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Yelena Eckemoff: Blooming Tall Phlox
by Dan Bilawsky
While the art of playing jazz qualifies as a multisensory experience, involving listening, touching, and seeing, it usually doesn't extend so far as to include the sense of smell. But that's not to say that a nose for scents has no place in musical and artistic spheres. If you need convincing, just look at Blooming Tall ...
João Hasselberg & Pedro Branco: Dancing Our Way To Death
by Mark Sullivan
Portuguese bassist João Hasselberg and guitarist Pedro Branco both hail from Lisbon, but are currently living and studying elsewhere--Hasselberg in Copenhagen, Branco in Amsterdam. They each contribute compositions to this co-led project, as well as play the core instrumental tracks, aided by additional players and vocalists. First, it must be said that the music is not ...
Azure Hiptronics: Ignacio
by Karl Ackermann
Azure was established in 2006, by guitarist Rogier Scheemann and pianist Pierre-Francois Blanchard, both studying at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague. Only Scheemann remains from that original group. With their first recording There Were Stars (Self-Produced, 2007), the group laid a framework for style-hopping, not just from track-to-track, but even within specific compositions. The latest ...
Olga Konkova and Jens Thoresen: December Songs
by Geno Thackara
It's a Christmas album even a Grinch can love. The title December Songs already hints that this affair is themed around the general season and mood rather than one particular holiday. The format (sparse piano/guitar duets) smoothly follows suit. The song selection includes a few of the same carols that always get overplayed at the end ...
Rudy Royston Trio: Rise Of Orion
by Karl Ackermann
The visceral style of drummer Rudy Royston was considerably toned down on his leader debut 303 (Greenleaf, 2014), a septet outing where the drummer often worked within the context of an ensemble player. Pared down to a trio formation for Rise Of Orion, Royston retains the services of the ubiquitous saxophonist Jon Irabagon and bassist Yasushi ...
Dag Magnus Narvesen Octet: Cornua Copiae
by John Sharpe
At times there seems no end to the bewildering stream of talent emerging from the Norwegian jazz scene. Fresh off the conveyor belt comes drummer Dag Magnus Narvesen whose Damana Octet functions more akin to an even larger ensemble, thanks to some expertly voiced charts. On the roster are some increasingly familiar names, such as saxophonists ...
Behn Gillece: Dare To Be
by David A. Orthmann
It pays to listen to Dare To Be, Behn Gillece's second release as a leader for Posi-Tone Records, from the bottom up. Bassist Ugonna Okegwo and drummer Jason Tiemann are one of most congenial, articulate, and straightforward bass and drums team in recent memory. They're self-effacing, deeply focused and frisky. Regardless of the differences in the ...
Ingrid Laubrock Serpentines: Serpentines
by John Sharpe
On the eponymous Serpentines, German-born, NYC-based saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock's unveils a new outfit featuring unconventional instrumentation, peopled by an all star cast. For this line up Laubrock takes her enigmatic charts for groups such as Anti-house and Ubatuba to another level, as improv jazz meets the classical avant-garde in pieces where mood and texture often trump ...
Leap of Faith Orchestra: Supernovae
by Karl Ackermann
Composer and multi-instrumentalist, PEK, set his sights on something bigger with the Leap of Faith Orchestra's Supernovae. The previous incarnation of the LOFO expands from the fifteen musicians on The Expanding Universe (Evil Clown, 2016) to twenty-one players on this new outing. Another noteworthy element of this project is PEK's use of Frame Notation where the ...
Morten Schantz: Godspeed
by Roger Farbey
The three Scandinavian musicians featured on Godspeed are also members of the eclectic JazzKamikaze quintet. By 2014, Morten Schantz had released eight albums, four as a soloist and four with JazzKamikaze. Saxophonist Marius Neset has played alongside Django Bates and Anton Eger is also drummer with Phronesis. JazzKamikaze produces a fairly frenetic sound whereas Godspeed is ...

