Bernstein is said to have confided to Duke Ellington: “Maybe that's really the difference between us. You write symphonic jazz, and I write jazz symphonies." However credible the remark, there is no doubt that the ...

5
Album Review

Gloria Reuben & Marty Ashby: For All We Know

Read "For All We Know" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky


The deeply felt farewell on vocalist Gloria Reuben's Perchance To Dream (MCG Jazz, 2015)—a duo take on “Here's to Life," with guitarist Marty Ashby—foreshadowed the arrival of this intimate date. It may have taken five years for this pair to find their way to this work, but it was destined to happen at some point. This is quite simply a meeting that was written in the stars and the trailing suggestions of its predecessor. A testament to ...

3
Album Review

The DIVA Jazz Orchestra: DIVA + The Boys

Read "DIVA + The Boys" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky


The all-female DIVA Jazz Orchesta has a boy-meets-girls story threaded into its origin, as drummer Stanley Kay served as the impetus behind the group's formation. Therefore, it's only fitting that the ladies have a few gentleman over to join them for some high times in the music every now and then. This eight-song set, recorded live at Pittsburgh's Manchester Craftsmen's Guild in March of 2017, finds clarinetist Ken Peplowski, dearly departed trumpeter Claudio Roditi, trombonist Jay Ashby, and ...

6
Album Review

The DIVA Jazz Orchestra: DIVA + the Boys

Read "DIVA + the Boys" reviewed by Jack Bowers


After more than twenty-five years as one of the world's most renowned big bands, drummer Sherrie Maricle's superlative all-female DIVA Jazz Orchestra invited a quartet of “the boys" onboard to help ensure the ensemble's twelfth album's success. Even though DIVA needs no consorts to affirm its unremitting mastery, it is nonetheless pleasurable to witness these talented women sharing the stage and blowing up a storm with such esteemed guest artists as clarinetist Ken Peplowski, trombonist Jay Ashby and (it hurts ...

2
Album Review

Bob Mintzer Big Band / New York Voices: Meeting of Minds

Read "Meeting of Minds" reviewed by Jack Bowers


Here's an appetizing treat for fans of big bands and vocals alike, neatly wrapped in one handsome package by the stalwart Bob Mintzer Big Band and the splendid New York Voices. Together, band and voices take a fresh look at eight memorable standards from the Great American Songbook written by such master craftsmen as Cole Porter, Jerome Kern, Hoagy Carmichael, Kurt Weill, Burton Lane and others, entwining for good measure a brace of instrumentals: Vincent Youmans / Irving Caesar's buoyant ...


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