Sep 3, 2025 12:02 PM
Keeping the Flame at Van Gelder Studio
On the last Sunday of 2024, in the control room of Van Gelder Studio, Don and Maureen Sickler, co-owners since Rudy Van…
Pianist Thandi Ntuli recently released Exiled (Inpartmaint), her second full-length album.
(Photo: Tseliso Monaheng)
Pianist Thandi Ntuli recently released Exiled (Inpartmaint), her second full-length album.
(Photo: Tseliso Monaheng)Do you feel affirmed as an artist in some way because Exiled is being released in Japan?
“Affirmed” is not the word. I think it’s different to have your music exist digitally in a country and to have it distributed physically—knowing that there’s a record label that really loves your stuff, that thinks it’s gonna work in the territory and that actively wants to help in the marketing of it. I think that’s a very different space to be in. It just means that there’s someone who’s identified something that they think would work in that market. And [Japan’s] always been a place I’d wanted to visit, for years. It just makes it seem closer in reach.
How has performing been, given your higher profile? I mean, you sold out two nights at the Market Theatre.
That blew my mind. I have seen gigs that I’ve done in smaller venues that pack up, but I never knew that there were so many people that would be interested in the gig. And the thing I loved is that I didn’t see many familiar faces. So, it just said to me that there are other people that I’m not reaching, because of the spaces that I always play at. The rising profile thing is a bit ... it’s like, everything moved so fast. I’m always having this thing of trying to balance the demands of that—more people wanting to profile you, speak to you, interview—and also still being able to put the time into my craft. I don’t want to become an artist that has a profile without the goods to show. DB
Don and Maureen Sickler serve as the keepers of engineer Rudy Van Gelder’s flame at Van Gelder Studio, perhaps the most famous recording studio in jazz history.
Sep 3, 2025 12:02 PM
On the last Sunday of 2024, in the control room of Van Gelder Studio, Don and Maureen Sickler, co-owners since Rudy Van…
Trio aRT with its avalanche of instrumentation: from left, Pheeroan akLaff, Scott Robinson and Julian Thayer.
Sep 3, 2025 12:03 PM
Trio aRT, a working unit since 1988, shockingly released its very first studio recording this summer. Recorded in…
“Think of all the creative people I’m going to meet and a whole other way of thinking about music and a challenge of singing completely different material than I would have sung otherwise to my highest level in dedication to the moment,” Elling says about his Broadway run.
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Kurt Elling was back at home in Chicago, grabbing some family time in a late-June window between gigs. Sporting a smile…
Pat Metheny will perform with his Side-Eye III ensemble at Big Ears 2026 in Knoxville, Tennessee, next March.
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Big Ears has announced the lineup for its 2026 festival, which will take place March 26–29 and include 250…
Mark Masters, right, with Billy Harper.
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The Rising Star Category of this publication’s annual Critics Poll was once called Talent Deserving Wider Recognition…
