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Results for "Dan McClenaghan"
David Ecker: Respite (Despite)
by Dan McClenaghan
The Covid pandemic has been educational. One of its lessons is (to paraphrase a famous movie): music finds a way. If getting together in the studio is a problem, then grab the technology and go the remote recording route. It worked for guitarist Justin Morell and drummer Mark Ferber on 2022's Exit Music For Intelligent Life ...
Tim Bruer: Love Letters: Compositions For Solo Piano
by Dan McClenaghan
The music on Australian pianist Tim Bruer's Love Letters: Compositions For Solo Piano have simple beginnings. For example, a chord that Bruer loved--one which came about via his “messing around" with a keyboard sound that caught his ear--then developed quickly, with little tweaking, into its completed form; a composition was born Bruer loves sounds ...
Avi Granite 6: Operator
by Dan McClenaghan
Guitarist Avi Granite--in the company of his brash band Avi Granite 6--opens his Operator with “Crushing Beans," displaying a big bad attitude. The drums are explosive, the horns belt it out, the bass shakes the walls and Granite slashes and burns. The first impression is: “This must be a great live band." And indeed, the studio ...
Alister Spence / Tony Buck: Mythographer
by Dan McClenaghan
Duo recordings, no matter what the particular instrumentation, are able to showcase musical mind-melds. Two artists conversing, trading and extrapolating on each other's ideas. Pianist Alister Spence and drummer Tony Buck try the format on for size with Mythographer. This spontaneous, one-day-session recording opens with “Dry Wood Talking." It sounds as if the talking ...
Brad Goode: The Unknown
by Dan McClenaghan
One of the joys attached to reviewing music is the exposure to artists who otherwise might not show up on the radar. For every Pat Metheny there are a hundred highly-creative, lower-profile, hugely-talented guitarists plucking the strings; for every Brad Mehldau plying the trade ten dozen marvelous, relatively unknown pianists show up in the mailbox or ...
Manzanita Quintet: Osmosis
by Dan McClenaghan
The tried and true quintet formation, set in stone by alto saxophonist Charlie Parker and trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie in the late 1940s, is back in 2022 with the Reno, Nevada-based Manzanita Quintet. So how do they give a fresh shine to a sound that could be considered “done to death?" On Osmosis the ...
ECM Records Touchstones: Part 3
by Dan McClenaghan
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 This third edition of “ECM Touchstones" explores more of the label's early recordings, repackaged and offered up as a way to present music that had perhaps slipped through time's cracks, into the hard-to-find category. Of these, four were re-released in 2019, one in 2008--24 to 47 ...
ECM Records Touchstones: Part 2
by Dan McClenaghan
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 This second edition of “ECM Touchstones" explores more of the label's early recordings, repackaged and offered up as a way to present music that had perhaps slipped through time's cracks, into the hard-to-find category. Of these, four were re-released in 2019, one in 2008--32 to 43 ...
Simona Premazzi: Wave In Gravity
by Dan McClenaghan
What do we listen for in a solo piano project? Technical proficiency. Heart. Body. Soul. A vulnerability versus strength dynamic. The ability to surrender to the sounds, to take them where they want to go. In other words, we look for how well the artist articulates their humanity. Simona Premazzi displays all these attributes ...
ECM Records Touchstones: Part 1
by Dan McClenaghan
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 Every album ever released by ECM Records would be readily available in a better world. But that, understandably, is not the case. The German label, founded by Manfred Eicher—who still holds the helm—debuted in 1969 with pianist Mal Waldron's Free At Last. In the ensuing five-plus ...
