This is something a critic usually saves for the end of a review, but let’s say right now, I love this freakin’ album. With Big Money, Jon Batiste hits the ears with a perfect little package of pure joy, fantastic wordplay, amazing musicianship and subtle soul all bundled in a stripped-down set of nine tunes that groove, bop and flow with perfection. If you’re looking for the jazz voice of Batiste, it’s in there somewhere, but this recording features the soul, blues and New Orleans grit of Batiste’s musical palette. The album delivers with a big, booty-shaking beat on tunes like “Big Money” — featuring the Womack Sisters (Sam Cooke’s granddaughters) and Nick Waterhouse killing it on guitar — and “Pinnacle.” Then, there’s the infectious pop of the opening tune, “Lean On My Love,” a beautiful duet with vocalist Andra Day. It features Batiste as an artist full of open-hearted love, as he shows on several tunes on the set, like the beautiful “Do It All Over Again.” As for that New Orleans grit, try “Petrichor,” an ode to the planet, where Batiste preaches about how “They’re burning the planet down/ No more second lining in the street,” but does it with Southern style that makes it go down easy and stick. But let’s get back to that big heart. There are two tunes on this recording that really let you inside. First, “Maybe,” with just Batiste and a piano, musing about what it all means with the only answer being the word “maybe” trailing off: “Maybe I’m just wasting my time/ Or maybe this is part of some strange design/ Maybe.” And then, there’s the song that brought a tear to this grizzled old writer’s eye. “Lonely Avenue” was written by New Orleans’ own Doc Pomus and recorded by Ray Charles back in 1958. Batiste reprises this chestnut in duet with the 81-year-old songwriting legend Randy Newman. It’s just Batiste and Newman squeezing this tune out at a gut-wrenchingly slow tempo. It’s late-night, after-hours heartbreak at its best. It’s important to note that this entire album was recorded in a week, with many tunes laid down in one take. “Lonely Avenue” was recorded on a handheld recorder at Newman’s piano. The process may be low key, but the results are high art. In addition to the music, also check out the videos for “Big Money,” “Lonely Avenue” and “Lean On My Love.” They’re terrific, too, with “Lean On My Love” shot at Victory Bible Church in Altadena, California, where the wildfires took down so much of that community.

Nobody reading this review needs me to tell them that drummer Joe Farnsworth has made an album of straightahead, hard-driving swing. Moreover, the names that appear on The Big Room’s cover below Farnsworth’s — trumpeter Jeremy Pelt, altoist Sarah Hanahan, vibist Joel Ross, pianist Emmet Cohen and bassist Yasushi Nakamura — guarantee it’ll be a barn burner.

What you really want to know is how they all sound when they come together. Let’s just say it’s a good thing this is a studio record. The level of energy and excitement they generate would be dangerous in a crowded club.

That doesn’t just apply on the uptempo numbers. Of course, those would be enough. The screaming relay race that Cohen, Pelt, Ross Hanahan and Farnsworth run on “You Already Know” is alone worth the price of admission. (That’s to say nothing of “Radical’s” slow-burn friction.) It’s how they turn up the heat while the velocity’s down that truly makes the album. Consider “I Fall In Love Too Easily,” Pelt leading the melody over Ross and the rhythm section, the latter characterized by Farnsworth’s punctilious brushwork. It’s as tender and vulnerable as any jazz reading of the Styne-Cahn ballad, yet, seemingly unconsciously, when the bridge arrives everyone puts just a hint more muscle into their line. Ross, then Cohen, channel that infinitesimal oomph into suddenly all-but-jaunty solos. This isn’t repeated on the date’s other ballad, “What Am I Waiting For” — but there’s an explosive tension in Pelt and Hanahan’s controlled call-and-response; it feels like it could burst at any moment.

Steam also rises from the medium-tempo “All Said And Done,” Ross submitting a particularly fine solo. It turns to smoke on the boogaloo closer “Prime Time,” where it’s Hanahan who shines brightest, with Cohen not far behind. The Big Room simply never lets up.

This sunny new release from the Gabriel Alegría Afro-Peruvian Sextet has essential elements of a great summer listen: a liberating liveliness that keeps inhibitions perpetually at bay, snappy percussion and ancient tribal rhythms from the hearts of South America and Africa, melodic horn lines that seem to ride waves of light and heat, pleasant jazz soloing that conjures an outdoor festival vibe, and just enough calm breeziness and wide-open sonic space to sustain a consistently refreshing breathability. Recorded in Lima, Peru, and built upon a depth of experience performing as an innovative, culturally immersed ensemble, El Muki is a spirit-guided excursion into sensory realms that serves as a homecoming in honor of the group’s 20th anniversary. The album consists of eight original pieces (four by trumpeter/bandleader Alegría and four by New York-based tenor saxophonist/composer Laura Andrea Laguía) plus a muted-trumpet exploration of the bouncy, reggae-pop tune “Walking On The Moon” by The Police. This incarnation of the sextet — part of a larger ecosystem of participating players dating back to its birth in 2005 — also includes cajon superstar Freddy “Huevito” Lobatón (who also plays cajita and quijada on these nine crisply recorded tracks), the dextrous jazz and traditional-Peruvian bassist Mario Cuba, founding drummer and Afro-Peruvian genre-definer Hugo Alcázar, guitarist and co-producer Jocho Velásquez and soprano saxophonist supreme JF Maza, with sensitive contributions from cellist Marco Lucioni and the 16-strong choir Shades of Yale. In support of El Muki (named for a mythical Andean elf traditionally believed to protect miners in the Peruvian highlands), the Gabriel Alegría Afro-Peruvian Sextet will embark on a fall 2025 U.S. tour that includes performances at Cameron Art Museum in Wilmington, North Carolina (Oct. 2), Shakori Hills GrassRoots Festival of Music & Dance in North Carolina’s Chatham County (Oct. 3), Blues Alley in Washington D.C. (Oct. 6), Origins Concert Series in Oneonta, New York (Oct. 9), and The Cutting Room in New York City (Oct. 10).

The Wild Iris Brass Band was born out of a beautiful good deed. Saxophonist Jeff Coffin (who was recently inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame with the Dave Matthews Band) was talking to a good friend in their hometown of Nashville during the height of the freaking pandemic back in 2021. That friend was about to turn 50 and dreamed of spending his birthday in New Orleans, sipping coffee and enjoying a brass band, but COVID put the kibosh on that plan. That’s all Coffin needed to hear. He reached out to trombonist Ray Mason, and the two cooked up a scheme: They assembled a brass band and, on that friend’s birthday, second-lined down that friend’s street in Nashville, delivering a set of New Orleans brass band favorites. The moment was so much fun that the two began to write and arrange more brass band music, and the Wild Iris Brass Band emerged. The Wild Iris plays fun, big-hearted music with a groove so deep, you’ve got no choice but to smile, tap your foot and get up and dance. The horn arrangements are tight with plenty of surprises. On “We’re The Wild Iris,” trumpeter Steven Bernstein guests with a killer electric slide trumpet interlude. Neil Konouchi’s sousaphone kicks off a delightful, party-time take on Dolly Parton’s “9 To 5” with fierce soloing from Coffin, Mason and trumpeter Emmanuel Echem. “Eye Of The Cyclops” comes in hot as a Coffin composition shaped by Mason with a sweet swamp groove delivered by drummer Justin Amaral and enhanced by a guest guitar spot from Bob Lanzetti of Snarky Puppy fame. What’s awesome about this group is that it sticks to the spirit if not the script of brass band music. Take, for example, “Step Up,” an interesting reimagining of John Coltrane’s “Giant Steps.” It grooves with sweet horn slurs, and plenty of room for soloing. “Slow Express” serves as a swinging medium-tempo stroll with Béla Fleck sitting in on banjo and a chant that reminds you to “Buckle up, enjoy the ride/ Relax, gonna let it slide.” Top to bottom, front to back, Way Up is way fun, packed with great arrangements, tight group work, amazing solos and a lotta smiles.

Embedded in a trio with Christian McBride and Jack DeJohnette, Ivan Farmakovskiy would get credit merely for keeping his head above water. The Muscovite pianist does a hell of a lot more than that.

Recorded in 2010, Epic Power (his sophomore recording) offers up Farmakovskiy’s abilities as both pianist and composer: He wrote seven of the album’s eight tunes and arranged its one cover, a sexy rendition of Lennon & McCartney’s “And I Love Her.” The pianist maintains a hard-bop vibe throughout; between the vibe and the company he keeps, hard-driving swing is a must, and Farmakovskiy delivers. The opening “Soul Inside Out” is ablaze from the start, and he runs away with that fire in his solo. “Professor” gives him a funky (in the Horace Silver sense) workout that makes room for a bluesy, groovy solo. But mid-uptempo is more the pianist’s speed. “Conciliation,” a lithe, pretty waltz based on “The Lady Is A Tramp,” inspires perhaps his best improvisational work: Greased-keyboard chops yield a rhythmically inventive line whose melodic phrases turn in on themselves in brilliant curlicues and trotting syncopations.

But it’s not all about Farmakovskiy. He’s a highly interactive leader, letting DeJohnette, in particular, shape his solos on “The Day Before” and “Orange” at least as much as he shapes their comps. His lightning runs on the former seem directly in response to DeJohnette’s fluttering brushwork, with the two conversing on the latter. Although there’s less direct engagement with McBride (whose arco solo on “And I Love Her” is an album highlight), their empathy is crystal clear. What a splendid trio, and record, this is.

This vinyl reissue of Walter “Furry” Lewis’ Back On My Feet Again from 1961 presents the iconic country blues singer and guitarist in the initial years of his historic career revival. Known for his soulful vocals and skillful, light touch on guitar, Lewis was among the earliest active bluesmen to find fame later in life amid the ’60s folk/blues revival. Born in the 1890s, Lewis began his career as a performer on Beale Street in Memphis, and in the late 1920s he cut his first sides for Vocalion and Victor. But during the Great Depression, he retired from music and turned to working menial jobs to make ends meet. Thirty years later, Lewis was given a second chance at stardom when music historian Sam Charters sought out the bluesman and encouraged him to return to the studio. His second album from that fertile period, recorded at Sun Studios in Memphis and originally issued via Prestige Records’ Bluesville imprint, Back On My Feet Again finds Lewis in a stripped-down setting, accompanied only by his acoustic guitar as he employs his signature stylings — including nimble finger-picking and explosive bursts of slide playing — and revisits several of his early recordings, including “John Henry” and “Big Chief Blues,” while weaving in traditional material like “Shake ’Em On Down” as well as newer compositions, “Back On My Feet Again” among them. As Back On My Feet Again ably demonstrated at the time, Lewis’ talents never wavered despite his lengthy break from music, and he ended up enjoying a career resurgence for the last two decades of his life (he passed in 1981). The album sounds better than ever now that it’s been remastered for 180-gram vinyl pressings that are currently available for pre-order (with a release date of Aug. 1). Back On My Feet Again can also be purchased as a download in hi-res and standard digital audio formats.

Another long-out-of-print blues classic being brought back to vinyl (and digital download) by Bluesville Records is Memphis Slim At The Gate Of Horn, recorded in 1959 for Vee-Jay. Named for his hometown and known for his commanding vocals and rollicking piano technique, Peter “Memphis Slim” Chatman (1915–’88) was one of the blues’ most versatile players and songwriters. He spent much of his youth touring the Southern bar and dance hall circuit before relocating to Chicago in 1939, where he found work as a sideman before finding his own voice as a performer and leading his own group starting in the mid-’40s. Slim and his band released a string of R&B hits, including “Blue And Lonesome,”“Mother Earth,” “The Come Back,” the 1948 chart-topper “Messin’ Around” and “Nobody Loves Me,” a 1949 B-side better known as “Every Day I Have The Blues.” When Slim recorded this collection of his best-known songs at The Gate of Horn, a Chicago folk club, he was joined by his longtime bandmates (including Matt “Guitar” Murphy and a solid horn section), and although their relatively short, well-paced set wasn’t captured during a live performance before an audience, it presents the superb pianist and always-clever wordsmith in his element, at the peak of his legendary blues powers.