LA-based pianist Bill Cunliffe is a member of a club that I’ve named “GIPP,” meaning “Genetically Incapable of Playing Poorly.” The select group includes people like Eric Reed and Alan Broadbent among the living and Hank Jones or Tommy Flanagan…
Author: George W. Harris
HMMMM-Satoko Fujii New Trio: Spring Storm, Satoro Fujii Ma-Do: Time Stands Still
Pianist/composer Satoko Fujii makes you ask a key question, namely, “when is music jazz, and when isn’t it?” These two recent releases, one in the form of a trio, and one with him leading a quartet, leave us with fewer…
Marlene Ver Planck: Ballads…Mostly
Vocalist Marlene Ver Planck searches through the Songbooks of Cy Coleman and Harry Coleman on this outing with impressive results. With her two trios of Tedd Firth-Mike Renzi/p, Jayu Leonhart-Boots Maleson/b and Ron Vincent/dr, she delivers clever and updated versions…
David Arnay: 8
Here’s an idea that is as clever and unique as it is successful. Keyboardist David Arnay starts the album off with a solo piano tune, in this case “Caravan,” and adds an instrument until you get to the last song…
Pablo Ziegler & Metropole Orkest: Amsterdam Meets New Tango
Grammy winning pianist and composer Pablo Ziegler brings his works for his working trio and arranges them with rich percussion and orchestration with the Metropole Orkest conducted by Jules Buckley. Recorde in concert, these nine tunes meld the sensuality of…
Arturo Sandoval’s Big Band@Catalina’s 08.02.13
If you’re a fan of the trumpet, you got an ear full of some of the brassiest sounds this side of the angel Gabriel this Friday night at Catalina’s. 9 time Grammy winner Arturo Sandoval fronted his sizzling Big Band…
Solomon Burke: Live At Montreux 2006
Solomon Burke left this world to join his family and Savior in heaven back in 2010, but he left here a testament of his own; a smokin’ concert from the Montreux Fest of 2006 that shows all that’s right with…
SUE MINGUS: CHANGES ONE AND TWO
It’s hard sometimes to get a perspective of where you are in life until you compare yourself with a certain standard. Think you’re on a high moral ground? Try reading The Sermon on the Mount. Think we’re going through difficult…
JOHN BEASLEY: MILES, MENDES AND MORE BLUES
I know that New York gets all of the accolades, but joyful fact is that LA can boast as excellent a jazz lineup as anywhere on the Least Coast. Keyboardist John Beasley, for example, is a local guy who is…
****RINGER OF THE WEEK****Jesper Lundgaard Trio: Walk Tall
Storyville Records is better known for releasing vintage jazz material ranging from Louis Armstrong to Ben Webster, but they are still able to put out some new material by Danish jazz artists (that’s not an oxymoron is it?). This one…