March 5th 2010
Posted under Jazz Writing
My latest article for the Island Packet newspaper on Hilton Head Island, SC, is a short profile of Tish Oney and her Peggy Lee Project.
Archive for the 'Jazz Writing' Category
February 26th 2010
Posted under Jazz Writing & Podcast
My most recent piece for The Island Packet newspaper on Hilton Head Island, SC, is a short profile of the Hammond organ and organists Jimmy Smith and Scott Giddens.
January 28th 2010
Posted under Jazz Writing & Podcast
My latest mini-profile for the Island Packet newspaper on Hilton Head Island, SC, is about pianist Noel Freidline. Here’s the opening:
Noel Freidline was first exposed to jazz in the usual manner: via National Geographic.
Wait a minute, National Geographic?
“My mom was briefly a member of the National Geographic album club back in the late ’70s,” Freidline said. “One of the albums they sent her that she did not actually order was a compilation album of Dixieland jazz. One day, when I was about 11 or 12, I found the album and put it on. I was fascinated. Shortly thereafter a neighbor gave me a Dave Brubeck album called ‘Time Out.’ He was probably the only person in my little hometown of Clearwater, Kan., who even knew who Dave Brubeck was. Now I was hooked.”
January 6th 2010
Posted under Jazz Writing
Here’s a short profile of John Pizzarelli I wrote for the Island Packet newspaper on Hilton Head Island, SC:
December 31st 2009
Posted under Jazz Writing & Podcast & Site Updates
My year-in-review article for All About Jazz is now available online. It’s a look at some of the interesting places at which I recorded episodes of the show in 2009. These spots include:
- Steve Kuhn’s kitchen
- The lobby of Vijay Iyer’s apartment building
- A trailer behind the stage at the Albany Riverfront Jazz Festival
- James Shipp’s minivan
- …and many more!
Read: The Jazz Session: Oh, The Places You’ll Go!
December 8th 2009
Posted under Jazz News & Jazz Writing & Podcast
These lists are always a bit ridiculous to compile, given the near impossibility of rating art and the sheer number of CDs released each year. That said, I compiled the list below for the 2009 Village Voice Jazz Critics Poll.
TOP 10
Artist – Album (Label)
- Fay Victor – The FreeSong Suite (Greene Avenue)
- Vijay Iyer – Historicity (ACT)
- Darius Jones – Man’ish Boy (AUM Fidelity)
- The Fully Celebrated – Drunk On The Blood Of The Holy Ones (AUM Fidelity)
- The Respect Sextet – Sirius Respect (Mode)
- Ted Sirota’s Rebel Souls – Seize The Time (Naim)
- Digital Primitives – Hum Crackle & Pop (Hopscotch)
- Terence Blanchard – Choices (Concord)
- Steve Lehman – Travail, Transformation & Flow (Pi Recordings)
- Kat Edmonson – Take To The Sky (Convivium)
TOP 3 REISSUES
- Art Pepper – The Art History Project (Widow’s Taste)
- Tony Bennett & Bill Evans – The Complete Tony Bennett & Bill Evans Recordings on Fantasy (Concord)
- — not voting for a 3rd —
BEST VOCAL ALBUM
Fay Victor – The FreeSong Suite (Greene Avenue)
BEST DEBUT CD
Darius Jones – Man’ish Boy (AUM Fidelity)
BEST LATIN JAZZ CD
– not voting —
November 9th 2009
Posted under Jazz Writing & Saxophonists
I interviewed Sonny Rollins tonight for the second time. Before the interview, I asked my wife Jennifer, who’s a casual jazz listener, what one question she’d ask Sonny if she were interviewing him. She said she’d ask him whether jazz is still relevant. So I asked him, and this is what he said:
“I think that the relevance of jazz depends on what you think jazz is. For instance, if you think that jazz is a piano trio playing in a small nightclub — they’re good musicians, maybe have a girl singer — and you come in and there are people smoking and sitting at tables … if that is your conception of jazz then of course jazz is not relevant, because that refers to a time and place. Jazz is something which is much bigger. Jazz has to do with freedom of expression. So is jazz still relevant? Of course, because there are always people trying to express themselves in music. I think of jazz as having the big umbrella, so that a lot of styles of music that have merged over the years all fall under the umbrella of jazz. The act of trying to create something musically and spontaneously is something that is a part of life. It’s like the weather — it’s always there. Jazz as something that fits into a narrow little remembrance, no, that kind of jazz is not relevant. But jazz is as relevant today as the yearning for people to be free. That’s how relevant jazz is.”
