Four score and two years ago, before he was brought forth onto this continent, John Mayall’s father conceived his son in liberty and dedicated him to the proposition that all blues are created equal. It was fitting that it was…
Month: July 2015
YESTERDAYS AVANT GARDE IS TODAY’S UP TO DATE…George Russell: Complete 1956-1960 Smalltet & Orchestra Recordings, George Russell: Sextet & Septet Complete 1960-1962 Decca & Riverside Album Collection
While he did play the piano, George Russell is best known as a free thinking composer and arranger who changed the direction of jazz by using various “unorthodox” chordal patterns in his songs, setting the stage for the modal revolution…
IN ECM, “E” IS FOR “ETHNIC”…Savina Yannatou and Primavera en Salonico: Songs of Thessaloniki, Anders Jormin/Lena Willemark/Karin Nakagawa: Trees of Light
Who needs National Geographic when ECM can take you to just about any country that you desire. Here are a couple new releases that mix sounds from Greece to Japan to Sweden. Bon Voyage! Savinna Yannatou has a penetratingly gorgeous…
THIS IS A HARD BOP TENOR 101…JR Monterose: Live In Albany 1979
Back in the 70s, almost every jazz artist was “going electric” one way or another. Jazz/rock fusion was at its zenith, and even diehards like Stan Getz succumbed to electric keyboards to “stay with the times.” Tenor saxist JR Monterose…
Denny Zeitlin & George Marsh: Riding The Moment
One of the most lyrical of mainstream pianists, Denny Zeitlin has recently discovered the world of electronica. His last album was a fairly impressive mix of sounds acoustic and plugged in. This time around, he ups the ante and teams…
MUSIC, MAESTRO, PLEASE…Ligro: Dictionary 3, Xadu: Random Abstract
When I took music lessons, and would play a piece for my teacher, the main thing that he would emphasize was, “Remember, every song doesn’t have to be ‘Happy New Year.’” In other words, subtlety can be enjoyable. Cases in…
Judy Collins @ The Del Mar Fair 07.02.15
One of the great selling points of the Del Mar/San Diego Fair is that they consistently have artists from the Baby Boomer period to help us realize how much music and culture have changed. Vocalist Judy Collins performed before an…
****RINGER OF THE WEEK****BRAVI RAGAZZI…Newpoli: Nun te Vuta’
Here’s a wonderful disc that captures the passion of the Mediterranean. Newpoli consists of Angela Rossi-Carmen Marsico/voc, Roberto Cassan/acc, Bjorn Wennas/g, Fabio Pirozzolo/perc, Daniel Meyers/perc, Karen Burciaga/vio and Sean Farias/b delivering tradision al folk sounds from southern Italy with excitement…
Roger Davidson Trio: Live At Caffe Vivaldi Volume 2
The fluid and lithe trio lead by Roger Davidson is captured in concert here during their series of Wednesday night gigs in Greenwich Village. Bassists David Finck and Pablo Aslan take turns here, and the drummer is always Adriano Santos…
Oded Lev-Ari: Threading
Pianist/composer Oded Lev-Ari creates a pastoral mood here as he blends the chamber sounds of classical with the gentle improvisation of jazz. The team of Anat Cohen/cl, Will Vinson/as-ss, Brian Landrus/bs-bcl and Nadje Noordhuis/tp-fh fronts a rhythm team of Lev-Ari…