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Tim Stevens: Media Vita
by Dan McClenaghan
Australian pianist Tim Stevens chose the year 2016 to pump up his compositional prowess, vowing to write one tune per day. The challenge he set for himself resulted in three hundred and sixty-six tunes (2016 was a leap year), and Media Vita, twelve pieces culled from the year long effort. Classically trained, but working ...
Joe Sullivan Big Band: Unfamiliar Surroundings
by Jack Bowers
Unfamiliar Surroundings, a well-designed two-CD set by trumpeter Joe Sullivan's all-star ensemble from north of the border, consists of three disparate suites, two on Disc 1, the other on Disc 2. If the surroundings seem unfamiliar, the music is not, as it honors the legendary bellwethers of the Big Band Era without echoing any of them. ...
Dizzy Gillespie: Concert of the Century - Tribute to Charlie Parker
by Mark E. Gallo
This superb album was recorded at the Montreal Jazz Festival in November of 1980. All of the principals have passed on, so it's that much more of a treat. Trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie fronted the group of Ray Brown (bass), Milt Jackson (vibraphone), Hank Jones (piano), Philly Joe Jones (drums) and James Moody (tenor sax and flute), ...
Atom String Quartet: Seifert
by Ian Patterson
Jazz string quartets are rare. Jazz string quartets as brilliant as Atom String Quartet, the Polish ensemble founded in 2010, are rarer still. This, the quartet's fourth release, sees Dawid Lubowicz, Mateusz Smoczyński (both violin), Michal Zaborski (viola) and Krzysztof Lenczowski (cello) embrace the music of Zbigniew Seifert, the great Polish violinist--and initially saxophonist--of Tomasz Stanko's ...
Steve Sandberg Quartet: Alaya
by Dan Bilawsky
The best word to sum up pianist Steve Sandberg's work is expansive. If his own performance history doesn't make that point clearly enough--he's hobnobbed with Brazilian music royalty like the Gilberto clan, made his mark on the salsa world by working with artists like Ruben Blades and Celia Cruz, touched down time and again in the ...
Dan Montgomery: Storyteller
by Edward Blanco
Young bassist Dan Montgomery makes a splashy entrance onto the landscape of recorded jazz with Storyteller, a brash, audacious offering of classic modern jazz featuring nine original compositions performed by a core quintet of fellow classmates from the University of Miami's (UM) Frost School of Music. A bassist/vocalist and educator from Rochester, NY, Montgomery is currently ...
Katie Thiroux: Off Beat
by Mark E. Gallo
Katie Thiroux has studied with jazz vocalist Tierney Sutton and bassist John Clayton, and the bassist/vocalist was awarded a scholarship to the Berklee, later teaching at the esteemed College of Music. Her resume is as impressive as it gets, but this is not a woman who rests on her laurels. Her instruments are her calling cards. ...
Federica Michisanti Trioness: Isk
by Neri Pollastri
La giovane contrabbassista romana Federica Michisanti giunge al secondo lavoro da leader del suo Trioness, gruppo in equilibrio tra l'eredità di Jimmy Giuffre e la poetica degli Oregon. L'influenza del grande clarinettista è evidente fin dalla tipologia della formazione -pianoforte e contrabbasso, con ance e senza batteria -ma è ancor più evocata dalle atmosfere, ...
Tony Allen: A Tribute to Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers
by Mark Sullivan
Legendary Nigerian drummer Tony Allen is an Afrobeat pioneer best known for his tenure as musical director for Fela Kuti. American jazz was an early influence, and he pays tribute to hard bop icon drummer Art Blakey and his band Jazz Messengers here. In a way this is full circle, as Blakey was greatly influenced by ...
Art Pepper: The Return of Art Pepper
by C. Michael Bailey
Alto saxophonist Art Pepper's first incarceration for drugs took place between August 1954 and July 1956, a period conspicuous for Pepper's absence from the recording studio. Pepper's first recording as a leader after his release was, aptly, The Return of Art Pepper. He had been busy as a sideman for trumpeters Shorty Rogers (Big Shorty Express ...
