Micah Graves Pawns Self-released There’s a buzz in Philly, a city that has boasted more than its fair share of legendary jazz artists, about the emerging pianist/composer/educator, 24-year-old Micah Graves, and his already prolific output. He has caught the attention of NPR and when one considers his development, we have a musician that clearly bears […]
Mathis Picard Live at the Museum Outside in Music Mathis Picard, only in his mid-twenties, is an emerging French-Malagasy pianist, composer, producer, and bandleader who currently resides in New York City and is ascending in popularity. If you’ve been fortunate to hear him, it was probably through his genre-bending 2020 EP World Unity under the […]
Emile Parisien Sextet Louise ACT Music & Vision French soprano saxophonist Emile Parisien forms American-European sextet for Louise, marking a decade with the Munich-based label, ACT Music & Vision. New listeners to Parisien will quickly sense a distinctive soprano saxophone tone, one that is softer and that often reads like a string instrument such as […]
The Jazz All Stars Volume 2 Le Coq The straight-ahead jazz label Le Coq enters its second year, reprising their introductory salvo of 2021, Volume 1, featuring an aggregation of premiere jazz musicians, with The Jazz All Stars, Volume 2. Most of the inaugural roster is aboard including both pianist/composer/arrangers Bill Cunliffe and John Beasley […]
John Hébert Sounds of Love Sunnyside Bassist John Hébert who keeps progressive company with the likes of Fred Hersch, Mary Halvorson, Uri Caine and bands led by Andrew Hill and Paul Bley earlier in his career, has long been fascinated with the music of Charles Mingus to the extent that he has modeled Sounds of […]
Oscar Hernandez & Alma Libre Visión Ovation Visión is the third release and the second on his own label, Ovation, for Multi-GRAMMY® Winning pianist, composer and bandleader Oscar Hernández, a giant of Latin jazz, most known as the leader of the Spanish Harlem Orchestra (SHO). Here, he leads his quintet, Alma Libre – a Los […]
Dave Wilson Stretching Supreme Self-released Dave Wilson’s Stretching Supreme is a follow-up of sorts to his 2019 release One Night At Chris’, a Philadelphia jazz institution that is the site for this tribute to John Coltrane. We did cover that release on these pages. Yes, one may be asking – do we need another tribute […]
Tony Malaby The Cave of Winds Pyroclastic The title, Cave of Winds, sounds like a rock formation but draws its name from an interesting place where saxophonist/composer Tony Malaby and his trio played in 2020 during the lockdown months. Beginning in July of that year, Malaby began hosting improvisational jamming sessions featuring bassist John Hébert […]
Roswell Rudd & Duck Baker Live Dot Time This is one that broke late in 2021 that we’d be remiss to overlook. It is not often that one finds duets between trombone and fingerstyle guitar to begin with and considering that the trombonist is the late legendary Roswell Rudd along with the renowned finger stylist […]
Making a Scene Presents Jim Hynes Top Jazz Releases for 2021 2021 marked by far the most jazz reviews we have ever done in this space which has proven to be a haven for some lesser-known names, artists making debuts, and a surprising number of forward-thinking, explorative performers. In hindsight, the list, which includes […]
