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AAJ CD reviews |
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All About Jazz CD Reviews
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Christine Tobin: Secret Life of a Girl
Three years--and a lifetime--in gestation, Secret Life of a Girl is an album London-based singer/songwriter Christine Tobin spoke about when she gave an interview to AAJ in autumn 2005. At the time, Tobin was touring in support of Romance and Revolution (Babel, 2004), the sixth own-name disc she'd recorded since 1995 and, like its predecessors, a soulful and intelligently programmed mixture of originals and covers...
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Alison Ruble: This is a Bird
It's amazing that out of the clutter of an industrial urban center like Chicago, a voice as serene and unruffled as Alison Ruble's can exist. For her debut recording, the opulent vocalist teams up with guitarist extraordinaire/producer John McLean for an intriguing journey through a collection of timeless American classics...
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Esperanza Spalding: Esperanza
For the purist who wants to know what all the excitement is about Esperanza Spalding, they can skip directly to track 11--"If That's True"--of her sophomore album Esperanza, where she works out on the acoustic bass in an all-out jam with Donald Harrison on alto saxophone and Ambrose Akinmusire on trumpet. It flat-out smokes, and showcases the Berklee-trained bassist as potentially one of the more promising young talents in jazz...
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An Upper West Side Story: Tobias Gebb and Trio West
After an acclaimed and successful outing with their debut CD Trio West Plays Holiday Songs (Yummy House Records, 2006), Trio West is back with An Upper Westside Story, a recording that should bring them up front and center once again. Tobias Gebb (drummer, composer, arranger) has a knack for stimulating the progression of through-composed pieces with his arrangements. The trio as a collective gives a tune subtle shapes and dimensions that are shaped by a whim. The transition can be affecting and not without delight...
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Torben Waldorff: Afterburn
Danish guitarist Torben Waldorff follows up his Artist Share debut, Brilliance: Live at the 55 Bar (2006) with Afterburn, a studio session featuring the same core group of New Yorkers featured on his previous release. Based in Denmark and Sweden, but educated in the States, Waldorff is a shining example of today's vibrant international jazz scene...
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Samuel Blaser Quartet: 7th Heaven
New York-based, Swiss-born trombonist Samuel Blaser has appeared on over 30 recordings as a sideman and former member of numerous European big bands (including the Vienna Art Orchestra). 7th Heaven is his impressive debut as a leader. Accompanied by sympathetic peers, his quartet interprets these elaborate, lyrical compositions with knowing restraint and simmering volatility...
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Sophie Milman: Make Someone Happy
Not that it ever totally went away, but the torch singer is making something of a comeback after years of neglect. Call it the Norah Jones Effect, but for some reason people are once embracing vocalists who can actually sing a song instead of emote and hit notes that make dogs start howling.
Sophie Milman's too cool to hit glass-breaking notes. She's more of a whisperer than a screamer which works just fine when she's crooning seductively ("Something In the Air Between Us"), in a cool groove ("So Long, You Fool") or just paying homage to the greats ("Fever")...
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Shot x Shot: Let Nature Square
The band Shot x Shot excels in the art of group improvisation. A term tossed about too often without consideration for the words, 'group' and 'improvisation.'
This, their second recording, follows the self titled 2006 live date from St. Mary's church at the University of Pennsylvania. It had a ghostlike sound, a sort of archeological remnant, with echoey vibrations bouncing throughout the church. The quartet, formed at Philadelphia's University of The Arts, is comprised of saxophonist Dan Scofield and bassist Engle (members of Sonic Liberation Front, an African percussion-infused jazz group), saxophonist Bryan Rogers (Bobby Zankel's Large Ensemble), and drummer Dan Capecchi (Jeff Baumeister Quartet)...
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Nicole Mitchell's Black Earth Ensemble: Xenogenesis Suite: A Tribute to Octavia Butler
Expectations must have been confounded in the premiere of flutist Nicole Mitchell's Xenogenesis Suite at the 2007 Vision Festival. Presented here in a crisply recorded version from the Firehouse 12 studio the previous day, the suite is a far cry from her previous Festival appearance with a freewheeling trio in 2005, and very different again from her recent well-received Black Unstoppable (Delmark, 2007) release. The focus this time out is on Mitchell the composer, whose intentions are manifest through some intense group readings of her charts. The nearest reference point is the ensemble works of fellow AACM spirit Muhal Richard Abrams, not so much in terms of style, but more definitely in terms of scope...
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Clusone Trio: Love Henry
Introduced on the first track as "der Free Jazz Veteran," Han Bennink lives up to his reputation on this live German festival concert recording. The Clusone Trio of drummer Bennink, wind player Michael Moore and cellist Ernst Reijseger constantly feed off of each other's energy and contribute to form a unique group sound that explores the humorous, the aggressive and the beautiful...
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Wu Fei: A Distant Youth
Wu Fei is a master player of the guzheng, a Chinese string instrument that is more than two thousand years old, and known today mostly as the parent instrument of the Japanese koto. Fei began her musical studies at the age of six in Beijing, later studied composition in Mills College in California, and now splits her time between Beijing and New York. She has collaborated with composers and improvisers such as Alvin Curran, Joelle Leandre, Elliot Sharp, Meredith Monk, Pauline Oliveros, Ikue Mori, Cecil Taylor and Fred Frith, who featured her in his recordings Eye to Ear II (Tzadik, 2004) and The Happy End Problem (ReR, 2007)...
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Peter Lerner: Cry For Peace
Sometimes an artist must leave his comfort zone to discover his true creative potential. Chicago guitarist Peter Lerner left his Windy City home and ventured east to record "Cry For Peace," a delightful session recorded at the legendary Van Gelder Recording Studio in New Jersey. Producer Don Sickler recruited a supporting cast of A-list New York sidemen, including trumpeter Jim Rotondi, tenor saxophonist Eric Alexander, trombonist Steve Davis and pianist/organist David Hazeltine, all members of the band One For All...
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 Saturday, 17 May 2008
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