Vocalist Lizz Wright performs April 30 at Arts Centre Melbourne’s Hamer Hall in Australia. (Photo: Steve Mundinger/Herbie Hancock Institute of Jazz)
In Melbourne and Sydney, International Jazz Day Explores Cultural Exchange
Acknowledgments of Australia’s indigenous Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people were peppered throughout the 2019 International Jazz Day celebrations in the host cities of Melbourne and Sydney during late April.
Before…
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Being a curator has become a defining ethos for the 21st century. With digital platforms bombarding us with choice, a curator’s purview—once confined to gallerists and museum…
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The premise for Ámbar, guitarist Camila Meza’s fifth leader date (due out May 31 on Sony Music Masterworks), has something to do with time, distance, and the excavation and…
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The day before guitarist/composer Hedvig Mollestad and her six-person band headlined the 46th annual Vossa Jazz Festival, which ran April 12–14, the group went hang-gliding in…
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In his intro to “McCoy Tyner and Charles McPherson at 80,” a tribute concert honoring the two jazz giants at Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Rose Theater on April 5–6,…
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BY Bobby Reed
Pianist Eric Reed is among the most gifted of today’s straightahead jazz players who draw important inspiration from the past. In the liner notes to his new quartet album, the excellent Everybody Gets The Blues, the 48-year-old Philadelphia native writes,…
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BY Ed Enright
Waves Of Calm is the perfect title for this new release from alto saxophonist Jim Snidero. A reflection on his since-departed father’s struggle with Parkinson’s Disease, the eight-song program is charged with powerful emotion recollected in tranquility.…
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BY Bobby Reed
For casual fans, a soundtrack album often is merely a keepsake, a memento associated with a film they love, rather than a musical compilation they’ll revisit frequently. In the particular case of Bolden, there is a slight difference in mood between the film…
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BY Dave Cantor
Olli Hirvonen’s guitar provided a dash of bombast on Brian Krock’s 2018 album, Big Heart Machine. The big band made something of an anachronistic album, pushing the vanguard of large-ensemble music, all scuffed up by those metally theatrics.
For…
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BY J.D. Considine
It’s not often that a bandleader is so selfless that they’ll open an album with a track they don’t play on. It seems perfectly appropriate here, though, because trumpeter Dave Douglas’ Devotion is all about recognizing the value of others,…
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BY Bobby Reed
On her sophomore album, Charismatic, charming Argentine singer-songwriter Laura Valle proves that a great melody is the universal language, as she offers lyrics in Spanish, English and German (with translations posted on her website).
Based in Southern…
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BY Dave Cantor
On her 2010 debut, Tangent, tenor saxophonist Trish Clowes offered up a baroque vision of jazz—pithy and skronky interludes bouncing between full-ensemble improv and intimate sonic investigations.
The approach steadily has morphed into a sturdy post-bop…
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BY Dave Cantor
The veracity of all those stories you’ve heard or read about Lee “Scratch” Perry is immaterial. The 50-plus years of music the producer and vocalist has worked on is legitimately awe-inspiring. And the fact that he has continued releasing work at a…
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BY J.D. Considine
Sometimes, the long view offers the best perspective. Reflections compiles tracks drawn from 20 years of sitar virtuoso Anoushka Shankar’s recordings, and in so doing demonstrates not only the breadth of her work, but also its consistency.
Like her…
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Roland’s LX700 series pianos (the LX708, LX706 and LX705) feature PureAcoustic Modeling technology that emulates the way that acoustic pianos produce sound, including hammer strikes and body resonance. Roland’s PureAcoustic Ambience technology then creates a sound space by emulating the…
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Kay Guitar Company has recreated and reissued the Barney Kessel signature models that the iconic guitarist endorsed during the 1950s. The K1700V Barney Kessel Pro, the K6700V Artist and the K8700V Barney Kessel Jazz Special all sport the authorized Kessel signature on the pickguard. Kay has…
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The six-piece handcrafted Collector’s Series Pure Almond kit from Drum Workshop features luminous finishes—ranging from Toasted Almond to Natural Burst Lacquer Specialty—and can be paired with a range of hardware options. Almond wood gathered from disused trees lends the limited-quantity…
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Offering a crisp, well-balanced response, Audio-Technica’s ATM350a condenser instrument microphone provides discreet, solid mounting solutions for a host of instruments, including woodwinds, strings, brass, percussion and piano. The ATM350a is capable of handling 159dB maximum SPL, allowing the…
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Cannonball has introduced the Artist Series B7 professional baritone saxophone. It features a new design that produces a rich and focused tone, excellent intonation, superb ergonomics and full-ribbed construction. The Artist Series B7 bari is available in gold lacquer and black nickel plate and…
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by Studs Terkel // December/11/1958
“Mahalia, she was a girl in the slave days. She was dreaming of jubilee all the time. Of better days to come. My people gave me her name.”
The big, handsome woman with the gentle face was weary as she stared out of the window of her Southside Chicago home at the Indian summer afternoon. She was looking out toward the setting sun, miles away…
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