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Tom Kessler: Nuevo Valso
by Friedrich Kunzmann
For his fourth album as a leader Mexican guitarist Tom Kessler gets drummer Jochen Rückert and bassist Eivind Opsvik on board to deliver nine, self-penned and diverse pieces. Opener “Ascilina" demonstrates the treats that the trio brings to the table. Intriguing voicings on guitar, buzzing melodic lines on bass and an understated percussive structure. The production ...
Al Hood and the H2 Sextet: Jazz Muses
by Nicholas F. Mondello
There's something fascinating about the word “inspire." We know from Latin that the word derives from inspirare, meaning “to breathe" or “blow into." It is the perfect theme as presented for trumpeter Al Hood and the H2 Sextet's terrific album, Jazz Muses. Not only is Hood inspired by his Jazz Muses, but his blowing here takes ...
Antoine Karacostas: Insulary Tales
by Mike Jurkovic
Paris based pianist Antoine Karacostas may have set out to write the music for Insulary Tales to evoke the idea of insularity and one's individual response to the natural world around them, but in the end he's created an emotional, ten song cycle universal to us all. A recording of hushed, sustained beauty and ...
Focus: 11
by Glenn Astarita
If the artwork looks familiar, yes, it's by Roger Dean who created album cover artwork for progressive rock icons, Yes, Gentle Giant, Uriah Heep and other notables. Dean continues his phantasmagoric images via his work for this pivotal 1970s and 80s Dutch prog unit, Focus for its 11th studio album, featuring founder Thijs van Leer (keys, ...
Justin Morell: Concerto for Guitar and Jazz Orchestra
by Jack Bowers
Justin Morell, himself a world-class guitarist, does not play guitar (or anything else) on this splendid new album, which, even so, could not have taken flight without him. Morell, an assistant professor of music at Lebanon Valley College in Pennsylvania, composed and arranged the inclusive three-movement Concerto for Guitar and Jazz Orchestra, performed in his stead ...
David Torn/Tim Berne/Ches Smith: Sun Of Goldfinger
by Mark Sullivan
Storied experimental guitarist David Torn is also so much more: looper, songwriter, improviser, session guitarist, film composer, record producer, and mixer. In his long association with ECM Records he has done most of those things, going back to Cloud About Mercury (1987, recently reissued)--arguably still his best known album as a leader--the group project Prezens (2007), ...
Larry Dickson Jazz Quartet: Winter Horizons
by Jack Bowers
Winter Horizons is the last of Cincinnati-based baritone saxophonist Larry Dickson's four-part salute to the seasons which began in 2015 with Second Springtime and includes Summergold Promises and Donora Autumn. As before, Dickson leads a quartet whose charter members are bassist Michael Sharfe and drummer Jim Leslie. Alto saxophonist Rick Van Matre, Dickson's band mate in ...
Triple Tea: The Tunnel
by Mike Jurkovic
Triple Tea rip open their debut recording The Tunnel with the arena-sized rock'n'roll pugnaciousness of “1994," a powerhouse panorama that instantly reveals the 3D view of jazz and its many incorporated elements. The seven tracks comprising The Tunnel all exhibit sweeping overtures and seemingly effortless, certainly seamless movements between song sections, reminiscent of the ...
Atomic: Pet Variations
by John Eyles
Formed in the spring of 2000, Scandinavian “supergroup" Atomic recorded and released their first album Feet Music (Jazzland) in 2001. The years since have been remarkably stable for the quintet; they have produced albums at an impressive rate of about a disc a year, including two collaborations with Ken Vandermark's School Days group. The only change ...
Paul Tynan: quARTet
by Dan McClenaghan
Trumpeter Paul Tynan's offering for 2019 is entitled quARTtet, emphasis on the capitalization of the embedded word “art." Jazz recordings have a long history of pairing up with the visual arts, especially in the realm of album and CD cover images: The paintings on Charles Mingus' Mingus Ah Um (Columbia, 1959); all of pianist ...
