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JJ 10/94: Gail Thompson - Gail Force - Jazz Journal
Gail Thompson has assembled a very useful big band and together with Andy Macintosh provided some good tunes for it to play. The fortunate thing is that it plays them well and has sidemen who show their all-round commitment by taking solos that complement the material. Be Bop Juice is more boogaloo than bebop and […]
JJ 10/84: Molde International Jazz Festival, Norway - Jazz Journal
Superlatives are notorious in jazz criticism, but Molde really is a very special event in the jazz calendar. What musicians and fans alike appreciate about Molde is that it has always stayed faithful to the central jazz values: a personal, human touch and a fruitful give-and-take between structure and improvisation. Of course, white nights and […]
JJ 10/94: Cassandra Wilson - Blue Light ’Til Dawn - Jazz Journal
An interesting mixture of sources here: R&B, blues, folk, rock and popular – and also some original material. To all the songs on this album Wilson brings a highly sophisticated and thoroughly professional attitude. Her singing voice, deep and cultivated, intriguingly blends confidence with intimacy. The two Robert Johnson songs, Kitchen and Hellhound, are undoubtedly […]
Jazz Revolutionary: The Life And Music Of Eric Dolphy - Jazz Journal
This Is a thoroughly comprehensive, complete biography of Dolphy’s life and music. After an informative foreword by Jeff Schwartz and an introduction by the author, the first chapter gives a brief resumé of his parents, Eric Allen Dolphy Sr. and his mother, Sarah Jr, mixed-race immigrants from Jamaica, and then covers Dolphy’s birth. Eric began […]
JJ 10/84: The Guest Stars - Jazz Journal
Women have barely impinged on jazz except as vocalists and pianists; the guest stars are living proof of the stupidity of this situation. Over the last couple of years, this all-women group has built up a large live following, and has now produced a fine debut album. Mixing accessible, vigorous jazz-funk and fusion with soul, […]
JJ 10/84: The Jazz Doctors - Jazz Journal
Last year, Charles Alexander of the International Jazz Federation brought two of America’s better known jazz educators to London’s Goldsmiths’ College to hold a jazz improvisation clinic. Encouraged by the keen response, Alexander this year organised another clinic with an expanded teaching faculty. Last year’s tutors, Jamey Aebersold and David Baker, were joined by Todd […]
Report: Vilnius Jazz Festival 2024 - Jazz Journal
As intrepid festival director Antanas Gustys explains in the programme, this is the 37th Vilnius Jazz Festival – and incredibly, he has been in charge since the first. The Alister Spence/Tony Buck duo on the first night is one of the highlights, building on their 2023 debut album Mythographer. Both players have a remarkable stylistic […]
JJ 10/84: Allan Holdsworth - Road Games - Jazz Journal
Among Allan Holdsworth’s references are jobs with Tony Williams’ Lifetime, Soft Machine, Bill Bruford and John Stevens. In recent years he has led his own bands and the latest edition of this is to be heard on this six-cut mini album. Typically, it has not been released here in his home country but is imported […]
Barbican film series recalls the 1970s, when free improvisation was on British TV - Jazz Journal
A panel discussion with free-improvisation veteran Maggie Nicols and 1970s TV appearances by Derek Bailey, Charles Fox, Tony Oxley, Evan Parker and Paul Lytton are among the more unusual elements of Jazz On Screen, this year’s jazz-film series at the Barbican in London. As part of So Watt: Jazz and Improvisation on British TV (16 […]
JJ 10/74: Miles Davis - Big Fun - Jazz Journal
By-passing ‘Bitches’ Brew’ I thought I had finally lost Miles Davis somewhere around ‘On the Corner’. I should have known better: people of Miles’s stature don’t just disappear through holes in the artistic ground, even when they seem to go whoring after strange gods. Having been a devoted Miles admirer at least since ‘Birth of […]
JJ 10/74: Michael Mantler - No Answer - Jazz Journal
This LP is a setting of words from ‘How It Is’ (1964) by Samuel Beckett, interspersed with instrumental passages. Extensive use of multi-tracking allows Bruce to produce eerie choral effects, and he controls his tone quality carefully, to conjure up the sombre, depressive and monotonous atmosphere of the Beckett novel. There is an emphasis on […]
JJ 10/74: Previn fiasco at Q.E. Hall - Jazz Journal
As the final concert of this year’s South Bank Summer Music season, on August 24th, Andre Previn and a ten-piece band were advertised to perform rags by Scott Joplin from the ‘Red Back Book’, Gunther Schuller’s re-working of the contemporary orchestrations. Also listed to appear were Cleo Laine and John Dankworth. When we opened our […]
Reviewed: Zachary Bartholomew | Timotej Kotnik | Nicole McCabe - Jazz Journal
Zachary Bartholomew: Balancing Act (zacharybartholomew.com) This is the first album Zachary Bartholomew has released as a band leader – but he hasn’t been lazing around on the couch. No. The pianist has a PhD and a professorship, thank-you-very-much. And the industrious ivory-tickler’s debut features 10 original tunes and 80 minutes of music, including a bonus […]
Jaden Evans releases album tribute to his grandfather - Jazz Journal
Yet another jazz dynasty may be upon us as Bill Evans’ grandson releases a recital of Evans compositions. Evans On Evans (Shamu Records) features Bill Evans pieces reinterpreted by the 16-year-old Jaden Evans, accompanied by Vicente Archer (b) and Marcus Gilmore (d) in a New York studio. Jaden began formal training on the piano at […]
JJ 10/64: The birth of the BBC’s Jazz 625 - Jazz Journal
Sixty years ago Jazz Journal welcomed the arrival of BBCTV's Jazz 625 series, which would turn out to be historic. It's been variously reshown, but why not now in place of endless TOTP, Queen and Bowie reruns? First published in Jazz Journal September 1964
JJ 10/64: Bill Le Sage - New Directions In Jazz - Jazz Journal
If you listen to young jazz publicists you might be persuaded that the nominal boundaries between jazz and classical are only now being breached. But 60 years ago Mark Gardner heard Bill Le Sage effectively blending 12-tone composition, cellos and jazz soloists
Ronnie Scott's, November: Lorber, Barron, Lundy, Basie - Jazz Journal
Among the highlights at the newly refurbished Ronnie Scott’s in November are the following: James Carter Quintet – Lookin’ at Lock: The Music of Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis Friday 1st November 2024. 5.30pm & 8.30pm (£40.00 – £60.00). They say: “Eddie Davis was a bop stylist whose brawny tone, convulsive energy and reservoir of licks laid […]
Boundary pushers: Seed and the LSO - Jazz Journal
Seed, described by their publicist as “a dynamic group of musicians pushing the boundaries of contemporary jazz”, are to collaborate with the LSO at the Barbican on 21 November 2024 in a concert called Nature’s Heart. Seed’s 2019 debut album Driftglass received a “rave review” from the Guardian, was nominated for a Mercury Prize and won […]
Jazz FM now and then - Jazz Journal
Jazz FM – just for London in those days before internet radio – was launched in 1990 after lobbying by Dave Lee, the former Dankworth pianist and composer of the That’s Life TV theme. Working in Los Angeles in 1980, Dave had been so impressed by the abundance of jazz on local radio that he […]
Those same old chestnuts roasting on an open fire - Jazz Journal
What is claimed to be the world’s first AI-generated Christmas jazz album is set for release on 14 November. At a time when so much jazz sounds reiterative, this is, perhaps, timely. The Christmas album, like Christmas itself, is full of clichés and going one step further, this one is a simulation of a set […]
Rochester Cathedral Jazz and Blues Festival - Jazz Journal
We know what an important role the church has played in the development and sound of jazz, so despite the music’s more venal connotations, a cathedral might not be such an unlikely venue for a jazz series. Thus it is next month when Rochester Cathedral in Kent hosts its second jazz festival. Born-and-bred Medway man […]
We Love Sérgio Mendes - Jazz Journal
Sérgio Mendes may not have been the main originator of bossa nova – one of the most innovative musical movements of the 20th century – and he may not have been the most talented musician to come out of Brazil, but he became the most successful Brazilian musician that ever lived. He put Brazilian music […]
Fantasies Of Nina Simone - Jazz Journal
You’d probably have to be very keen on Nina Simone’s music to want this book, and the author is, of course, just that. He’s also keen on very complex prose, as exemplified in this quotation (from Malik Gaines): “In Simone’s performance methodology, multiple positionality is a source of the permanent exclusion experienced in any one […]
Reviewed: Benny Goodman | Leonard Feather & Dick Hyman - Jazz Journal
Benny Goodman: The Famous 1938 Carnegie Hall Jazz Concert (Avid AMSC 1459). This two-CD set is a reissue of the original LP album, with most of CD2 containing 18 added bonus tracks. For this prodigious and groundbreaking concert, Goodman augmented his orchestra with several star guests on selected tracks. With a large and excited audience creating […]
Down For The Count at Cadogan Hall - Jazz Journal
I first saw DFTC at the London Jazz Festival in 2018 and the band consisted of a mere nine members. I’ve seen them several times since and watched as, like Topsy, they just grew and grew. In this most recent concert, augmented by strings, they were able to boast 30 members. Polished and well-drilled from […]
Reviewed: Lina Allemano's Ohrenschmaus | Achim Kaufmann - Jazz Journal
Lina Allemano’s Ohrenschmaus with Andrea Parkins: Flip Side (Lumo Records LM 2024-16) This is my kind of album – an eclectic mix of styles, from song-forms to free playing, but with a unity of musical purpose that’s rare and enthralling. The basic trio is Lina Allemano (trumpet), Dan Peter Sundland (electric bass) and Michael Griener […]
Reviewed: Steve Baczkowski | Niklas Fite & Gunter Christmann | Sentient Beings | Keir Cooper + Eleanor Westbrook | Kuba - Jazz Journal
As what passed for summer in the UK turns distinctly to autumn / the downpour season, the tide of jazz-related “product” proves impervious to climate change. In musical terms, the present day 24/7 availability of something not unlike everything has the curious effect of marginalising even further those forms that were marginalised by dint of […]
Jazz stars play for Kamala Harris in New York - Jazz Journal
Is jazz intrinsically left-wing? Judging by the JJ inbox, it’s a question that many might think doesn’t need asking. It certainly seems a frequent assumption, often unspoken but evident from actions or positions taken. And jazz has long been associated – by political activists and some musicians – with civil rights, equality and other nominally […]
Reviewed: Wayne Shorter | Jan Lundgren & Yamandu Costa | Dal Sasso Big Band - Jazz Journal
Wayne Shorter: Celebration Volume 1 (Blue Note) Almost a quarter of a century ago – it seems like only yesterday – I enjoyed a conversation with Joe Zawinul after a Syndicate gig of his at the Bergen Jazz Festival. We got onto the subject of contemporary saxophonists. It wasn’t long before Joe advised me “ […]
Reviewed: Mingus Big Band | Jacob Christoffersen | Yannick Benoit | Das Rad | Jazz In Norwich - Jazz Journal
Mingus Big Band: The Charles Mingus Centennial Sessions Vol. 2 (Candid Records CAN3346) Since 1991, the Mingus Big Band, formed as an extension to Mingus Dynasty, has become something of a jazz institution with its residences in New York and appearances around the globe. The commitment to all things related to the composer and bassist […]
Reviewed: Elaine Delmar | Karen Mack - Jazz Journal
Elaine Delmar: Speak Low (Ubuntu Music UBU0165) Until she died, in January 1918, I had no problem thinking of Marlene VerPlanck as the finest female vocalist currently working the jazz, pop and cabaret circuit. As it happened, I didn’t have far to look for someone to fill her shoes, and the name on the tin […]
Obituary: Benny Golson - Jazz Journal
One of the last survivors of the golden age of bebop – the 1950s – tenor saxophonist and composer Benny Golson died on Saturday, 21 September at home in Manhattan. He was 95 and had been ill for a short time. Best known in the jazz world as a composer and tenor soloist, Golson produced […]
Reviewed: New Jazz Orchestra, Neil Ardley | Howard Riley | Gérard Gustin, Chet Baker | Matyas Gayer | Etienne Charles - Jazz Journal
New Jazz Orchestra/Neil Ardley Group: BBC Sessions 1968-1970 (RANDB101) Once again, Nick Duckett’s RandB Records mines the rich vein of material from the BBC archives, lost gems from a changing period of British jazz. The National Jazz Orchestra and Howard Riley were indirectly linked, part of the emerging scene of the late 60s and championed […]
The Rhodes piano, alive and well in a London basement - Jazz Journal
The Rhodes electric piano, reviled by many purists, but a key new sound in jazz from the late 1960s on, is the centre of attention in Triology, a series of videos produced in London by DJ Gilles Peterson. The first, featuring a whirlwind of Hancock-esque playing from Brazilian pianist Amaro Freitas, is available now. Freitas, […]
The economy might be listless but composition is booming - Jazz Journal
The Performing Rights Society – the body that has pursued music publishing rights since 1914 and is now styled PRS For Music – says that professional songwriting, including composition, is enjoying a massive upswing. It says 37,000 new members have joined in the last five years, membership has grown 20% since 2019 and 4.5 million […]