By John Stevenson Like a Brazilian soccer superstar, UK hip-hop sensation, Nate, goes by just a single moniker. His music and urgent poetic flow sweeps up a whole host of influences in the rhythmic undertow. Jazz, reggae, rock, South African music, and drum’n’bass, are among the myriad genres showcased in …
Liner notes for STRIKE UP THE BAND CDby Tom ChesekDeep in the heart of New Jersey, just 30 miles from Times Square and a shell’s throw from the Atlantic Ocean, there’s a happening little town called Red Bank. A destination town; where folks flock to the many shops, restaurants, bars, …
Glenn Astarita Similar to the touring be-bop all-stars of yesteryear, the post-modern sensibilities of today’s improvising musicians often derail semblances of the tried and true. This drummer-less quartet featuring prominent improvisers, generate progressive jazz-based undertones and semi-controlled interactions, largely entrenched within avant-garde type persuasions. Here, the band is captured at …
By: Edward Blanco Internationally-recognized recording artist Harry Allen is an award-winning tenor saxophonist with over thirty albums to his credit. Rhythm On The River is his third recording on the Dutch Challenge Records label, and as per Challenge executive Chris Ellis’s opinion, “we think it’s his best yet and that …
By: Edward Blanco One of the top-tier saxophonists of our time, Bob Sheppard is not just one of the finest musicians in Los Angeles; he is a jazz luminary with an international reputation. Close Your Eyes not only brings to the fore Sheppard’s talents as a composer and arranger, but …
Glenn Astarita With her impressive 2011 debut as a leader “Devil’s Dress” (TOAP Music) and involvement in various European projects, highly-educated trumpeter Susana Santos Silva looms as a nascent voice within progressive-jazz circles. Here, the Portuguese artist works within the trio format. It’s a democratic engagement modeled on structure and …
by LARRY RENI THOMAS Jazz is a term that was given to American classical music around 1900, by the New Orleans aristocrats who after visiting the whorehouses and hearing the black musicians play the sounds of freedom, sought to deny it its dignity when they realized that they couldn’t play …
Kansas City musicians riff on proposed label for a favorite genre. Special to The Star By BILL BROWNLEE Not a single note was played in the creation of the most consequential jazz-related story of last year. A furious torrent of incendiary blog posts and tweets by musician Nicholas Payton is …
“No music is my music. It’s everybody’s who can feel it. You’re here… well, if there’s music, you feel it–then it’s yours too. You got to be in the sun to feel the sun. It’s that way with music too.” “Jazz isn’t just me. It isn’t just any one person …
Henceforth, please refer to the genre as “Black American Music.” By Victor Fiorillo Last Thursday, while I rocked out in Greenwich Village to the white-people music known as Van Halen, Philadelphia-based pianist Orrin Evans–recipient of the $60,000 Pew Fellowship for the Arts–was a quick ride up the A-C-E in Hell’s …
