Evanston Il's cross-genre club Space showcased drummer Billy Martin's lively, upbeat Wicked Knee brass band last night, and the neighborhood tavern Beat Kitchen hosted its weekly exploratory jam by Extraordinary Popular Delusions the night before. I've barely scratched the surface but clearly Chicago's got a broad range of performance venues fun to poke into, considering the bookings. Billy Martin, the man at the tubs for jam band jazzers Medeski, Martin and Wood, is a generous player, just trying to give everyone (band and himself … [Read more...]

I'm aghast at The New Yorker's rip-off of Sonny Rollins' good name and great heart to slag jazz in the guise of "humor." A Daily Shouts piece, bylined "Django Gold" (surely a pseudonym) purports to be "Sonny Rollins: In His Own Words" and controverts the very essence of the art form this grand hero has embodied for more than half a century -- without raising a chuckle (at least from me). See for yourself -- then write the editor a letter saying "This ain't funny." Not that jazz is sacrosanct, but this ain't funny. Ok, call me sensitive. I … [Read more...]

Saxophonists Mars Williams and Ken Vandermark played like wild beasts before a tight and determinedly transgressive troupe recalling little-known but regionally influential multi-instrumentalist/bandleader Hal Russell (1926-1992) last night in Millenium Park's swanky Pritzker Pavillion (the one designed by Frank Gehry) as part of the city's free Made In Chicago: World Class Jazz series. With bassist Kent Kessler, percussionist Steve Hunt and guitarist-bassist-trumpeter Brian Sandstrom -- like Williams, stalwarts of Russell's 1979-'92 NRG … [Read more...]

While Hypnotic Brass Ensemble, comprising eight sons of jazz-beyond-jazz seer Kelan Phil Cohran, was tearing it up in the midst of its Bad Boys of Jazz tour at the Enclave de Agua African American Music Festival in Soria, Spain, the patriarch himself held forth nearer home at the Garfield Conservatory, on the first of four free Neighborhood Nights concerts presented this month by the Jazz Institute of Chicago. The elder Cohran, an early member of Sun Ra's Arkestra and original co-founder  (though soon ex-member) of the 49-year-old … [Read more...]

Charlie Haden, who died July 11 at age 76, was the man who anchored the free flights of many musicians to the foundations of music: rhythm and harmony. This photo by Enid Farber shows how I felt about being around him, Dewey Redman and Edward Blackwell (not pictured; the saxophonist is Branford Marsalis, but the occasion was a Blackwell tribute concert).   Haden was a man who made connections. Ornette Coleman, who Charlie called his guru, was able to extend blues and jazz beyond limits of convention to flights of melodic … [Read more...]

Jazz above and beyond established conventions of jazz in and around NYC last month was super abundant -- and I'm going to miss a lot about this scene when I move base of operations to Chicago in mid-July. In the past 30 days I heard:  The Eric Dolphy Freedom of Sound 2-day conference/concerts at Montclair State University, NJ May 30 and 31, the JJA's NYC Jazz Awards party at the Blue Note (with music by Stephanie Richards Trumpet Quartet, beautiful Sheila Jordan singing with great bassist Cameron Brown and for a finale pianist Elio … [Read more...]

The National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Masters of 2015, announced today, are musicians Carla Bley, George Coleman and Charles Lloyd -- all personal favorites who provoked my earliest interests in jazz going beyond "jazz." So here are listening recommendations -- and my special shout out to Jazz Master Joe Segal of Chicago's Jazz Showcase  (receiving the A.B. Spellman Award for Jazz Advocacy) who let teenage me in free to hear real jazz to begin with: Coleman Hawkins, Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis, Jimmy Forrest, Sun Ra, Rahsaan, Mingus, great … [Read more...]

Saxophonist and pianist Charles Gayle has one of the largest, most urgent and original saxophone sounds to be heard since the 1990s. That was 20 years after he moved from Buffalo to NYC and started playing on the streets, then was "discovered," promoted and booked by Michael Dorf, operator of the original Knitting Factory. Today (June 11) Gayle is receiving Lifetime Achievement honors and performing with three ensembles at the 19th Vision Festival. I interviewed and profiled Charles for The Wire in March, 1994 -- and read part 2, as originally … [Read more...]

If saxophonists Eric Dolphy and Albert Ayler, icons of bust-loose and beautiful improvisation, were alive today . . .they'd be pleased by and maybe attending the festival and concert in their honor this week in Montclair, NJ and Brooklyn. Dolphy died of undiagnosed diabetes in 1964, and Ayler either jumped or was pushed into the East River in 1970, however their music is imbued with immortal spirit. Eric Dolphy: The Freedom of Sound Festival is an extraordinary convening of musical survivors and admirers of the flutist/bass clarinetist/alto … [Read more...]

Ornette Coleman, genius musician and major inspiration to this blog and blogger, turned 84 on March 9. His son Denardo threw a family 'n' friends party in celebration, which I was privileged to attend. Denardo graciously allowed me to bring Hungarian photographer Sánta István Csaba, who created this portrait of one of the creative heroes of the 20th and 21st century (and all other photos on this page, but Sound Evidence's image of Ben Schacter and Jamaaladeen Tacuma). Ornette Coleman has exemplified the big, natural, fundamental idea of … [Read more...]

Leading up to and so far during Jazz Appreciation Month, I've heard some stunning, challenging and engaging if not always 100%, brilliantly revelatory music that goes beyond the strictest (old) definitions of jazz. I'm just getting to post about certain performances (here's a preview: -- having been busy with grassroots organizations and activists in 22 cities publicly celebrating local Jazz Heroes, part of the Jazz Journalists Association's JazzApril efforts to raise media profile of jazz (broadly defined) throughout especially the USA, … [Read more...]

Trombonist Ray Anderson and composer/conductor Sarah Weaver at Roulette last Sunday hit a collaborative sweet spot. Their unusually mixed, all-star ensemble at Brooklyn's creative music concert hall wove highly individualized solos into a continuous 50-minute set based on loose, humorous writing and spontaneous textural swells.  Photographer Sánta István Csaba took photos while I just listened -- also to the opening piece performed by Slide Ride, the four-man trombone unit in which Anderson takes part. Soprano saxophonist Jane Ira Bloom, … [Read more...]