Jazz Articles

Buddy Rich: Live in Miami with Flip Phillips

by Nic Jones
August 1, 2008

Rich's work was arguably one dimensional and these two live dates, captured for the ages from 1954 and 1957, set out a case in favor of that argument as persuasive as any. Rich, as was his vocation, is all over his drums on everything here, his extrovert nature in harness to a musical sensibility seemingly too precise to tolerate any way other than his own.

It's all there in abundance on the opening “Lover, Come Back to Me," which for ...

Allen Eager: An Ace Face

by Nic Jones
September 30, 2007

Allen Eager was one of those swing-through-bop tenor saxophonists who seem to have walked this earth in abundance in the late 1940s. An Ace Face is a two-disc set from that period, chronicling work both under his leadership and as a sideman. Within the canon of those players Eager was arguably the one who got closest to bop's creativity. He is thus further “out than, say, Flip Phillips, whilst he lacks the individuality of someone like Lucky Thompson.

He's certainly ...

Shorty Rogers: Shorty Goes To Hollywood

by Nic Jones
June 22, 2007

This is volume three in an ongoing series devoted to the music of trumpeter Shorty Rogers, released by Giant Steps. The temptation to say that what's on this set is unlikely to win any new converts to his music is great, but while it might be apposite the case is a little more complicated than that. The quintet that Rogers led with reedman Jimmy Giuffre in the front line is arguably the best band he ever led, ...

Joe Harriott: Killer Joe!

by Nic Jones
June 6, 2007

Jamaican-born alto saxophonist, bandleader and composer Joe Harriott was destined to become a seminal figure in the evolution of British jazz in the 1960s. This two-disc collection of his earlier work in Britain is a primer in just what a gifted instrumentalist he was, covering as it does a range of his work from the mid-1950s--he arrived in Britain from his place of birth in May, 1951--under his own name as well as those of other leaders. ...

Stan Getz & The Lighthouse All Stars: Live

by Nic Jones
May 28, 2007

Tenor saxophonist, Stan Getz, had a way with music that was always pretty uncompromising. Capable of producing a tone of exceptional beauty, he often relied on it to disguise a certain imperious quality in his work. If this was indeed the case, then it was prevalent for the majority of his career. However, musically speaking, he was at his hungriest in the early 1950s and this set is a nice companion to The Complete Roost Recordings (Blue Note,1950-54).

It documents ...

Ronnie Scott: Birth Of A Legend

by David Rickert
January 15, 2007

Ronnie Scott stares out at you from the cover shot on Birth of a Legend with a confident glare, as if to dare you to suggest that the Brits couldn't play as well as their American counterparts overseas. This two-disc set of the saxophonist's various musical exploits indeed proves that across the pond in the forties and fifties were a small group of musicians who could play just as well, and sometimes better on a good night, than their idols. ...

Oscar Peterson: Birth of A Legend: Oscar Peterson Historic Carnegie Hall Concerts

by David Rickert
December 12, 2006

Legend has it that Norman Granz wanted to introduce Oscar Peterson to America through his Carnegie Hall concerts, but the Canadian citizen couldn't obtain a work visa to allow him to appear. So Granz planted him in the audience and asked him to appear on stage with bassist Ray Brown for a set. The pianist wowed the crowd and became the talk of the town immediately afterward.

Those performances from 1949 are captured at the beginning of Birth ...

Tal Farlow: Tal Farlow Guitar Genius: The LA Sessions

by Nic Jones
November 27, 2006

The word “genius" is used far too much, but Guitar Genius is an apposite term for a performance by Tal Farlow, and its use is fully justified with regards to this two-disc set.

Farlow was apparently blessed with unusually large hands, which on a practical level enabled him literally to reach places that were beyond a lot of other guitarists. But this would have counted for nothing if he had not allied such an attribute with equally exceptional harmonic and ...

Ronnie Scott: Birth Of A Legend

by Nic Jones
October 16, 2006

Ronnie Scott's role as the owner of Britain's longest surviving jazz club has perhaps distracted attention from his work as a musician, and this situation was hardly helped by the fact that he wasn't recorded that often in his lifetime. This set goes some way towards rectifying the first situation, but at the same time it serves also as a primer for the way in which bebop was disseminated in the later 1940s and 1950s.

In a sense there is ...

Oscar Peterson: Birth of a Legend: Historic Carnegie Hall Concerts

by Nic Jones
October 9, 2006

It's probably safe to say that Oscar Peterson has never shown much understanding of restraint in the course of his lengthy career, and indeed it might be argued that his whole approach to the piano has always run the the risk of coming across as the triumph of technique.

Things are a little different on Birth of a Legend. The music was recorded between 1949 and 1953, and during this period, Peterson's characteristically ebullient swing was like the most benevolent ...