Results for "AAJ Staff"

Starlicker - Double Demon (Delmark, 2011)

May 17, 2011

Cornetist Rob Mazurek may live in Brazil now, but he retains deep ties to the Chicago jazz scene. Joining up with John Herndon on percussion and Jason Adasiewicz vibraphone they take us on a beautiful cosmic voyage, something akin to an updated Sun Ra small ensemble if there were such a thing. They combine their sounds ...

Alex Vittum Creates a Sound Poem for Drums-Percussion and Electronics on "Prism"

May 17, 2011

The drum set is not just that noisy contraption that disturbs parents' peace of mind for years at a stretch with barrages of cracks, crashes and ba-booms (and I must admit I was guilty of doing that to my folks while growing up). It is of course a MUSICAL instrument, capable of holding its own (in ...

Orchestra in a Box + 4

May 17, 2011

Zeitgeist dubbed its collaboration with accordionist Guy Klucevsek as “Hammers, Horns Skins and Squeezeboxes," but they might have added “mallets, toys and cafeteria boxes" to acknowledge the full arsenal. Playing to full houses for three consecutive nights at Studio Z, the four Zs (percussionists Heather Barringer and Patti Cudd; multi-reedist Pat O'Keefe; pianist Shannon Wettstein) perfectly ...

Forgotten Series: Pat Martino - El Hombre (1967)

May 16, 2011

By Mark Saleski Given the fact that Pat Martino had played with some of the biggest B3 players in the business (including Jack McDuff and the great Jimmy Smith), it probably surprised no one that Martino's first solo release carried on in that blues and groove-based organ trio vein. What surprises me about this, decades later, ...

Weekend Extra: Miguel Zenon in Spain

May 16, 2011

Weekend Extra: Young Ella on Film

May 16, 2011

In what may have been her motion picture debut, here is Ella Fizgerald at 25 in the 1942 Abbott and Costello comedy Ride 'Em Cowboy. With her in the sequence are the Merry Macs singing and the Lindy Hoppers lindy-hopping. This was at about the time she had stopped fronting the Chick Webb band and moved ...

JazzSnap: Harry James (C. 1943)

May 16, 2011

The saxophonist here is Corky Corcoran, lead tenor on Harry James' band recordings from 1941 through the 1970s. That's James on trumpet, of course, and James band stringman John deVoodgt to James' right. I'm guessing this is 1943 based on the cut of their suits and the fabulous 1943 newspaper photo of James on the right. ...

Essentially Ellington Weekend

May 16, 2011

Is it something in the nearby salt water? Much more likely is the strength of the local music programs at the secondary level—and in the schools that feed up to it. Bands from Washington State and Florida took the top four awards at last night's finale of Jazz at Lincoln Center's 16th annual Essentially EllingtonHigh School ...

Jazz Singer Samantha Farrell Performing at Bond Lounge in Boston on Wednesday, May 18

May 16, 2011

Rising star Samantha Farrell has a return engagement at BOND Lounge at Boston Langham Hotel on Wednesday, May 18, 2011 from 7:00㬆:00 p.m. The singer/songwriter, originally from Boston and now living in Los Angeles, has been described by Ben Evans of the Huffington Post as possessing “a liquor-honey voice, deft guitar work and slightly melancholic tones ...

Fred Hersch, Improvising Pianist, Alone at the Vanguard

May 16, 2011

Fred Hersch plays one hell of a piano. He was very ill several years ago, in a near-death coma- state, but most thankfully he's recovered and back at it. The live solo disk Alone at the Vanguard (Palmetto 2147) shows a certain even deeper level of profundity than the usual, which I have to believe comes ...