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George Brooks: McCoy
by Mike Jacobs
By the time Summit (Earth Brother, 2000) was released, Bay Area-based saxophonist George Brooks had already built a reputation with his brand of East-meets-West Indo-jazz and working alongside music luminaries such as Zakir Hussain. But with the inclusion of bassist Kai Eckhardt, guitarist Fareed Haque, drummer Steve Smith along with Hussain and sitarist Niladri Kumar, Summit ...
Hadrien Feraud: Rhapsody In Blue
by Mike Jacobs
Prodigies are certainly nothing new but it's still quite unbelievable when a young talent arrives so fully-formed and so poised to build on the work of absolute game-changers in their musical idiom. Such was the case in 2007 when bassist Hadrien Feraud's self-titled debut album hit people's ears. The then 20-year-old Feraud's take on “Rhapsody In ...
Jay Clayton: Looking Back (Reflections)
by Katchie Cartwright
Born and raised in Youngstown, Ohio, Jay Clayton (October 28. 1941--December 31, 2023) summoned the courage to move to New York in 1963, finding her way into the free jazz scene at a time when singers (excluding Jeanne Lee and a few outliers) were simply not within the ranks of the jazz avant-garde. Her free jazz ...
Remembering Tony Oxley: Combination
by Ian Patterson
The sad news of the passing of free-spirited English drummer/percussionist Tony Oxley on December 26, 2023, is tempered by the knowledge that his was a life well lived, and his musical legacy a lasting one. As a member of Ronnie Scott's house band in the latter half of the 1960s, Yorkshireman Oxley played with some of ...
Ralph Towner: Winter Solstice
by Geno Thackara
It's a thoughtful, pastoral yet playful album--an early touchstone of the ECM label's sound, for good reason--and right in the middle, Ralph Towner decides to take a breather a bit more sparse than the rest. The quartet lineup drops to just a duo, and he and Jan Garbarek spin a cozy little tone poem evoking the ...
Hilario Durán and his Latin Jazz Big Band: Cry Me A River
by John Chacona
Believe it or not, people were writing kiss-off songs long before Taylor Swift and Justin Timberlake. This one was made famous by the unjustly neglected Julie London in 1955, but you've never heard it done like this before. Havana-born pianist Hilario Duran arranged this title song from a 2023 recording on his own Alma Records label ...
Michael Leonhart Orchestra: Silent Night
by Ludovico Granvassu
Conceptually, I find holiday music puzzling. How can it be that, year after year, it keeps being churned out? Even by jazz musicians, who are usually not driven by commercial considerations? Then why not spring-break albums? Or something more meaningful like World Oceans Day jazz music? Or Martin Luther King day songs? I presume ...
Mike Reed / The Separatist Party: A Low Frequency Nightmare
by John Chacona
In 2021, the Chicago instrumental drone trio Bitchin Bajas dropped Switched on Ra (Drag City), a collection of Sun Ra covers for synthesizers. Drummer, bandleader and scenemaker Mike Reed probably heard the cassette-only release and he almost certainly heard the band's October 2021 performance of that material at his Hungry Brain venue. They must have made ...
Siril Malmedal Hauge and Jacob Young: Little Wing
by Geno Thackara
"Butterflies and zebras and moonbeams and fairy tales"--even if they're separated by decades, Siril Malmedal Hauge has just the kind of voice Jimi Hendrix could have written those dreamy lines about. She and Jacob Young are a sleeper duo that rarely need anything but voice and guitar, but use those simple means to a wide and ...
