Home » Jazz Articles

Jazz Articles

Our daily articles are carefully curated by the All About Jazz staff. You can find more articles by searching our website, see what's trending on our popular articles page or read articles ahead of their published dates on our future articles page. Read our daily album reviews.

Sign in to customize your My Articles page —or— Filter Article Results

19
Album Review

Justin Chart: Keep The Blue

Read "Keep The Blue" reviewed by Hrayr Attarian


Not all entirely improvised music necessarily embraces dissonance and atonality, however stimulating that may be. Saxophonist Justin Chart is famous for spontaneously creating entire sets, whether in the studio or in live settings, that are firmly rooted in mainstream sounds. His output is consistently cinematic and absorbing with a mysterious aura. His Keep the Blue is the quintessential soundtrack looking for a film, a classic film noir to be exact. The twelve tracks recorded at the Mixx in ...

4
Album Review

Rory Gallagher: Deuce: 50th Anniversary Edition

Read "Deuce: 50th Anniversary Edition" reviewed by Doug Collette


Since Rory Gallagher's untimely passing in 1995, there have been more than a few posthumous audio and video packages devoted to the prolific output of the late bluesman. And while most of them, supervised by family members as is this one, have been both historically exacting and passionate in devotion to their subject, none are more so than this Deuce: 50th Anniversary Deluxe Edition of the man's second solo album. With its nine and a half inch square ...

8
Album Review

Justin Chart: The Midnight People

Read "The Midnight People" reviewed by Hrayr Attarian


Saxophonist Justin Chart is an inventive and versatile musician who spontaneously creates mellifluous and enthralling soundscapes. Leading a synergistic band of like-minded sidemen. Chart excels in live improvisations that are simultaneously free as well as charmingly accessible. His output in the third decade of the century has been prolific without sacrificing artistic vision. The Midnight People is Chart's third release of 2022 and continues the trend started in its predecessors.The title track, for instance, simmers with a soulfulness ...

10
Album Review

Justin Chart: The Scarlet Jazz Room

Read "The Scarlet Jazz Room" reviewed by Kyle Simpler


Improvisation is one of the key elements of jazz, and it isomething listeners expect to hear in most performances. However, it is often a part of the overall composition, which is based around a central melody. But saxophonist Justin Chart takes improvisation a step further with The Scarlet Jazz Room. This album relies almost entirely on improvisation, and the result is quite impressive. Some might assume that this amount of improvisation would suggest that it's some sort of ...

29
Album Review

Justin Chart: The Scarlet Jazz Room

Read "The Scarlet Jazz Room" reviewed by Hrayr Attarian


Justin Chart is an award winning singer-songwriter and an accomplished jazz saxophonist. On his spontaneously created pieces Chart often collaborates with a rotating cast of like-minded sidemen. The resulting music is as sophisticated and intricately structured as carefully notated compositions. Chart, once again, showcases his unique artistic approach with the cinematic and enchanting The Scarlet Jazz Room. Chart's unaccompanied, soulful alto opens “Shape of My Shade." As the four piece rhythm section enters, the piece simmers with passion. ...

30
Album Review

Justin Chart: Live In Los Angeles

Read "Live In Los Angeles" reviewed by Hrayr Attarian


Los Angeles-based, award-winning, musician Justin Chart is both an accomplished singer-songwriter and a superlative saxophonist. Chart infuses his jazz work with a distinct melodicism and his pop songs with a crackling spontaneity. A number of his releases are recorded in one take and are mostly improvised while eschewing dissonance and embracing lyricism. His tenth, Live in Los Angeles, is no different. Accompanying him through this exciting set of 12 originals are a rotating cast of sidemen all of whom share ...

3
Album Review

The Band: Stage Fright 50th Anniversary Edition 2CD

Read "Stage Fright 50th Anniversary Edition 2CD" reviewed by Doug Collette


In order to more fully appreciate the 50th anniversary edition of the Band's third studio album, Stage Fright (Capitol, 1970), it is best to resist the temptation to go off on tangents regarding the revisionism visited upon the release. The supervision administered by the group's guitarist/songwriter Robbie Robertson may be as questionable as that visited upon other such packages in recent years, but rampant skepticism and suspicion about his motives ultimately precludes deeper enjoyment of the work both past and ...

1
Album Review

Steve Miller: Live! Breaking Ground August 3, 1977

Read "Live! Breaking Ground August 3, 1977" reviewed by Doug Collette


Given the careerist bent of Steve Miller around the time of Live! Breaking Ground: August 3, 1977, not to mention the popularity of concert releases in the wake of Frampton Comes Alive! (A&M,1976), it is altogether surprising the Space Cowboy did not issue a formal concert album until 1983. Miller came back from a self-imposed hiatus following the surprise (and widespread) popularity of The Joker (Capitol, 1973) with two smash albums in successive years, Fly Like An Eagle (Capitol, 1976) ...

1
Album Review

U2: All That You Can't Leave Behind 20th Anniversary Deluxe Edition (2CD)

Read "All That You Can't Leave Behind 20th Anniversary Deluxe Edition (2CD)" reviewed by Doug Collette


The music of U2 on All That You Can't Leave Behind is very much in keeping with the austere black and white graphics, preserved throughout the graphic design of this digipak as well as its enclosed twenty-four page booklet within. A distinct move away from the density of production experimentation on their three previous studio albums—Achtung Baby (Island, 1991), Zooropa (Island, 1993) and Pop (Island, 1997)— the sound produced by Brian Eno and Daniel Lanois on this 2000 project is ...

5
Album Review

Rory Gallagher: Check Shirt Wizard: Live in '77

Read "Check Shirt Wizard: Live in '77" reviewed by Doug Collette


Check Shirt Wizard: Live in 1977 is yet another in a lengthy string of posthumous archival work devoted to Irish guitarist and songwriter Rory Gallagher. Like virtually all its predecessors in both audio and video configurations, including Live at Montreux (Eagle, 2006) and Notes From San Francisco (Eagle/Legacy, 2011), this double CD set (also available as three vinyl LPs with similarly variegated artwork, action photos and replications of press testimonials of the time) not only does justice to, but enhances ...


Get more of a good thing!

Our weekly newsletter highlights our top stories, our special offers, and upcoming jazz events near you.