Ron Miles: Quiver (enja yellow bird) Miles’s playing on “There Ain’t No Sweet Man Worth the Salt of My Tears” draws 21st century Denver and 1928 Chicago close. Some of his flurries of wildness on this album are as daring as the work of any modern trumpeter, but the Bix Beiderbecke lyricism in Miles’s soul extends into everything he plays. With just Bill Frisell’s guitar and Brian Blade's drums, Miles may seem to be operating lean. No, there is richness in their harmonic … [Read more...]

Heather Masse And Dick Hyman: Lock My Heart (Red House) With The Wailin’ Jennys and the Wayfaring Strangers and appearances on radio’s Prairie Home Companion, Heather Masse has attracted a following among folk and bluegrass fans. This album of duets with master pianist Dick Hyman discloses the jazz foundation that has long been evident in her singing. Their treatments of Strayhorn’s “A Flower is a Lovesome Thing” and Buddy Johnson’s “Since I Fell For You” are ballad … [Read more...]

Miles Davis Quintet Live In Europe 1969: The Bootleg Series Vol. 2 (Columbia/Legacy) This three-CD, one-DVD set finds the trumpeter fomenting even more dramatic change than usual. The first volume in the so-called bootleg series of Davis concert recordings found his primarily acoustic 1967 quintet already tending toward electronic music and rock. Saxophonist Wayne Shorter remains from that band. Here, the transition intensifies. Electric pianist Chick Corea, bassist Dave Holland and drummer … [Read more...]

Bill Frisell, The Disfarmer Project (La Huit) Belgian filmmaker Guillame Dero captures the eclectic guitarist Frisell, violinist Carrie Rodriguez, guitarist Greg Leisz and bassist Viktor Krauss in a live performance set to portraits by the 1950s Arkansas photographer Mike Disfarmer. Some of the music was on a 2009 CD mentioned in this Rifftides post. Hearing it in new versions with Disfarmer’s eccentric and vaguely disturbing photos looming over the band is an adventure. Watching … [Read more...]

Paul de Barros, Shall We Play That One Together? The Life and Art of Jazz Piano Legend Marian McPartland (St. Martin’s Press) The nonagenarian pianist presented de Barros with every biographer’s hope, unrestricted access to his subject’s personal papers and nearly unrestricted access to her private thoughts. He made the most of it, turning exhaustive research and hundreds of hours of interviews into a true story with the sweep of a novel. From the early discovery of McPartland’s … [Read more...]

Gerry Mulligan and the Concert Jazz Band, Santa Monica 1960 (Fresh Sound) Mulligan’s Concert Jazz Band had three fewer musicians than most big jazz outfits. Its size permitted precision, flexibility and subtlety, yet the band had the power of sprung steel. In this concert from a half century ago, the CJB is as fresh as yesterday. Arrangements by Mulligan, Bob Brookmeyer, Al Cohn and Johnny Mandel set standards to which big band writers still aspire. Bassist Buddy Clark and drummer Mel Lewis … [Read more...]

JD Allen Trio: The Matador And The Bull (Savant) The tenor saxophonist has changed record labels but not sidemen or his conciseness. While many of his contemporaries’ solos demand endurance by player and listener alike, Allen expresses himself in short bursts of creativity; the longest track here runs 4:45, including pauses that induce reflection. The CD and tune titles suggest the bullring. If such thematic dressing attracts an audience, so much the better, but the drama and passion of the … [Read more...]

Scott Robinson: Bronze Nemesis (Doc-Tone) Robinson unleashes his imagination and a substantial cross section of his instrumental arsenal to pay homage to the 20th century pulp fiction adventure hero Doc Savage. He uses the colossal contrabass sax to great effect, but his otherworldly theremin wins the weird-atmosphere sweepstakes. Novelty aside, the music is entertaining and high in quality. Pianist Ted Rosenthal, drummer Dennis Mackrel, bassists Pat O’Leary and— on one track—the late … [Read more...]

Woody Herman, Blue Flame: Portrait Of A Jazz Legend (Jazzed Media) Producer Graham Carter traces Herman’s career from a vaudeville childhood through leadership of a succession of big bands that made him a formative influence in jazz for more than 50 years. Photographs, film and early television trace development of the Herman herds. There are rare scenes of sidemen including Stan Getz, Serge Chaloff and Bill Harris in action, and complete sequences of performances by later editions of the … [Read more...]

Wadada Leo Smith: Ten Freedom Summers (Cuneiform) The trumpeter and composer’s four-disc work is a monument to Black Americans’ struggles for freedom. The names of the 19 movements summon up key episodes in the story, among them “Dred Scott,” “Thurgood Marshall and Brown vs. Board of Education” and “The Freedom Riders Ride.” With his free jazz quintet’s unfettered improvisation Smith blends skilled writing, including passages for a nine-piece ensemble of strings and winds. … [Read more...]

Ben Webster and Joe Zawinul: Soulmates (Riverside OJC) Long after Ben Webster became famous and when the pre-Weather Report Joe Zawinul was laboring as a sideman, the immigrant Austrian pianist and the seasoned tenor saxophonist became pals. In 1963 they made this album, a product of their friendship and a reminder of what a splendid mixing bowl for jazz New York was in those days. Philly Joe Jones is the drummer, Sam Jones and Richard Davis split the bass duties, Thad Jones plays cornet on … [Read more...]

Diana Krall: Glad Rag Doll (Verve) Krall takes a side trip into the 1920s and shows a bit of thigh on the album cover. Evidently, that’s all it takes to get the music business stirred up and the tweets and sales figures flying. How’s the music? Not bad. On some tracks, she has fun. On others—well, how much uplift could anyone get from “Here Lies Love?” The harmonies, if not the lyric, of “Let it Rain” inspire animation in her voice. Glad Rag Doll won’t replace Live In … [Read more...]

Johnny Griffin Live In France 1971 (Jazz Icons) One of the greatest second-generation bebop tenor players, Griffin (1928-2008), was also one of the fastest. He is often remembered for speed and excitement , but here his ballad playing is an equal attraction, notably on his “When We Were One” and “Soft and Furry.” In a concert performance with Dizzy Gillespie sitting in on two pieces, and filming in a studio, the man known as The Little Giant is in superb form. His colleagues are … [Read more...]

Ted Gioia: The Jazz Standards: A Guide To The Repertoire (Oxford) In nearly 500 pages, Gioia covers 254 songs that he considers the core of the jazz repertoire. They include compositions by jazz musicians as well as standard songs. Duke Ellington, of course, fits both categories. In a typical essay of perhaps 500 words, Gioia discusses a song’s and its writer’s history, its musical form and construction and, often, its social and cultural significance. He also recommends important … [Read more...]

Branford Marsalis, Four MFs Playin’ Tunes (Marsalis Music) The Marsalis quartet achieves openness without abandoning harmonic guidelines, hipness without complex chord permutations. A saxophone soloist who manages to meld aggressiveness and wryness, Marsalis is at his peak here. The delight that he, pianist Joey Calderazzo, bassist Eric Revis and young drummer Justin Faulkner find in supporting and surprising one another is likely to also affect the listener. The tunes are by members of the … [Read more...]

Ryan Truesdell, Centennial: Newly Discovered Works Of Gil Evans (artistShare) Truesdell apprenticed with arranger and composer Maria Schneider, who apprenticed with Gil Evans. That makes him, in effect, Evans’ musical and spiritual grandson. He does his heritage proud, taking 10 previously unrecorded Evans arrangements from manuscript—or, in some cases, expanding Evans sketches—to performance by a superb collection of musicians. The scores go back as far as Evans’ Claude … [Read more...]

Alan Broadbent Trio Live At Giannelli Square, Volume 2 (Chilly Bin) Recorded in Los Angeles shortly before Broadbent transplanted himself to New York, Giannelli 2 is the equal of Volume 1. That is high praise. The pianist’s harmonic acuity, melodic invention, touch and rapport with bassist Putter Smith and drummer Kendall Kay made this one of the finest trios in jazz. They find freshness in “Yesterdays,” “You Don’t Know What Love Is” and a romp based on “Just Friends.” … [Read more...]

John Coltrane, Live In France, 1965 (Jazz Icons) Television cameras captured Coltrane with his classic quartet months before it disbanded and he began the space-bound journey he was on when he died two years later. At the Juan-le Pins Jazz Festival in Antibes, Coltrane, pianist McCoy Tyner, bassist Jimmy Garrison and drummer Elvin Jones accomplished a concentration of passion even greater than that in their studio recordings of “Naima,” “Ascension,” “Impressions” and “A Love … [Read more...]

The Complete Stanley Dance Felsted “Mainstream Jazz” Recordings 1958-1959 (Fresh Sound) This nine-CD treasure chest contains dozens of the finest mainstream artists from a golden era. Stanley Dance, who applied the term mainstream to jazz, supervised the sessions for the British Felsted label. Johnny Hodges, Earl Hines, Coleman Hawkins, Rex Stewart, Buster Bailey, Jo Jones, Budd Johnson, Dicky Wells, Billy Strayhorn; they’re all here, along with superb half-forgotten musicians like … [Read more...]