Month: January 2025

Jerry Kalaf: Safe Travels

Drummer Jerry Kalaf mixes his classy trio of Tom Ranier/p and Trey Henry/dr with the serene strings supplemented by ATLYS (Sabrina Tabby-Jinty McTavish/I, Erin Raffrty/va, Genevieve Tabby/cel). The strings serve as a reflective muse, not overpowering or strangling the trio,…

Joe Elefante: Wheel Of Darma

Pianist Joe Elefante serves up a blue plate special of Blue Note inspired bopping originals with Freddie Hendrix/tp, Erena Terakubo/ts, Sameer Shankar/b and Dave Hellman/dr. The horns give wonderful harmonies on the hip fingersnapping “Bad Dancing” and sprint like Olympians…

Rick Roe: Tribute

Modern jazz composer Gregg Hill has some of his nuggets warmed up and served in  a trio setting by pianist Rich Roe with Robert  Hurst/b and Nate Winn/dr. There’s a taste of Ellingtonia in the elegant “Summer  Nights” wile Latin…

Charles Mingus: Reincarnations

One of Charles Mingus’ overlooked gems is this recently reissued 1960 album from Candid Records. The bassist mixes and matches here with Dannie-Jo Jones/dr, Eric Dolphy/as-fl-bcl, Booker Ervin-Roy Eldridge-Ted Curson-Lonnie Hillyer/tp, Tommy Flanagan-Paul Bley-Nico Bunick/p, Charles McPherson/as and Britt Woodman-Jimmy…

Jackson Potter: Small Things

Guitarist Jackson Potter mixes post bopping originals with some clever takes of standards with a super  hip team of Alex Ridout/tp-f, Troy Roberts/ts, Hamish Smith/b and Marcello Cardillo/dr. The tone and mood is set from the get go with Roberts’…