May 26, 2026 11:08 AM
Sonny Rollins Passes Away at 95
Sonny Rollins, the iconic saxophonist, composer and improviser whose career stretched from the origins of bebop to 21st…
Marsalis Music will provide May releases by two young jazz artists: Doug Wamble and Miguel Zenón.
Wamble’s Bluestate (available May 10) is the sophomore effort of the guitarist/vocalist/composer who the label introduced on the 2003 disc Country Libations. Featuring Wamble’s longstanding rhythm section of pianist Roy Dunlap, bassist Jeff Hanley and drummer Peter Miles, the new album documents the strides that the quartet have taken after months of touring and refining Wamble’s singular amalgam of jazz, blues, gospel and country music.
“Playing night after night focused us more in a jazz direction,” Wamble says, “but, in an odd way, it brought out the other eclectic stuff as well. The disparate elements are coming together in a more cohesive way.”
Alto saxophonist/composer Zenón is another musician not content to rest on his growing laurels. After releasing Ceremonial at the start of 2004, Zenón set to work on a set of new compositions inspired by music from the rural regions of his native Puerto Rico. The result is Jíbaro (available May 24), a collection of ten pieces which have earned rave reviews as Zenón has performed them with his quartet.
“When I started to work on my own music and to develop my own sounds, I looked into Puerto Rican music,” Zenon says, “and after immersing myself in bomba and plena, I pushed further and started to address Jíbaro. At the beginning I just wanted to learn about the music, but after I learned the rules and the forms, I heard that they allowed me to apply my own ideas.’
What has resulted is brilliant playing from Zenón and his bandmates pianist Luis Perdomo, bassist Hans Glawischnig and drummer Antonio Sánchez.
Onstage, Rollins would move about restlessly, thrusting his tenor sax in the air as he blew.
May 26, 2026 11:08 AM
Sonny Rollins, the iconic saxophonist, composer and improviser whose career stretched from the origins of bebop to 21st…
To the world, James Blood Ulmer was a legend, a visionary and a musical force whose sound was distinctive and unique. To his family, he was their teacher, their storyteller and a source of strength.
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“I wanted to get into the real feeling,” Melissa Aldana says of studying the work of singers from Cuba’s filin tradition in preparation for her collaboration with pianist Gonzalo Rubalcaba.
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Ibrahim was an early jazz acolyte, studying the music via 78s he would buy from soldiers stationed in South Africa — who also gave him the nickname “Dollar.”
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