Straight-Ahead / Classic - CD Reviews (1959)
Connecticut native Mike DiRubbo has made a name for himself as a featured saxophonist in New York-based groups led by trombonist Steve Davis, pianist David Hazeltine and many others. His sixth release as a leader, Chronos (Posi-Tone), is a hard-blowing, straight-ahead affair with organist Brian Charette and drummer Rudy Royston.…
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Guitarist Russel Malone has maintained a prolific balance over the last couple of decades as both a leader and sideman to jazz luminaries, such as Diana Krall, Harry Connick, Jr. and Sonny Rollins. It comes as a surprise to realize that his ninth solo release Triple Play is his first…
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The fourth in a series of loosely-structured, jam session recordings for the Canadian-based Alma Records, One Take: Volume Four features Hammond organ giant Joey DeFrancesco with a trio of veteran Toronto jazz musicians performing a cozy set of straight-ahead standard fare. Fronting the session is saxophonist Phil Dwyer who displays…
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Pianist Jacky Terrasson is a painter on the keyboard, and this can be heard in the jazz portraits created in his new release Push. Since the early nineties, European born Terrasson has been lauded as a bright new star. His eponymous debut on Blue Note in 1995 predicted a successful…
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There are rare instances in any art expression when all the elements gets together to create a piece of art that borders on perfection. When a good painter or sculptor get that moment of inspiration or when a good script, director and actors coincide in the creation of a movie…
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Well, let’s see. There’s this disc entitled Standard Transmission (Origin). There’s this cat, Bruce Williamson, playing reeds and backed by a rhythm section...and, we have the great, time-tested standards by Rodgers and Hart, Ray Noble and Monk, among others. This ought to be rather routine, so then, let’s press “Play.”This…
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Things yet unknown is the debut album from Michigan native trombonist Shawn Bell. Shawn is a young musician who studied at Michigan University and Northern Illinois University. All the music on Things yet unknown are Shawn Bell originals except You stepped out of a dream and In the wee small…
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There is a very good reason why tenor and soprano, as well as sometime alto, saxophonist Joe Lovano is one of the greatest jazz musicians of all time. It’s because he has devoted his life to finding new ways to express improvised melodic conceptualizations, because his harmonic language continues to…
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Europeans always liked and supported jazz since the beginning, when they first heard James Reese's Europe HellFigthers. At the beginning of the 20th century when jazz was regarded as inferior black music, some European classical composers were among the first to recognize the richness and the quality of this new…
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Achingly soulful with a hint of apathetic teenage angst, from top to bottom, Spiral drips with an honesty that has been lacking with many of the latest jazz offerings of the past decade. Trimmed out with guitarist Jonathan Kreisberg and drummer Jamire Williams, Dr. Smith’s current touring band, the tunes…
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On the surface, putting together a duo album seems like a pretty straight-ahead idea: you get some tunes together and head to the studio. All too often though, the mojo that keeps a duo album from going stale runs out. Without the collaboration that comes with putting together four or…
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Saxophonist Dan White began his musical studies on piano before switching over to the saxophone at a young age. Raised in Williamsville, NY, he is currently a junior at Ohio State University studying music. Fran’s Place is his first full-length self-released recording. The seven tunes were all recorded on one…
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Acoustic and electric bassist Terje Gewelt hails from Norway, where he grew up in a small town on the southeastern coast. Starting on the guitar at the age of 10 he switched to the bass at age of 14 and never looked back. Studies with the great Norwegian bassist Arild…
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Saxophonist and pianist Brian Hogans has been making the jazz world take notice. The Morrow, GA native has worked with artists like James Williams, Winard Harper and as a regular in the Sean Jones Quintet. A switch hitter with fantastic abilities on both saxophone and piano (he subbed as a…
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Imagine that the classic quintet albums recorded by the late Tony Williams now have the following instrumentation: tenor saxophone, trumpet, drums and Hammond B-3 organ. This scenario makes up almost half the performances on Back Home, organist Pat Bianchi’s second release. This recording is balanced out when Bianchi leads a…
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It wasn’t until tenor saxophonist, flutist and clarinetist Takao Iwaki was 19 that he took his first private lesson. Late, by American standards for studying individually, Iwaki was eventually accepted by the Berklee College of Music where he studied with famed musician George Garzone and was a member of Phil…
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After winning the 2008 International Massimo Urbani Award, Philology Records offered Italian pianist Francesco Marziani the opportunity of recording his debut. So here it is, the first album from one of the new italian jazz talents, Francesco Marziani. In My Own Sweet Way was recorded with bassist Massimo Moriconi and…
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CD Review: Alva Nelson - Soul EyesAlva Nelson new album, Soul Eyes is a combination of mostly original compositions with some jazz classics. Nelson is a pianist with great technique equally good playing the fast tunes like Synonymous Dichotomy or the slow ballads like Soul Eyes, Some other time and…
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The music of this trio sounds so full and powerful. Since the first notes of the first track, "My heart stood still", everyone shine without getting in each others way, just like a jazz group should be. Some of the music is relaxing but intense at the same time like…
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Salvatore Bonafede is a jazz pianist born in Palermo, Sicily, in 1962. If you’ll pardon the reference to Mario Puzo’s novel The Godfather, he made his bones at the Berklee School of Music, and with bosses Jerry Bergonzi, Joe Lovano, Judi Silvano, the late Lester Bowie, and John Scofield. He…
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