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Maurizio Minardi: My Piano Trio
by Bruce Lindsay
There's something rather endearing and self-effacing about Maurizio Minardi's decision to name this album My Piano Trio--even if the title isn't strictly accurate. The unpretentious title reflects the accessible and open nature of the music, but it's actually the product of two talented and imaginative trios: one from the UK, and the other from Italy.
Tom Soloveitzik, Korhan Erel, Kevin Davis: Three States of Freedom
by John Eyles
Eddie Prevost's improvisation workshop has been meeting weekly in London since 1999, with several hundred participants having attended. In that time, some of its long-standing participants, such as saxophonist Seymour Wright, guitarist Ross Lambert and pianist Sebastian Lexer, have built up considerable performance histories and discographies. Lately, there has been an increasing trickle of ...
Jessica Williams: Songs of Earth
by Dan McClenaghan
Jessica Williams, with her last four CDs on Origin Records, is like a butterfly coming out of its cocoon. Earlier in her career, Williams--who once held the piano chair in drummer Philly Joe Jones band--wrapped her artistry in the Great American Song on Some Ballads Some Blues (Red and Blue, 1999), along with stellar tributes to ...
Bobby Sanabria Big Band: Multiverse
by Dan Bilawsky
Drummer/historian/educator/percussionist Bobby Sanabria is more than the sum of his parts; he's actually the sum of all parts, collected, absorbed and observed over the course of his musical life. The Nuyorican jazz giant is a stylistic sponge, historical repository and bringer of the boom, but he's a true artist above all else. He understands that music ...
Marco Cappelli: The American Dream
by Mark Corroto
Things get lost in translation. It's inevitable, and it's not just words and meaning. Cultural things morph. Take a Venetian or Roman to an Olive Garden restaurant in America and she won't recognize much on the menu, or send an American to Puglia with the task of finding a pizza pocket. Some things just don't translate.
300 Basses: Sei Ritornelli
by John Eyles
The credits of Sei Ritornelli require some explanation, in order to avoid confusion or unrealistic expectations. Firstly, formed in 2010, 300 Basses is a multinational trio consisting of the Portuguese-born Alfredo Costa Monteiro, Jonas Kocher from Switzerland and Italian Luca Venitucci. Contrary to the mind-boggling images conjured up by the group name, all three play accordion; ...
Aram Shelton: Everything For Somebody
by Mark Corroto
Alto saxophonist Aram Shelton cannot break his Chicago habit. We're not talking that monkey woman Joe Williams used to sing about, back in the day. Shelton, who left Chicago a few years back for the Bay area of California, returns to the windy city often, both physically and for its sound.His second quartet recording, ...
Rich Halley 4: Back From Beyond
by Dave Wayne
It's perplexing that a jazz saxophonist of Rich Halley's caliber has never recorded for a large jazz label such as ECM or Soul Note/Black Saint. Perhaps a victim of geography (he's chosen to live in rural Oregon almost his entire life) and circumstance (he maintained a career as a wildlife biologist) more than anything else, the ...
Ezra Weiss and The Rob Scheps Big Band: Our Path To This Moment
by Edward Blanco
A veteran jazz artist and educator, Oregon-based Ezra Weiss is much more than a fine pianist; he is a talented composer and arranger nominated for Best Arranger under the Rising Star category of Downbeat Magazine's 60th Annual Critics Poll of 2012. Since graduating from the country's oldest music school (Ohio's Oberlin Conservatory of Music), Weiss has ...
Gary Porter: Can't Keep Still
by Bruce Lindsay
"Oh Mr. Porter, what can I do? I wanted to go to Birmingham and they've taken me on to Crewe." So went the refrain of an old Music Hall tune. Porter, a sextet from Essex in the south of England, doesn't take its name from that great old song, nor is it named for an equally ...

