I bet you didn’t know that Portland Oregon has a cooking jazz scene. They even have an annual festival, rain or shine! Here, you’ve got local hero Gordon Lee on piano along with drummer Mel Brown’s band of Derek Sims/tp,…
Month: November 2014
Auction Project: Slink,
Alto saxist David Bixler puts together a richly textured team of Arturo O’Farrell/p, Carlo De Rosa/b, Vince Cherico/dr and the ringer of violinist Heather Martin Bixler for a collection of tunes that mixes jazz sensibilities with Cumberland Gap evocations. With…
3d: Dabrowski Davis Drury: Vermillion Tree
Trumpeter Tomasz Dabrowski mixes freedom and form here with the elastic and flexible team of Kris Davis/p and Andrew Drury/dr through a collection of 14 pieces that range from barely over a minute to over ten. Dabrowski likes using the…
OLE’!…Juan Maria Solare: Gardel al Piano
Pianist Juan Maria Solare delves into the world of old school tango by tackling the compositions by acclaimed Argentine vocalist Carlos Gardel. The concept is a bold one, and it works fantastically well, as Solare turns his fingers into dancing…
HEAVY HITTERS…Simon Phillips: Protocol II, The Suite Unravelling: The Suite Unravelling
Subtlety? Forget it! Let’s kick out the jams! Drummer Simon Phillips leads a hard rocking team of Andy Timmons/g, Steve Weingart/key and Ernest Tibbs/b on a disc that is filled with hard hitting rhythms and first rate guitar wizardry. Some…
THREE VOCAL TRENDS…Ranee Lee: What’s Going On, Dara Tucker: The Sun Season, Elizabeth Shepherd: The Signal
What’s a singer to do? Stay with the standards? Re-interpret them? Do new material? Do forward thinking material? Here are three woman who are answering the questions. Ranee Lee mixes standards of days gone by and some Motown as well…
AVID GOES TO KANSAS CITY…Duke Jordan: Three Classic Albums Plus, Big Joe Turner: Two Classic Albums Plus, Phil Woods: Three Classic Albums Plus
You can make a good argument that REAL jazz didn’t come from New Orleans, but up the river a bit to Kansas City, which brought us Basie and, of course, a guy named Charlie Parker who influenced everyone in his…
Freddy Cole: Singing the Blues
I’m not sure why Freddy Cole shuns the piano on his studio sessions. Oh, John Di Martino is absolutely fantastic here, don’t get me wrong. And, the rest of the team of Harry Allen/ts, Randy Napoleon/g, Elias Bailey/b and Curtis…
A MISSING TREASURE…King Fleming: The King Fleming Trio
King Fleming just left this earth to his eternal destiny on April 1 of this year at the tender age of 94. I only wish I had heard of him, as well as heard him sooner, but at least we…
THE DREAM TEAM…Miles Davis Quintet featuring John Coltrane: All Of You-The Last Tour 1960
The essential and life-affirming music on this 4 disc set has been available before, but to the best of my knowledge, this is the first time all of the music from the famous 1960 Sweden, Denmark, Switzerland and German concerts…