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Tessa Souter: Singing Her Way to Happiness
by Dean Nardi
The English/Trinidadian artist is a bona fide treasure--consummate stage presence, captivating singer, accomplished songwriter. Arriving in New York in 2009 from England, Souter studied at the Manhattan School of Music while taking a masterclass with Mark Murphy. Starting with open mic sessions, she soon began making a name for herself on the scene, bringing an appealing ...
Lara Somogyi: Finding Her Muse in the Desert
by Dean Nardi
When one is making a pilgrimage to Joshua Tree in California--even by Zoom call--you must be careful about protecting your eyes from the blinding sunlight and keep your cap on to cover your brain. Listening to the music of Lara Somogyi from her album désert (Mercury KX 2025), one's brain is constantly heated by thoughts of ...
Dave Anderson: Plays with Gusto
by Dean Nardi
Gusto! Vigorous and enthusiastic. Implies doing something with great spirit and energy. From the Spanish, gusto indicates taste, pleasure or liking, and that, friends, wraps and puts a bow around what you hear from New York-based soprano and tenor saxophonist Dave Anderson on his uplifting In Lieu of Flowers album (Label1, 2025). Anderson needed ...
Gustavo Cortiñas Inspires Unity and Empathy Through Music
by Dean Nardi
The renowned French writer Victor Hugo once wrote that “music is noise that thinks." Hugo was highlighting the profound and intellectual nature of music, suggesting that while it may seem like disorganized sound ("noise"), it carries deep meaning and expresses complex ideas and emotions that can only be conveyed through this medium. Hugo also wrote of ...
Shuffle Demons: They Are for Real... Really
by Dean Nardi
On the Shuffle Demons' Are You Really Real (Alma Records 2025), the uncategorizable Toronto band knits together traditional jazz, modern funk playfulness, blues, rap and the sensuality of Prince. For an ensemble that has been a going concern for 40 years, they maintain an optimistic, let's-go-for-something-new outlook, reflected in their flamboyant retro clothing that resembles that ...
Tropos: Outer Space Chamber Music
by Dean Nardi
Upon first listen to Switches (Endectomorph, 2024), the remarkable album from the group Tropos, one could imagine being caught in the traffic circle at the Arc de Triomphe. The clarinet blares, the violin evokes the squeal of rubber, the drums maintain the churning sound of the motors, while the piano searches for a safe exit. Is ...
Matthieu Chazarenc Evokes Bel Canto, Singing and Celebration
by Dean Nardi
The music has its source in Matthieu Chazarenc's natal southwest of France. The Paris-based drummer has offered his unique blend of jazz, classical and multi-rhythmic versatility on Canto III (Bonsai Music, 2024), linked to his first two albums as a leader--Canto II (Cristal Records, 2021) and Canto I (Jazz Family, 2018). “I like to be able ...
Michala Østergaard-Nielsen: The Poetic Vibrations of Drumming
by Dean Nardi
Michala Østergaard-Nielsen is a jazz drummer from Denmark, a country with a rich tradition of women playing drums. Once during a lesson with Gerald Cleaver, she was told you could either play drums upon sound or upon a pattern. “That really opened the doors for me to not think just the technical things, but listen to ...
Jamie Baum: These Are Her Times
by Dean Nardi
Jamie Baum is a world-class composer as well as flutist, who smoothly balances woodwinds with horns, guitar, bass, piano and drums so that they are equals. Her compositions can remind you of a Gil Evans arrangement with several decades of development added to create a thoroughly modern milieu. She mixes high-energy with ballads and Western foundations ...
Julian Shore: Sharing Secrets Under The Rose
by Dean Nardi
Piano trios walk the thin line between exhibitionism and intimacy, and you can look no further than Bill Evans whose tones vibrated ever so slightly with the distant thrill of zeal. Despite insistent attempts to overlook its worthiness in contemporary jazz, the piano trio is alive and well, in good hands with pianists such as Kris ...
