Jazz Articles
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Francois Carrier Ensemble featuring Mat Maneri /Tomasz Stańko / Gary Peacock / Michel Lambert: Openness
by Mark Corroto
Openness waited nearly two decades on a shelf (ok, probably on a hard drive) before being released for our listening pleasure. Recorded on May 5 & 6, 2006 at the Théâtre La Chapelle in Montréal, Canada, these three precious discs document a meeting between Canadian saxophonist François Carrier and Polish trumpeter Tomasz Stańko. It is the Polish label Fundacja Sluchaj to thank for this release and the prior disc Unwalled (2022), with Carrier being joined by Alexander von Schlippenbach, John ...
read moreIvo Perelman, Nate Wooley, Mat Maneri, Fred Lonberg-Holm, Joe Morris, Matt Moran: Seven Skies Orchestra
by Hrayr Attarian
Ever the intrepid innovator, saxophonist Ivo Perelman takes his music in a new direction on the double-disc set, Seven Skies Orchestra. After a long series, primarily of duets, Perelman returns to a larger ensemble setting, a sextet in this case. That is not the only difference between this release and his previous output; the music here, although still entirely improvised and easily recognizable as Perelman's, moves in a more spacious, contemplative direction, less introspective and more outgoing. Vibraphonist ...
read moreIvo Perelman: Seven Skies Orchestra
by Mike Jurkovic
In another reality, where the love one makes is what gets the headlines, the big money, the streaming specials, ceaselessly inquisitive saxophonist and downtown legend Ivo Perelman might just top the list of good guys. The guy who pushes for the better mind, the better heart, and confesses it all to tape or lacquer or binary code; chronicling one man's pursuit of the day. while hopefully inspiring others to cut the course the same. Even before the most ...
read moreIzumi Kimura & Gerry Hemingway: Kairos
by Ian Patterson
In ancient Greek kairos means the right time for action. The word relates both to archery and weaving. It is an apt title for pianist Izumi Kimura and drummer/percussionist Gerry Hemingway's debut duo album, as in-the-moment intent, precision and intricacy course through their dialogues. No strangers to one another, they first played as duo in 2016, and then in a trio with Barry Guy on Illuminated Silence (Fundacja Sluchaj, 2019). Compositional credits are shared, though the structures are really frames ...
read moreBarry Guy Blue Shroud Band: all this this here
by John Sharpe
Bassist and composer Barry Guy combines a number of his passions on All This This Here in a stunning act of synthesis. For the third major work for his Blue Shroud Band, following its eponymous debut (Intakt, 2016) and Odes And Meditations For Cecil Taylor (Not Two, 2018), Guy sets to music Nobel winning playwright Samuel Beckett's last poem What Is The Word (in two versions, both the original French and the English translation, which bookend the program).
read moreFrançois Carrier/Alexander von Schlippenbach/John Edwards/Michel Lambert: Unwalled
by Mark Corroto
Don't you love it when a plan comes together? Even if the plan is totally improvised, as is that of Unwalled. The album is the first meeting between Canadian alto saxophonist François Carrier and German-born pianist Alexander von Schlippenbach. The free jazz pioneer Schlippenbach was the founder of the Globe Unity Orchestra back in 1966, and it featured Peter Brötzmann, Peter Kowald, Han Bennink, Derek Bailey, Paul Lovens and Evan Parker, to name just a few of the future legends ...
read moreBrass And Ivory Tales
by Hrayr Attarian
Innovative saxophonist Ivo Perelman celebrates his 60th birthday with the release of a magnum opus, Brass And Ivory Tales. Recorded over a period of seven years, this nine-volume box set is impressive in both its depth and breath as it matches Perelman with a different piano master per disc. The improvised duets are usually the first documented meeting between the two musicians and the instant and rapidly evolving synergy is fresh and thrilling. Both remarkable and expected is Perelman's ability ...
read moreIvo Perelman: Brass And Ivory Tales
by Mark Corroto
Archeologists and cultural anthropologists theorize early humans had some form of music appreciation. They listened to the sounds wind made as it passed through trees. The breeze sounded different passing through oak than it did fir trees, and the sound was altered whether it was spring or fall. Then there were the bird songs, the first Lennon & McCartneys of the stone age. Early man replicated these melodies, with bones that could be whittled into horns or used to recreate ...
read moreCecil Taylor Quintet: Lifting The Bandstand
by Mark Corroto
No other artist, except maybe Miles Davis, created the sort of event/happening that surrounded a Cecil Taylor performance. As Taylor's career advanced from the 1960s on, his presentation became an almost pure expression, one not limited by the terms 'jazz,' 'poetry,' and 'dance.' Of the many chapters his art held, for many fans it is Taylor's travels to Europe that define his career. Much of it is documented in the coveted In Berlin '88 (FMP, 1989) eleven ...
read moreIvo Perelman: Deep Resonance
by Hrayr Attarian
Saxophonist Ivo Perelman is an exceptional innovator, even in a genre where originality and inventiveness are the norms. A stalwart of the international creative music scene, Perelman excels in small, intimate group settings. His collaboration with the string trio Arcado, the stimulating Deep Resonance, is a dramatic and introspective recording which draws equally on free improvisation and western classical music traditions. The first movement is constructed out of a mix of overlapping duets alternating with four individual stream-of-consciousness ...
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