In his article on the collaboration of Jim Hall and Bill Frisell in the April issue of Jazz Times, Evan Haga refers to the “Big Three” of current jazz guitarists: Frisell, John Scofield and John McLaughlin. Much as I dig them (and Hall), that designation is a rather typical journalistic foreshortening of a field, relegating to […]
Archives for April 2009
McLaughlin-Corea Five Peace Band and a fan’s disappointment
The Five Peace Band — guitarist John McLaughlin, keyboardist Chick Corea, alto saxist Kenny Garrett, bassist Christian McBride and drummer Brian Blade — opened the last leg of a multi-month tour with a three-night stand at Jazz at Lincoln Center last night. The players’ musicianship can’t be faulted, their energy was high and they looked […]
Manhattan jazz residencies (my new City Arts column)
The Vanguard Jazz Orchestra at the Village Vanguard on Monday night since 1967  The Mingus Big Band, Orchestra and Dynasty ensemble in regular rotation on Mondays at the Jazz Standard Guitarist Les Paul, at age 94 a genuine hipster, the Ben Franklin of American popular music, Monday nights at Iridium forever. These are a few of […]
Vision Festival, NYC’s sole surviving summer jazz big bang
With no news confirming — or denying — that there will be a mainstream New York City jazz festival next summer like those produced by George Wein since the late ’60s and for the past 25 years supported by the JVC Corporation of America, the artist-organized “avant-jazz” Vision Festival stands as the largest and longest concentrated […]
Guggenheim’s seven jazz-related winners
The John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation last week announced recipients in the U.S. and Canada of 180 fellowships from nearly 3000 applicants. Fellows in this 85th year of the program include seven who are jazz-related: composer-pianists Billy Childs (winner of two Grammies in 2006), Ryan Cohan (Chicago-based, in trumpeter Orbert Davis’s ensembles) and Chuck Owen (prof of jazz studies at University of […]
Al di Meola and the Fusion Wars pt 1
Guitarist Al di Meola, recently of Return to Forever’s reunion tour, takes me to task for not knowing his most recent recordings — during WNYC’s “Soundcheck Smackdown,” which pitted me “against” Will Layman (of PopMatters.com) regarding jazz fusion’s legacy, moderated by John Schaefer. Di Meola let it be known that he agrees that some of Return […]
Lose some, gain some
ASCAP’s longstanding Deems Taylor Awards recognizing excellence in music journalism has been suspended; no-charge online listening station Accujazz.com wants to be “the future of jazz radio.” Seismic shifts in the music media landscape continue.
Modern “classical” composition informing Jazz Beyond Jazz
Commenting after my Cecil Taylor postings, correspondent “Jake” reports  Alex Ross “publicly champions Cecil Taylor . ..  lists the rather obscure FMP big band record “Alms/Tiergarten (Spree)” as among his favorite pop/jazz recordings and wrote an appreciation of the maestro (paired with Sonic Youth) in The New Yorker way back in ’98 . I […]
Cecil Taylor’s most recent recording, free mp3
Pianist Cecil Taylor, live at the Village Vanguard from July 2008 with drummer Tony Oxley, was recorded for a 2-lp vinyl album titled Ailanthus/Alitssima, and one cut of it is being offered as an MP3 for a limited time, free, by the website Destination-out.com. Word is only 475 copies of the lp will be sold — […]