Entries from July 2013
Mike Wofford: It’s Personal
Pianist Mike Wofford can boast decades of high-caliber sideman gigs: notably with vocalists m: Ella Fitzgerald (for whom he served as music director), m: Mel TormA(C) and m: Sarah Vaughan , as well as drummer m: Shelly Manne , saxophonist m: Phil Woods , guitarist m: Joe Pass and others. His studio work is amply represented on records by a dizzying variety of artists.
Date: No Comments · Categories: Jazz CD Reviews
·Convergence Quartet: Slow And Steady
It might just be that the third record from the Transatlantic Convergence Quartet is its best yet. Recorded live at north London’s Vortex at the conclusion of a short British tour, the band was firing on all cylinders. Not that its previous two outings were in any way remiss. Live In Oxford (FMR, 2007) documented a foursome still getting to know each other, while Song Dance (Clean Feed, 2010) delved into a dizzying range of options for common ground.
Date: No Comments · Categories: Jazz CD Reviews
·Tyler Mire Big Band: Enter the Atmosph-Mire
Originally televised back in the black-and-white1960s, Rod Serling’s The Twilight Zone broadcast an episode–now classic–in which miniature alien spacemen land and terrorize a woman who is frightfully alone in her farmhouse. The cover art depicting happy little “musician-nauts” walking in space notwithstanding, Enter the Atmosph-mire does no terrorizing.
Date: No Comments · Categories: Jazz CD Reviews
·Ben Monder: Hydra
New York-based guitarist Ben Monder has been an active member of the contemporary jazz scene for more than two decades, appearing on over 100 sessions as a sideman for such luminaries as Paul Motian , Maria Schneider and Kenny Wheeler . Despite such prestigious collaborations, Monder has maintained a relatively low profile as a solo artist, with less than half a dozen records as a leader or co-leader to his credit; Oceana, the last release under his own name, was issued by Sunnyside Records back in 2005…
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·Candi Staton: Evidence – The Complete Fame Records Masters
American roots musician Jason Isbell, on his live recording Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit Live in Alabama (Lightning Rod Records), performed a potent cover of Candi Staton’s “Heart on a String,” recorded at FAME Studios in Muscle Shoals in 1970. In that performance rests an entire history of American music of the period. Muscle Shoals and FAME Studios were, in their heyday, making music–and a lot of it–of a quality not heard since…
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·Peter Sprague String Consort: Dr. Einstein’s Spin
Composer/guitarist Peter Sprague isn’t well-known, but there are few musicians operating at his level; he counts pianist m: Chick Corea , bassist m: Charlie Haden and fellow six-stringer m: Pat Metheny among his enthusiastic supporters. One of his ongoing projects, The Peter Sprague String Consort, represents a true marriage of jazz trio with string quartet, and the ensemble is back after 2009’s The Wild Blue (SBE, 2010) with Dr. Einstein’s Spin, which was in part commissioned by Chamber Music America’s New Jazz Works program…
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·Eldar Djangirov: Breakthrough
“Point Of View Redux”–the eight-minute-long opener on pianist Eldar Djangirov’s Breakthrough–doesn’t exactly say it all, but it says a hell of a lot. A firmly delivered flourish flies through the air in the opening seconds, a rollicking riff sets things in motion as titan-like technique powers the warp-speed explorations that follow, things take a bluesy turn for a spell, and Djangirov generates enough energy to power an entire city block along the way. This aptly-titled number serves as a musical manifesto-of-sorts, as Djangirov wears his likes on his sleeve–and in his hands; this album is, indeed, a breakthrough, but not a completely unexpected one…
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