Mar 2, 2026 9:58 PM
In Memoriam: John Hammond Jr., 1942–2026
John P. Hammond (aka John Hammond Jr.), a blues guitarist and singer who was one of the first white American…
The sound of pianist Marilyn Crispell changed following a trip to a festival in Stockholm: “I heard them playing stuff that really, really touched me.”
(Photo: Claire Stefani)The performance is remarkably cohesive, traveling through several distinct phases, neither player ever seeming to catch the other off guard. This might be because Crispell and Sorey both are composers who improvise, and both are deeply in-tune with the creative and philosophical principles of the AACM, the drummer as a student (he wrote his master’s thesis on Mitchell) and the pianist as a peer.
“Tyshawn gives me a lot of space—in a way, a lot more space to introduce things than I’m used to,” she said, admiringly. “Often, someone will just put something down and I’ll react to it, which became a way of operating for me. And so, I suddenly felt that I was not in that kind of comfort zone anymore, that I had a different kind of responsibility for the direction of the music.”
On Wednesday, Crispell and saxophonist Joe Lovano’s Trio Tapestry, a group that made its debut earlier this year, head out on a string of European dates. Somewhere along the way, they’ll duck into the studio and make a second album.
Crispell describes the trio as “sort of a renaissance for me, to be invited to join that group and play his music that’s also challenging; a lot of stuff out of my comfort zone. But it’s all stuff that I can relate to, and I love the challenge.”
Four decades out from her Creative Music Studio days, it seems as if Crispell continues foraging for new sounds. DB
Hammond came to the blues through the folk boom of the late 1950s and early 1960s, which he experienced firsthand in New York’s Greenwich Village.
Mar 2, 2026 9:58 PM
John P. Hammond (aka John Hammond Jr.), a blues guitarist and singer who was one of the first white American…
“Cerebral and academic thought is a different way to approach music,” Flea says of his continuing dive into jazz. “I’ve always relied on emotion and intuition and physicality.”
Mar 30, 2026 10:30 PM
In the relatively small pantheon of certifiable rock stars venturing into the intersection of pop music and jazz, the…
Vocalist Dee Dee Bridgewater will be among the headliners at this year’s DC JazzFest.
Mar 2, 2026 9:48 PM
The first wave of artists scheduled to perform at the 2026 DC JazzFest have been announced. This year’s headliners…
“These days, with curated news, where people only get half the story, people can’t even speak to family members anymore,” Schneider laments.
Mar 10, 2026 1:43 PM
Maria Schneider is doing her part to try to fix what ails America. Which got her thinking about crows, specifically,…
Each of the 25 JAMs has delivered a poster featuring a jazz legend that is sent out to schools across the nation. This year’s poster features Tony Bennett.
Mar 30, 2026 10:20 PM
Every April for the past quarter century, something remarkable has happened across the United States and far beyond.…
