jazz
Sinne Eeg / Cathrine Legardh, Pizza Express Jazz ClubSunday, 18 September 2016![]() It’s fair to say that vocal jazz ranks modestly in British awareness of Danish culture, certainly below the instrumental music and the phenomenon of the moment, the cable-knit-sporting detective Sarah Lund. Which is a shame, because this second... Read more... |
CD: Madeleine Peyroux - Secular HymnsWednesday, 14 September 2016Madeleine Peyroux made her name channeling Billie Holiday. White stars have never ceased to model themselves on African-American genius – Mick Jagger on Don Covay, Rod Stewart on Sam Cooke and Joe Cocker on Ray Charles. The resemblance is often... Read more... |
10 Questions for Pianist Morten SchantzThursday, 08 September 2016![]() Pianist Morten Schantz has been a prominent and pioneering figure on first the Danish, then international jazz and fusion scene for more than a decade. With saxophonist Marius Neset and drummer Anton Eger, also members of his new trio, he founded... Read more... |
Prom 49: Quincy Jones Prom, Royal Albert HallTuesday, 23 August 2016As I waited outside the entrance to the Royal Albert Hall, someone leaned over to me and said: “My cocaine is to your left.” I glanced in that direction and realised they’d actually said “Michael Caine is to your left”, and indeed he was, on his way... Read more... |
10 Questions for Actor Don CheadleWednesday, 10 August 2016![]() Cinema has waited a long time for a film about Miles Davis. It hasn’t been for want of trying by Don Cheadle, who stars in, directs, produces and takes a co-writing credit on Miles Ahead. Despite the support of Davis’s son, daughter, nephew and... Read more... |
The Girl from Ipanema: Brazil, Bossa Nova and the Beach, BBC FourTuesday, 02 August 2016![]() Some years ago broadcaster Andy Kershaw introduced on BBC World Service radio a piece of Brazilian music with this blunt dismissal: “When I hear a track by, say, Gilberto Gil, I tell myself: ‘Right, time to take the lift and go to bed’.” It wasn’t a... Read more... |
The Impossible Gentlemen, Pizza Express Jazz ClubMonday, 01 August 2016![]() "Jazz,” said Keith Jarrett once, “is there and gone. It happens. You have to be present for it. That simple." For an audience, it produces a never-to-be repeated event: yes, you were there, and you didn’t miss it. One of the pleasures of seeing a... Read more... |
theartsdesk at the Montreal Jazz FestivalSaturday, 30 July 2016![]() The Montréal International Jazz Festival's 37th edition presented its accustomed surfeit of gigs, covering the complete range from concert hall spectaculars to small club sessions. A large part of this, the globe's biggest jazzfest, is the massive-... Read more... |
10 Questions for Musician Jasper HøibyWednesday, 27 July 2016![]() Copenhagen-born bassist Jasper Høiby moved to London in 2000 to attend the Royal Academy of Music. In 2005 he created the trio Phronesis which has toured extensively in Europe and North America and won awards for Jazz Album of the Year in Jazzwise... Read more... |
CD: John Martin - The Hidden NotesSunday, 17 July 2016![]() Few new releases come with quite such a specific technical claim as this double release from British saxophonist John Martin. His album title refers to his incorporation of multiphonics, an established technique in free improvisation, within his 11... Read more... |
CD: Hedvig Mollestad Trio - Black Stabat MaterWednesday, 13 July 2016![]() Thirty-three minutes is not long for an album. What actually counts is not length but what is said and its impact. Norway’s Hedvig Mollestad Trio know what they are doing and over Black Stabat Mater’s 33 minutes they do it with such clarity, force... Read more... |
CD: Elliot Galvin Trio - PunchMonday, 11 July 2016![]() Ludic, ironic, kaleidoscopic, highly stylised, this follow-up to the Elliot Galvin Trio’s acclaimed 2014 debut, Dreamland, packs an exhilarating feast for the ears into its shortish 38-minute time frame. Like that greatest of musical magpies, Igor... Read more... |
