Apr 1, 2025 11:04 AM
Vijay Iyer, Wadada Leo Smith United by Values on ‘Defiant Life’
On March 20, the night before the release of Defiant Life, the new Vijay Iyer-Wadada Leo Smith duo album from ECM, the…
“It’s an honor and a blessing to be in this universe with Mr. Smith,” said Vijay Iyer, left, of Wadada Leo Smith, right, at the March 20 release party for their latest duo recording, Defiant Life (ECM).
Apr 1, 2025 11:04 AM
On March 20, the night before the release of Defiant Life, the new Vijay Iyer-Wadada Leo Smith duo album from ECM, the…
Vijay Iyer (left) and Nicole Mitchell perform music by Andrew Hill at Harlem Stage’s Gatehouse on March 1.
Mar 12, 2024 4:28 PM
A program of music by the late Andrew Hill is right up Harlem Stage’s alley. “Let’s get real: This is what we…
Jacob Bro performs at the Bergamo Jazz Festival on March 18.
Apr 12, 2022 10:43 AM
The 43rd edition of the Bergamo Jazz Festival was a triumph for its artistic director, Maria Pia de Vito, one of the…
The Jakob Bro Trio with, from left, Jorge Rossy, Bro and Arve Henriksen
Mar 1, 2022 4:25 PM
During its prior 42 editions, Bergamo Jazz — situated in a medieval city of 120,000 souls an hour northeast from…
Nate Wooley
Dec 8, 2021 3:28 PM
Jazzfest Berlin returned to in-person concerts Nov. 4–7 with the 58th edition of the acclaimed arts organization’s…
Vijay Iyer
Jul 13, 2021 4:21 PM
By his own account, the Vijay Iyer of a decade ago was made to feel like a “token weirdo” when moving among the…
Pi founders Yulun Wang (left) and Seth Rosner
Jun 23, 2021 4:07 PM
Pi Recordings is one of the most respected labels in jazz, routinely presenting innovative, challenging work from…
Mette Rasmussen, shown here performing at Festival International de Musique Actuelle de Victoriaville in 2018, is set to stream a performance on Monday.
Jul 30, 2020 9:31 AM
As performers look to replace income from lost gigs and regain a sense of community amid the coronavirus pandemic, a…
Bassist and bandleader Dezron Douglas is set to stream a trio set from Smalls on Wednesday.
Jun 22, 2020 8:55 AM
As performers look to replace income from lost gigs and regain a sense of community amid the coronavirus pandemic, a…
Marc Ribot is on the steering committee of the Music Workers Alliance, which is fighting to protect musicians’ rights.
May 11, 2020 12:05 AM
Within 24 hours of the World Health Organization’s March 11 announcement that the COVID-19 outbreak was a pandemic,…
Steve Lehman’s Xenakis And The Valedictorian is the first of Pi Recordings’ digital releases aimed at providing assistance to performers who have lost income due to the coronavirus pandemic.
May 18, 2020 2:04 PM
Pi Recordings, the New York label focused on avant sounds for the past two decades, has hit pause on its regular…
Egberto Gismonti flew to New York from his home in Brazil for ECM Records at 50, a Nov. 1 and 2 celebration of the imprint at Jazz at Lincoln Center in New York.
Nov 8, 2019 1:50 PM
The curation for ECM Records at 50, Jazz at Lincoln Center’s tribute to the famed record label on Nov. 1 and 2 in New…
Fifty years ago, Manfred Eicher co-founded Edition of Contemporary Music, better known as ECM, and has issued more than 1,600 titles spanning jazz and classical sounds.
Oct 29, 2019 9:36 AM
A search for the heart of the ECM Records operation leads to a small, quiet space located on the second floor of a…
Saxophonist Melissa Aldana and her quartet pay tribute to artist Frida Kahlo on Visions. The ensemble is set to play the Jazz at the Logan series on April 5.
Jan 24, 2020 10:49 AM
Now in its seventh year, the Jazz at the Logan series offers programing that works to encompass a range of the jazz…
Steve Gadd performs June 27, the opening night of International Festival de Jazz de Montreal.
Jul 10, 2019 10:36 AM
In 1979, Montreal’s warmer months weren’t exactly vibrant.
“Summer was very quiet here,” recalled jazz…
Georgia Anne Muldrow performs June 8 at a CapitalBop showcase during the DC Jazz Festival.
Jul 10, 2019 4:46 PM
The DC Jazz Festival might have its weak points, but musical variety is not one of them.
The festival’s annual…
Craig Tabor (left) and Vijay Iyer pay tribute to artists and pianists who recently have passed on Transitory Poems.
Apr 18, 2019 10:29 AM
A spirit of camaraderie and collaboration permeated the room when Vijay Iyer and Craig Taborn took the stage of…
Lewis Porter, whose new album is titled Solo Piano, is in a prolific phase of his career.
Apr 4, 2019 9:36 AM
After flirting with a career in psychology, Lewis Porter, the jazz educator and pianist, turned to music full time…
On June 29, the Impulse! label issued previously unreleased studio recordings by John Coltrane (left), Elvin Jones, Jimmy Garrison and McCoy Tyner under the title Both Directions At Once: The Lost Album.
Jan 4, 2019 12:27 PM
During 2018, DownBeat published hundreds of articles and album reviews. What’s below, though, are some features and…
Aug 18, 2018 12:19 PM
Following Aretha Franklin’s death on Thursday, an outpouring of emotion and appreciation for her work washed over…
Kurt Elling performs during the 2018 North Sea Jazz Festival in Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
Jun 15, 2020 11:30 AM
At the 2018 North Sea Jazz Festival—held July 13–15 in Rotterdam, The Netherlands—DownBeat embarked upon an…
Vijay Iyer (left) discusses a track with journalist Dan Ouellette during a DownBeat Blindfold Test at the North Sea Jazz Festival in Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
Jun 15, 2020 11:31 AM
A MacArthur Fellow, Harvard University faculty member and winner of the Jazz Artist category in the 2018 DownBeat…
Ethan Iverson performs at Umbria Jazz in Perugia, Italy, which ran July 13-22.
Aug 9, 2018 11:02 AM
What keeps Umbria Jazz in the upper echelon of the world’s festival scene is its inspired balance of elements. Its…
Dan Weiss performs at the Gent Jazz Festival in Gent, Belgium.
Jul 18, 2018 4:42 PM
The Gent Jazz Festival has been running since 2002, although prior to 2008, it was known as the Blue Note Festival.…
Pianist Vijay Iyer topped two categories in the DownBeat Critics Poll: Jazz Artist and Jazz Group (for the Vijay Iyer Sextet).
Jun 27, 2018 9:28 AM
Pianist Vijay Iyer, singer-songwriter Cécile McLorin Salvant, flutist Nicole Mitchell, trumpeter Amir ElSaffar,…
Artifacts—a trio comprising cellist Tomeka Reid, flutist Nicole Mitchell and percussionist Mike Reed—recently performed at the Spoleto Festival USA in Charleston, South Carolina.
Jun 18, 2018 4:09 PM
The trio Artifacts would have seemed a worthy one-off a few years ago. Organized in 2015 by cellist Tomeka Reid to play…
Cecil Taylor—shown here performing in Cologne, Germany, in 1987—died April 5. He was 89.
Feb 24, 2020 10:17 AM
Trumpeter Eddie Gale only made one album—the legendary 1966 Unit Structures on Blue Note—with pianist Cecil Taylor,…
Pianist Vijay Iyer performed in a variety of settings, including in this sextet, during a four-day showcase at SFJAZZ in January.
Feb 15, 2018 1:51 PM
Pianist, composer, bandleader and educator Vijay Iyer returned to San Francisco late in January for the second time in…
Trumpeter Ingrid Jensen performs at the star-filled tribute to Geri Allen at Winter Jazzfest in New York.
Feb 6, 2018 3:21 PM
On the evening of Martin Luther King Day, Jan. 15, the New York City Winter Jazzfest hosted a splendid and heartfelt…
Alexander von Schlippenbach (left), Rudi Mahall, Uli Jennessen and Axel Dörner perform at the Molde Jazz Festival in Norway. (Obscured: bassist Jan Roder)
Jul 28, 2017 11:24 AM
Vijay Iyer has done more than his share in the contemporary cause of musical border-crossing and idiom-fusing in—and…
Dan Weiss (left), Rudresh Mahanthappa and Rez Abbasi of the Indo-Pak Coalition will release a new album, Agrima, on Oct. 17.
Aug 1, 2017 11:44 AM
Several of the most acclaimed, innovative artists in jazz will release albums in the next few months. Running the…
Vijay Iyer (center) performs with the Brentano String Quartet on June 10.
Jun 16, 2017 5:29 PM
For several decades, the idyllic small town of Ojai, California, has been the annual site of one of America’s more…
Wayne Shorter performs during the April 19 press conference, at which headliners for the 2017 Detroit Jazz Festival were announced.
Apr 20, 2017 2:15 PM
The Detroit Jazz Festival, the world’s largest free jazz fest, has announced its full artist lineup for the 38th…
Vijay Iyer (left) and Tyshawn Sorey at Q2 in New York on April 13.
Apr 17, 2017 6:50 PM
Q2 Music, a multi-platform home for musical discovery dedicated mostly to modern classical composition, hosted a…
Vijay Iyer (left) and Rudresh Mahanthappa perform at the Musicians Against Fascism concert at Symphony Space in New York City on Jan. 19.
Jan 25, 2017 10:04 AM
New York jazz musicians united in concert at Symphony Space on Jan. 19, the eve of Donald Trump’s inauguration to…
The sextet Invocation includes Vijay Iyer (left), Johannes Weidenmeuller, bandleader Rez Abbasi, Rudresh Mahanthappa and Dan Weiss.
Dec 30, 2016 4:03 PM
In a striking example of East-meets-West, Pakistani-born guitarist Rez Abbasi led his Invocation sextet for the…
Vocalist Dianne Reeves is the recipient of a 2016 USA Fellowship Award.
Nov 17, 2016 3:51 PM
Singer Dianne Reeves, pianists Randy Weston and Vijay Iyer and drummer Mike Reed are among the 46 artists who have been…
Former First Lady Laura Bush (left), President George W. Bush, First Lady Michelle Obama and President Obama at the Sept. 24 opening ceremony in Washington, D.C.
Oct 17, 2016 2:35 PM
As part of Freedom Sounds, a weekend-long festival in Washington, D.C., that celebrated the opening of the…
Pianist Vijay Iyer, shown here in a publicity photo, performed with bassist Stephan Crump and drummer Tyshawn Sorey at Chicago’s Constellation on July 1.
Jul 8, 2016 12:57 PM
Pianist Vijay Iyer typically tours with his trio of bassist Stephan Crump and drummer Marcus Gilmore, but his July 1…
Kamasi Washington topped three categories in the DownBeat Critics Poll, including Jazz Album of the Year, for his three-disc set, The Epic.
Jul 1, 2016 3:19 PM
Acclaimed tenor saxophonist Kamasi Washington, veteran pianist Randy Weston, inventive pianist/keyboardist Vijay Iyer…
Vijay Iyer (left) performs with Wadada Leo Smith at the Met Breuer on March 31.
Jun 28, 2016 12:44 PM
Throughout March, pianist Vijay Iyer’s tenure as Artist-In-Residence at the Met Breuer resulted in what was perhaps…
