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Pan Afrikan Peoples Arkestra: 60 Years
by Chris May
The 2 x LP 60 Years celebrates the history of the Pan Afrikan Peoples Arkestra (PAPA), which was founded by the pianist, composer and community activist Horace Tapscott in South Central Los Angeles in 1961, and directed by him until he passed in 1999. The release, albeit of archive material, also reminds us that the Arkestra ...
Charlie Parker: At Birdland 1950 Revisited
by Chris May
When it comes to live recordings of Charlie Parker, Jazz At Massey Hall, from a concert in Toronto in May 1953, has been widely considered the slam-dunk number one ever since Charles Mingus released it on his Debut label in 1956. Forensicists might favour the 7-CD The Complete Dean Benedetti Recordings Of Charlie Parker (Mosaic, 1990), ...
Anthony E. Nelson Jr.: Swinging Sunset
by Chris May
Swinging Sunset, New Jersey-based tenor saxophonist Anthony E. Nelson Jr.'s fifth album on his Musicstand label, is an unpretentious, undemanding and utterly enjoyable celebration of the organ trios of the 1950s and 1960s. From the first bars of the opener, Eddie Heywood's “Canadian Sunset," it feels like we are in for a good time and, over ...
Asher Gamedze: Turbulence And Pulse
by Chris May
South African drummer Asher Gamedze's Turbulence And Pulse is a magnificent, gutsy, stirring piece of work, authentic to its core. It resonates, almost without mediation, with Black American jazz as played by bands led by Charles Mingus and Art Blakey circa 1960. And therein lies a story, for Black South African jazz has seen its compass ...
Anders Lønne Grønseth & Multiverse: Inner View
by Chris May
Since George Russell published his influential Lydian Chromatic Concept Of Tonal Organization in 1953, other jazz musicians have attempted to reforge the theoretical construct of their music--with varying degrees of success and including some egregiously posturing examples of b.s. which bring to mind Hans Christian Andersen's salutary story The Emperor's New Clothes. One ...
Wayne Shorter: Adam's Apple To Super Nova Revisited
by Chris May
In the three and a half years which separate the recording of the Blue Note albums Adam's Apple, in February 1966, and Super Nova, in August and September 1969, jazz went through a paradigm shift going on profound identity trauma. In 1966, though it was already past peak popularity, hard bop was still an important soundtrack ...
Long-Lost Paradigm-Shifting LPs By South Africa's Malombo Jazz Reissued
by Chris May
Strut Records has reissued in LP format two long-lost classics of Black South African jazz, Malombo's Malombo Jazz (Gallotone, 1966) and Malombo Jazz Makers Vol. 2 (Gallotone, 1967). At the time of their release, the albums were in a symbiotic relationship with the country's emerging Black Consciousness movement. It would be hard to overstate the discs' ...
Lonnie Liston Smith: Jazz Is Dead 17
by Chris May
Having kicked off 2023 with one of the strongest albums in its catalogue--Phil Ranelin and Wendell Harrison's Jazz Is Dead 16--Ali Shaheed Muhammad and Adrian Younge's label continues on a roll. Jazz Is Dead 17 finds the two producers in their funked-up comfort zone and relishing it. Strange but true, Jazz Is Dead ...
Stan Tracey Quartet: Jazz Suite Inspired By Dylan Thomas' Under Milk Wood
by Chris May
Pianist and composer Stan Tracey's Under Milk Wood, released in 1966, was among the first albums to prove that British jazz could, on a good day, stand as tall as its American parent. Over a decade would pass, however, before that fact was widely accepted by jazz lovers in either America or Britain. Indeed, it is ...
Kósmos: Averno
by Chris May
Formed in 2015 in Naples, though its individual members have long since gone outernational, piano trio Kósmos debuted with Back Home (Jazzit) in 2019. The album was composed of reworkings of five tunes by Lennie Tristano plus one original each by pianist Stefano Falcone, bassist Ilaria Capalbo and drummer Giuseppe D'Alessandro. The follow-up, ...
