jazz
Thomas H. Green
Due to COVID-related nonsense too tedious to relate, this month’s theartsdesk on Vinyl was delayed. But here it is, over 7500 words on new music on plastic, covering a greater breadth of genres and styles than most major festivals. From reissues of some of the biggest bands that ever lived, to limited edition micro-releases from tiny independents, it’s all here. Dive in!VINYL OF THE MONTHKiko Dinucci Rastilho (Mais Um)São Paulo artist Kiko Dinucci has said, “The idea has always been to play the guitar as a percussion instrument.” Couldn’t agree more. Dinucci has iron in his musical blood and Read more ...
Liz Thomson
What a pick-me-up this album is. Released as the days darken, literally and metaphorically, it’s a real joy – a transport of delight to dappled squares in Paris or Lisbon, or a street party in Rio. Sunset in the Blue is billed as “an orchestral celebration of Melody Gardot’s jazz roots” but the abiding sound that remains in the mind’s ear after the album’s finished is that of a jazz guitar, played with a bossa nova rhythm.This is Gardot’s fifth album in twelve years, a mix of standards and originals in which her voice is close-miked and properly out front in the mix. Peggy Lee, Eartha Kitt Read more ...
Sebastian Scotney
Ronnie Scott was a remarkable man: “Jazz Musician, Club Proprietor, Raconteur and Wit, he was the leader of our generation,” reads the memorial to him at Golders Green Crematorium. Oliver Murray’s documentary film Ronnie’s is an affectionate and portrait of him and of the jazz club he founded.It was Ronnie Scott’s trips to New York as a member of the dance bands on the transatlantic liners (the musicians known as “Geraldo’s Navy”) that crystallised the idea in his mind to start a club run by the instrumentalists themselves, to play the bebop music they had heard on 52nd Street. An ill-starred Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
Giant Steps doesn’t suffer from a lack of availability. A couple of weeks ago, two editions of John Coltrane’s 1960 landmark set were available in a central London music store. One was a 2002 CD version which supplemented the album’s seven tracks with eight bonus cuts: alternate studio takes which were not originally released. It was selling for £7. For the same price, there was a 2CD set teaming Giant Steps with three other Coltrane albums. Internet sales sites have even more keenly priced reissues of the album.The first CD reissue appeared in 1987. Since then, the master tapes have never Read more ...
Sebastian Scotney
“Produced by Tommy LiPuma.” That phrase has appeared on just about every Diana Krall album since the summer of 1995, when the Cleveland-born mogul arrived at the GRP label – it would be his sixth and last music industry affiliation – and promptly signed the Canadian singer-pianist.The four words appear again in the credits for each of the twelve tracks of This Dream of You. They are the album’s anomaly. And also, sad to say, its problem.It is an anomaly because Lipuma, with 33 Grammy nominations and 5 Grammys to his name, and 75 million albums sold, passed away Read more ...
Sebastian Scotney
Seattle-born Allison Neale’s alto saxophone sound is instantly appealing. Her playing has the light wispy, airy quality from the "cool", "West Coast" school of Paul Desmond. One day last year, she spent just six hours (10am-5pm minus an hour for lunch, I gather) with three other top-flight jazz musicians at Angel Studios in Islington – shortly before it closed, in fact. The result, Quietly There (Ubuntu Music) is a completely delightful album.Neale’s totally assured sense of how to convey melodies finds the perfect complement in New York guitarist Peter Bernstein. And if there are echoes Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
The Turnamat is a type of washing machine made by AEG. In the composition titled “Turnamat”, Seventies-type synths, wobbly keyboard lines and hard-grooving drums give way to a brass-led interlude suggesting an acquaintance with the compositions of Lalo Schifrin. It’s as if a jazz-inflected soundtrack from 45 years ago has been shoved into a blender rather than a washing machine, then reconstituted and given a major buff-up. “Turnamat” is by Skarbø Skulekorps, an oddball Norwegian jazz outfit.“Surrender” is as impactful. On this, over just-short of five minutes, the sax player Bendik Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
The usual summer vinyl release slump doesn’t seem to apply this year. During the COVID-19 crisis, the demand for vinyl has risen rather than fallen and theartsdesk on Vinyl reflects that again this month with another monster round-up of reviews, covering everything from extreme metal to country’n’western to contemporary jazz.VINYL OF THE MONTHVarious Come Stay With Me (Come Play With Me)August 2020’s Vinyl of the Month is an Arts Council-backed compilation on bright red vinyl from Leeds label Come Play With Me. It’s designed to help support the contributing artists from the area as they deal Read more ...
Sebastian Scotney
Norwegian singer Solveig Slettahjell has a feeling for slow. Her 2001 debut album was called Slow Motion Orchestra, and in the years since then she has turned her very fine sense of how to convey the essence and the meaning of songs at a very measured pace into her calling card.She has explained what draws her to slowness: “When I slow down the tempo, I can hear the sound in the words, there are so many little details when you play and sing slowly. These little details fascinate me.”In the early days when she was taking on the mantle of Norwegian jazz singers such as her teacher Sidsel Read more ...
joe.muggs
Music awards shows are a strange beast: part window display, part industry conference and part party. Especially if you don’t have Brit Awards or Mercury Prize budget to create a whizz-bang spectacle, the ceremonies can be an interminable pileup of attempts to earnestly celebrate both musicians and behind-the-scenes figures, in front of a room full of increasingly drunk and impatient people.The pandemic, though, requires something different. With the announcements and performances on a live video stream, and extra interviews and video clips on an app, the Association of Independent Music had Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
Whether explicitly or indirectly, what’s written on a master tape box can tantalise. Revealing part of a picture creates a desire to want to know more. Take the example seen above. It’s for an album by South African alto saxist Dudu Pukwana. The annotation gives a date of July 1968 and the client is Witchseason, the company run by manager/producer Joe Boyd. The recording took place at Sound Techniques, the independent Chelsea studio favoured by Boyd for his other clients. He’d worked there with Pink Floyd in 1967. Around the time of this session, Boyd had brought Fairport Convention and The Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
“These are African rhythms, passed down to us from the ancient spirits. Feel the spirits, a unifying force. Come on, move with the spirits. Stand up. Clap your hands. Groove with the rhythms. Get down. Get off.”So begins “African Rhythms”, originally released in 1975 as the opening cut from an album of the same name by Oneness Of Juju. It was issued on Black Fire, their own label.As a thematic mission statement, “African Rhythms” lays it out. As a musical mission statement, “African Rhythms” was equally explicit. With its clamorous percussion bedding, the track is driving, funky, jazzy and Read more ...