Dec 17, 2024 9:58 AM
Tabla Master Zakir Hussain, 73, Succumbs to Illness
Tabla master Ustad Zakir Hussain, one of India’s reigning cultural ambassadors and a revered figure worldwide…
Vincent Herring’s new album, Hard Times, is due out Nov. 3 on Smoke Sessions Records
(Photo: Jimmy Katz)With Hard Times, his third release for Smoke Sessions Records, master saxophonist Vincent Herring offers a musical response to our troubled political climate. Over the course of 11 songs, he and his band rely on the age-old structures of swing and blues to craft a modern message of healing and progress.
Due out Nov. 3, Hard Times finds Herring at the helm of a crack quartet, with pianist Cyrus Chestnut, bassist Yasushi Nakamura and drummer Carl Allen. The saxophonist’s conception of the project evolved during a six-month residency at the jazz venue Smoke, in which he was joined by Nakamura and Allen.
The band is bolstered on roughly half the tracks by the horn section of trumpeter Brad Mason, saxophonist Sam Dillon and trombone virtuoso (and Smoke Sessions labelmate) Steve Turre. Guitarist Russell Malone appears on three tracks, while the rich baritone of vocalist Nicolas Bearde graces three tunes.
Herring had wide-ranging vision for Hard Times. “It’s the theme of the times that we’re going through,” he explained, pointing out that, at the time of this writing, the possibility of nuclear war loomed large in media discourse. “The obvious red elephant in the room would be politics. So it’s hard times not necessarily just from my vantage point, but from looking at world events. At the same time, I do realize how blessed and fortunate I am to be living the life I’m living. I have a lot of real fans that support me and a lot of great people in my life; I have wonderful kids. This album will hit people in different ways, but I offer it as an uplifting piece for the hard times in the universe.”
The album’s lead track, “Hard Work,” can be streamed below. It perfectly exemplifies Herring’s muscular yet agile tone, which is a thrill to listen to as it darts in and out of his bandmate’s steadfast accompaniment.
For more information on Smoke Sessions records, click here. DB
“Watching people like Max Roach or Elvin Jones and seeing how they utilize the whole drum kit in a very rhythmic and melodic way and how they stretched time — that was a huge inspiration to me,” Hussain said in DownBeat.
Dec 17, 2024 9:58 AM
Tabla master Ustad Zakir Hussain, one of India’s reigning cultural ambassadors and a revered figure worldwide…
Gerald and John Clayton at the family home in Altadena during a photo shoot for the June 2022 cover of DownBeat. The house was lost during the Los Angeles fires.
Jan 21, 2025 7:54 PM
Roy McCurdy and his wife had just finished eating dinner and were relaxing over coffee in their Altadena home, when he…
Queen Latifah extols Harlem and the Apollo Theater at this year’s Kennedy Center Honors.
Dec 12, 2024 1:58 AM
Cuban-American jazz trumpet legend Arturo Sandoval and Harlem’s Apollo Theater were among the honorees at the 2024…
“With jazz I thought it must be OK to be Black, for the first time,” says singer Sofia Jernberg.
Jan 2, 2025 10:50 AM
On Musho (Intakt), her recent duo album with pianist Alexander Hawkins, singer Sofia Jernberg interprets traditional…
The Old Country: More From The Deer Head Inn arrives 30 years after ECM issued the Keith Jarret Trio live album At The Deer Head Inn.
Jan 21, 2025 7:38 PM
Last November, Keith Jarrett, who has not played publicly since suffering two strokes in 2018, greenlighted ECM to drop…
