Indholdsfortegnelse for September 2016 i JazzTimes

As Nate Chinen points out in his finely crafted profile of the 13-year-old pianist Joey Alexander, prodigies are nothing new in jazz. Many of our greatest jazz musicians were fiercely precocious, already performing like dutiful pros while still in the midst of adolescence or even childhood. Of course, prodigal gifts are an old fact of Western music, period. One revelation I recall from my early reading on classical music was how absurdly young the iconic composers were when they debuted. Beethoven, Liszt, Chopin, Haydn, Mendelssohn—all were shaping legacies well before adulthood; Mozart famously began touring at age 6. Wherever an immensely talented child turns up in the public sphere, a host of complicated ideas follow, despite what the realities might be—for instance, the dangers of stage parenting, or whether or…

The National Endowment for the Arts has announced the 2017 NEA Jazz Masters Fellows, recipients of the nation’s highest honor in jazz. The five awardees—vocalist and broadcaster Dee Dee Bridgewater; author, editor, producer and educator Ira Gitler (winner of the A.B. Spellman NEA Jazz Masters Award for Jazz Advocacy); bassist, cellist, composer and bandleader Dave Holland; keyboardist, composer and arranger Dick Hyman; and organist-composer Dr. Lonnie Smith—are being recognized for their exceptional contributions to the advancement of jazz. Each will receive $25,000 and be honored at a tribute concert on April 3 at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. Chamber Music America has appointed pianist-composer Billy Childs as president of its board of directors. Childs—the first jazz musician to be elected to this influential position—is a multiple Grammy Award winner.…

MILT JACKSON “Bags” was the first whose vibes playing really spoke to Wolf. The Modern Jazz Quartet’s The Last Concert was one of his father’s favorites, and the younger Wolf also loved Jackson’s 1969 version of “Frankie and Johnny” with Monty Alexander and Ray Brown. “The way they were swinging so hard on that record, I was like, ‘I gotta get some of that,’” Wolf says. GARY BURTON People often assume that Burton was one of Wolf’s teachers at Berklee; in fact, he was the school’s vice president when Wolf was a student there. But Burton had already stupefied him through a recording with the GRP All-Star Big Band. “Gary was playing through these changes so much,” he says. “Fantastic musician.” Wolf paid tribute on his first album with a…

Shortly after I moved to Chicago in 1994, I began regularly attending shows at a small coffeehouse/ performance space called the Lunar Cabaret. Most of the leading voices on the local avant-jazz and improvised music scene—Ken Vandermark, Mars Williams, Hamid Drake, Michael Zerang, Jim Baker, Weasel Walter—cycled through the space in a variety of contexts. One week might offer organized bands like the Vandermark Quartet or Caffeine, the next a free-for-all with a cramped stage of improvisors playing toy instruments. It was an ideal immersion for a notyet-21-year-old who had just begun exploring the music and had no opportunity to see it live in his native Wilmington, Del. Ultimately it was a foundational experience, a Rosetta stone for a notoriously daunting art form that turned me into a lifelong listener.…

When Louis Armstrong died, in the summer of 1971, one of his most pointed and perceptive tributes appeared in what might now seem an unlikely place: the pages of Rolling Stone. Plainly titled “God Bless Louis Armstrong” this piece was the work of veteran Bay Area jazz critic Ralph J. Gleason, who had recently cofounded the magazine with Jann Wenner. Part personal reminiscence, part critical appraisal, it opens with a startling analogy—to The Fire Next Time, James Bald-wins searing book about racial alienation and oppression in America. The point is implicit but potently clear: Armstrong, the grinning entertainer known around the world for his folksy insouciance, was nobody’s fool, and never had been. Gleason goes on to litigate this argument with graceful clarity, weaving together biographical detail and many of…

Jazz produced many multi-instrumentalists before Rahsaan Roland Kirk, and has produced many more since his death in 1977. But none embodied the idea of multi-instrumentalism as definitively as Kirk. His typical stage rig saw him festooned with a brace of whistles, rattles and flutes, and he played three saxophones simultaneously, harmonizing with himself on tenor and two lesser-known members of the woodwind family, a manzello and a stritch. Over the years, the polyglot nature of Kirk’s instrumentation has led some to dismiss him as a novelty act. The mission of The Case of the Three Sided Dream, Adam Kahan’s award-winning feature documentary, is to solidify Kirk’s position as an artist to rank alongside John Coltrane, Eric Dolphy and other barrier-shattering contemporaries. So consumed is the film by this musical canonization…

Fred Hersch is one of those rare pianists who can complement almost any musical situation while asserting a strong personal aesthetic. He has absorbed the influence of (and no doubt influenced) a storied list of collaborators—Joe Henderson, Art Farmer and Bill Frisell among them, in addition to vocalists Dominique Eade, Norma Winstone and Nancy King. As an educator, Hersch has inspired and mentored several generations of pianists; Ethan Iverson, Brad Mehldau, Dan Tepfer and Sullivan Fortner are all former students. Now 60, Hersch seems busier and more celebrated than ever. The eight-time Grammy nominee recently won a 2016 Doris Duke Artist Award and was selected as the 2016 Pianist of the Year by the Jazz Journalists Association. Having released dozens of albums as a leader, Hersch’s new disc, Sunday Night…

George Colemans discography is a de facto compendium on jazz history from hard bop to the present. Looking it over, its easy to see why the National Endowment for the Arts named the tenor sax icon an NEA Jazz Master in 2015. Along with his extraordinary work on highly influential albums by Miles Davis and Herbie Hancock, Coleman has appeared on dozens of sessions that, while not as famous, were truly significant in the creative evolution of modern jazz. His own recordings, and participation in bands such as Cedar Walton’s Eastern Rebellion, have left a lasting imprint on the music as well. Coleman began his journey in Memphis, Tenn., in 1935. He took up alto and was already gigging as a teenager with B.B. King in the early ’50s. He…

WHEN JT PUBLISHER LEE MERGNER SPOKE TO AL JARREAU IN JUNE, what was originally intended to be a conversation about the vocal-jazz hero joining the 2017 Jazz Cruise snowballed into an inspired, freewheeling dialogue. In this interview, edited for space, the 76-year-old discusses his return to the duo format, his upcoming Ellington big-band project, what icons like Ali and Obama mean to the American spirit and why he “ain’t scared of Trump at all.” LEE MERGNER: I WANTED TO TALK ABOUT YOU DOING THE JAZZ CRUISE FOR THE FIRST TIME. ONE OF THE UNIQUE ASPECTS IS THE HANG WITH YOUR FELLOW MUSICIANS. AL JARREAU: Yes, yes. And to rub some shoulders with the important people that you do it for. You could do your music in the basement or you…

Paiste 2002 Black Big Beat Cymbals Yes, drummers, your fragile vintage Ks are absolute perfection when it comes to old-school spang-a-lang, but what about the higher-volume, higher-energy settings that define the genre-blending state of jazz today? This new line of cymbals from Paiste offers welcome updates to the brand’s 2002 line—since ’71 a staple for drummers playing rock, R&B, country and other styles—including a fresh hammering design and semi-matted finish. Cymbals available in 18, 19, 20, 21, 22 and 24-inch singles, and 15 and 16-inch pairs. $436-$465 online. paiste.com Kurzweil Forte 7 Keyboard Typically with midsized keyboards, you’re going to sacrifice some features and functionality for the added portability. But Kurzweil’s 76-note Forte 7 is essentially a stage piano worthy of a permanent spot in your home studio. Among the…

Keyboardist Bernie Worrell, whose composing and synthesizer playing as the music director of Parliament-Funkadelic made him a key figure in the development of funk and hip-hop, died June 24 at his home in Everson, Wash. Worrell was diagnosed with lung cancer early this year. He was 72. Worrell also worked fruitfully in the jazz, avant-garde and jam-band scenes, and his discography includes extensive work with Bill Laswell as well as recordings with Pharoah Sanders, James “Blood” Ulmer, Jonas Hellborg and many others. Randy Jones, a drummer best known for his three-decades-plus tenure in the Dave Brubeck Quartet, died June 13 at a New York City hospital. The cause was heart failure. He was 72. Jones’ other notable credits included Gerry Mulligan, Maynard Ferguson, Chet Baker and Bill Watrous. Sir Charles…

On the first Tuesday of May, guitarist Dave Stryker performed, as he does every month or so, in the cozy confines of the Bar Next Door, a lounge/café located in the basement of a 19th-century row house on MacDougal Street. Stryker has a long history in that neck of Greenwich Village. Two doors north, at the corner of West 3rd Street, are the former premises of Visiones, an important but long-defunct club where, 28 years ago, Stryker first coled a band with saxophonist Steve Slagle; that partnership has since thrived through six recordings by the Stryker/Slagle Band, most recently Routes, on the guitarist’s Strikezone imprint. A right turn and short walk along 3rd Street would bring you to the Blue Note, where Stryker gigged with Stanley Turrentine in September of…

It’s an early Friday evening in May in Washington, D.C., and Warren Wolf is already on a tear. He and his quartet, the Wolf-pack, first work out “On Green Dolphin Street.” Wolf rains light-speed melody all over his vibraphone, tinting it with short Monk-like phrases, and swings the hell out of it in the process. He’s a strapping, muscular man—a gym addict—and he stands over the vibes in the same squared-off stance that Milt Jackson did. It makes him look like he’s preparing to wrestle an alligator. Next comes a Wolf composition, “The Struggle ” which, though not included on his new Mack Avenue album, Convergence, will be included on the album to follow it. It’s rich and beautiful, and his solo demonstrates a careful architecture that flows naturally within…

My bet is that in a few years we’ll be listening to most of our music [via voice command], and wondering how we ever had the patience to punch all those buttons. What jazz fan hasn’t thought, “I’d love to hear Sonny Rollins right now” but was too wrapped up in work or chores to spend time flipping through records and CDs, browsing iTunes or a streaming service, and turning on the stereo? Wouldn’t it be great to simply summon Sonny right out of midair with little to no effort? I can—and I can conjure up pretty much any other jazz artist I want, too. When I woke up this morning, I wanted to hear some jazz but didn’t have anything particular in mind, so I tapped a button on…

KENNY GARRETT DO YOUR DANCE! (Mack Avenue) trumpeter Marcus Belgrave, who died last year, Kenny Garrett’s Do Your Dance! is an alluring celebration of the many ways music can make you move. These nine tracks, all Garrett originals, are deeply grounded in groove, and the different styles the album engages with allow the alto saxophonist to unfurl his full compositional range and instrumental dexterity. Do Your Dance! kicks into high gear right from the jump with opening track “Philly” where pianist Vernell Brown Jr.’s lushly romantic chords give way to Garrett stabbing out fast-break phrases over densely packed explosions from drummer Ronald Bruner Jr. Intense numbers, like the deep-in-the-pocket “Backyard Groove” and the light-footed, lightning-speed “Chasing the Wind” find Garrett pushing his horn to its raw-throated sonic limits while providing…

When you’re an improvising cellist, there isn’t so much history to contemplate. Unlike saxophone players or guitar players, who have a long line of titans to measure themselves against, we jazz cellists are more or less on our own. We do, however, have Oscar Pettiford. He tuned the cello like a bass so he’d be instantly familiar with where the notes lay, and he never used the bow, so it’s fair to say he didn’t make use of the full spectrum of sounds available to a cellist. But he was passionate about the instrument, using it often in crucial sessions under his name. If it’s an Oscar Pettiford recording, the cello is often there, in a central role. The New Oscar Pettiford Sextet “THE PENDULUM AT FALCON’S LAIR” The New…