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Don Byron: Do the Boomerang: The Music of Junior Walker
by John Kelman
Clarinetist Don Byron is proof that one can be a serious musician and still have fun. A member of Mensa, he's a composer of “serious music like A Ballad for Many (Cantaloupe, 2006). Still, anyone who was at his Montreal Jazz Festival show this past summer knows that, whether he's reinventing Afro-Cuban music on Music for ...
Jason Moran: Artist in Residence
by Mark F. Turner
Art, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder, and Jason Moran's Artist In Residence is no exception. An enigmatic traditionalist, Moran has produced releases that are as diverse as his reinterpretation the blues on Same Mother (Blue Note, 2005) or his conceptualization of the soundtrack of daily life on his debut, Soundtrack to Human ...
John Coltrane: Fearless Leader
by Norman Weinstein
John Coltrane Fearless Leader Prestige 2006 This six-CD set of all of the original Prestige albums led by John Coltrane comes as a relief after the previous sixteen-disc box of every one of his preserved recordings on the label, as leader or sideman. Putting aside the daunting cost of that ...
Charles Mingus: Two Impressive Souvenirs
by Jim Santella
From an original Dixieland arrangement of “Muskrat Ramble to a genuine bebop mosaic and some extended works, the music of Charles Mingus brings us variety--seeped with the emotion Mingus pumped into just about everything that he created. The 1965 riots in Watts, which is that part of Los Angeles where Mingus spent much of his youth, ...
Winard Harper Sextet: Make It Happen
by John Kelman
Jazz records made in one day aren't particularly unique. But looking at the large cast of players on Make It Happen, one has to be impressed at the amount of planning that went into the session--an effort that, in the hands of lesser mortals, might suck the life out of such an ambitious outing. But drummer ...
Branford Marsalis: Braggtown
by Jim Santella
Branford Marsalis continues to push jazz in the directions that this art should seek for eternity. Never satisfied with achievements from the past, he's determined to make things new and positive happen every time out. With Braggtown, he's on fire. Jazz's modern mainstream fights with a furious approach. It demands that the artist remain ...
Michy Mano: The Cool Side of the Pillow
by Jim Santella
World music reminds us that every corner of the globe has its own particular sound. Instruments differ, languages differ, elements such as harmony and rhythm differ, but it's all music. The power of our universal language cannot be understated. Michy Mano sings about sociology and politics, personality and emotion, good fortune and bad. He ...
Jason Moran: Artist in Residence
by Paul Olson
Pianist/composer Jason Moran has never made the same album twice. While his Bandwagon group with bassist Tarus Mateen, drummer Nasheet Waits and, of late, guitarist Marvin Sewell, remains a constant presence on all but his 2002 solo record Modernistic, it's the only constant in a recorded career marked by a restless insistence on trying out new ...
Branford Marsalis Quartet: Braggtown
by John Kelman
Sometimes the smallest germ of an idea can generate grist for extended exploration. Many of the late saxophone giant John Coltrane's compositions from the early 1960s onward were proof of that. From the opening two bars of “Jack Baker, the first track on Braggtown, it's clear that the same concept still applies. For nearly two minutes ...
Branford Marsalis: Braggtown
by Mark F. Turner
"Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead! could be one of the underlying messages of Braggtown. While other jazz groups are experimenting with a variety of artistic freedoms, including odd instruments, spoken word, hip-hop and electronica, Branford Marsalis and his quartet are staunch on the path of hard bopping, straight-ahead acoustic music. The music ...
