#Joshua Redman Quartet

[nonesuchrecords]

Congratulations to all of the Nonesuch nominees for the 65th Grammy Awards: Molly Tuttle for Best New Artist and Best Bluegrass Album with Golden Highway; The Black Keys for Best Rock Album and Best Rock Performance; Dan Auerbach for Producer of the Year, Non-Classical; Cecile McLorin Salvant for Best Jazz Vocal Album and Best Arrangement, Instrumental and Vocals; Joshua Redman, Brad Mehldau, Christian McBride, and Brian Blade for Best Instrumental Album; Brad Mehldau for Best Contemporary Instrumental Album; Punch Brothers for Best Folk Album; Caroline Shaw & Attacca Quartet for Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance; Taj Mahal & Ry Cooder for Best Traditional Blues Album; Wilco for Best Historical Album and Best Album Notes; and the late Astor Piazzolla for Best Album Notes! Details here.

[jazzstandardspoll]

Descriptions & Propaganda

St. Thomas

Composed by Sonny Rollins

Notable versions: Sonny Rollins and Tommy Flanagan (x), Ron Carter and Jimmy Hall (x), Joshua Redman Quartet (x)

Propaganda: When I was in highschool this was the audition piece for saxophone players looking to join the jazz band. I remember sitting at the theory bar (a cozy little nook in the music room with fairy lights and posters of all Miles Davis, Ella Fitzgerald and etc.) listening to St. Thomas seep through from the practice rooms. Deeply beautiful and nostalgic piece.

Goodbye Pork Pie Hat

Composed by Charles Mingus

Notable versions: Charles Mingus (x), Jeff Beck (x), Joni Mitchell (x)

Propaganda: None submitted.

[projazznet]

Joshua R

Moodswing is a 1994 album by jazz saxophonist Joshua Redman.

Joshua Redman �� tenor saxophone, soprano saxophone Brad Mehldau – piano Christian McBride – bass Brian Blade – drums

edman Quartet – Moodswing

[yoyos-princess]

i got tagged by @misato-katsuragis-wife to make a poll of my 5 favorite albums! pick the one that matches my vibe best ^.^

[thechanelmuse]

My Top Albums/EPs of 2022

So I bet you thought I forgot to post my end-of-the-year music list 😏

Chile, I did 🙃. Better late than never tho, right? 

Enjoy!

JAZZ

The Baylor Project - The Evening: Live at APPARATUS

Billy Drummond & Freedom of Ideas - Valse Sinistre

Brandon Coleman - Interstellar Black Space

Cécile McLorin Salvant - Ghost Song

Charlie Gabriel - Eighty Nine

Jeremy Pelt - Soundtrack

Joshua Redman Quartet (Redman, Brad Mehldau, Christian McBride, Brian Blade) - LongGone

Makaya McCraven - In These Times

Marquis Hill - New Gospel Revisited

Ron Carter - Finding the Right Notes

Samara Joy - Linger Awhile

COUNTRY

Abbey Cone - Hate Me EP

Carrie Underwood - Denim & Rhinestones

Luke Combs - Growin Up

Madeline Edwards - Crashlanded + Madeline Edwards EP (two projects)

Maren Morris - Humble Quest

Mickey Guyton - I Am Woman EP

FOLK

Brandi Carlile - In These Silent Days (Deluxe Edition) - In the Canyon Haze

Kina Grannis - It's Hard to Be Human — (2021 album)

Valerie June - The Moon and the Stars: Prescriptions for Dreamers + Under Cover (two projects)

GOSPEL

DOE - Clarity

Kirk Franklin & Maverick City Music - Kingdom Come One (Deluxe)

Ricky Dillard - Breakthrough: The Exodus (Live)

Tasha Cobbs Leonard - Hymns (Live)

Tye Tribbett - All Things New

BLENDED GENRES

Gabriels - Angels & Queens – Part I

Janet Jackson - The Velvet Rope (Deluxe Edition) — 25th anniversary

Moonchild - Starfruit

PJ Morton - Watch the Sun (Deluxe)

Robert Glasper - Black Radio III (Supreme Edition)

SZA - SOS

Tank and the Bangas - Red Balloon

Various Artists - Stranger Things: Soundtrack from the Netflix Series, Season 4

YEBBA - Live at Electric Lady

SOUL/BLUES (ROCK*)

Jamison Ross - JAMO

Lady Wray - Piece of Me

Lee Fields - Sentimental Fool

Liv Warfield - Live at Cafe Wha? *

Lizz Wright - Holding Space: Live In Berlin

Miko Marks and The Resurrectors - Feel Like Going Home

Various Artists - Summer of Soul Original Motion Picture Soundtrack

R&B

Alex Isley & Jack Dine - Marigold

Ari Lennox - age/sex/location

Arin Ray - Hello Poison

Coco Jones - What I Didn't Tell You

Durand Bernarr - Wanderlust

India Shawn - BEFORE WE GO (DEEPER)

Kenyon Dixon - Closer

Lucky Daye - Candydrip

Mariah Carey - Butterfly: 25th Anniversary Expanded Edition

Mary J. Blige - Good Morning Gorgeous

Ravyn Lenae - HYPNOS

Sevyn Streeter - Drunken Wordz Sober Thoughtz

Siergio - BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE

POP/ALTERNATIVE (ROCK)

The 1975 - Being Funny In a Foreign Language

Aurora - The Gods We Can Touch

Avril Lavigne - Let Go (20th Anniversary Edition)

James Bay - Leap

LÉON - Circles

Lissie - Carving Canyons

Sigrid - High Note

RAP

Danger Mouse & Black Thought - Cheat Codes

Denzel Curry - Melt My Eyez See Your Future

Elzhi & Georgia Anne Muldrow - Zhigeist

JID - The Forever Story

Leikeli47 - Shape Up

Mozzy - Survivor's Guilt

Nas - King's Disease III

Saba - Few Good Things

Smino - Luv 4 Rent

EXPERIMENTAL

Niia - OFFAIR: Mouthful of Salt

Sault - Air + Aiir (2 projects)

HONORABLE MENTION

Beyoncé - RENAISSANCE

I know it’s coming... *hands on hips* “Honorable mention?!?”

I just can't listen to Renaissance straight through. I’ve tried and tried and tried. When it comes to my listening experience, I approach music sonically first, following the story and arrangement of the music instruments, and how the timbre of one's singing or rapping meets and interweaves between those elements. Give me an audio painting with a tapestry of enthralling colors and textures that I can feel. Then I'll invite in the lyrics.

It's like cinema. The average person most likely follows the eyes of the camera as it relates to the dialogue for the cinematic story. The way my brain is wired 🤖 I have to separate a number of other elements into parts as the story moves along — from the color grading and lighting to the sound design and mise-en-scène — to fully understand the director's vision and grasp the actual tale.

The thing about Renaissance as a whole is that it doesn't breathe enough for me. It feels chaotic like a tide than a flow if I let it run straight through. Give me spatial, darling! But that's the intentional, heavy-handed part about Renaissance, especially on the heels of a post-pandemic world: "Get tf up, dance and feel good." I don't wanna dance; I just wanna listen 😩 lol

Side note: 

We all have a specific musical palette as to why we fully gravitate to some songs/albums and not to others. I posted my review of Susan Roger’s book, This Is What It Sounds Like: What the Music You Love Says About You, a few months ago. (She was Prince's sound engineer from 1983 to 1988.) If you’re curious about why you like the music you like, I recommend for you to read it.

[jazzandother-blog]

The Bad Plus Joshua Redman — Joshua Redman

"THE BAD PLUS JOSHUA REDMAN

The Bad Plus Joshua Redman is the debut album from the eponymous quartet. Seven of the album's nine tracks are new compositions by quartet members.

In 2011, The Bad Plus invited saxophonist Joshua Redman to join them for a week of enthusiastically received performances at the Blue Note in New York City. They then played a handful of dates before heading into the studio in 2014 to record their debut album, The Bad Plus Joshua Redman, which Nonesuch releases on May 26, 2015 (June 8 outside of North America). Seven of the nine tracks on The Bad Plus Joshua Redman are new compositions by the quartet members who include saxophonist Joshua Redman and The Bad Plus bassist Reid Anderson, pianist Ethan Iverson, and drummer David King. The other two songs on the album, "Dirty Blonde" and "Silence Is the Question," are new arrangements of Bad Plus favorites.

The album is a knockout,"" exclaims the New York Times. ""It is impressive how much vital presence [Joshua Redman] brings to the Bad Plus without altering the band’s dynamic."" It's ""a roaring and beautiful summit meeting,"" says NPR. ""The ideas are impressive by themselves, but become more powerful as Redman and the rhythm section go about developing them ... [T]he real triumph of The Bad Plus Joshua Redman: It exhibits genuinely fresh thinking."

https://www.joshuaredman.com/the-bad-plus-joshua-redman#:~:text=THE%20BAD%20PLUS,genuinely%20fresh%20thinking.

The Bad Plus Joshua Redman es el álbum debut del cuarteto del mismo nombre. Siete de las nueve pistas del álbum son composiciones nuevas de miembros del cuarteto.

En 2011, The Bad Plus invitó al saxofonista Joshua Redman a unirse a ellos durante una semana de actuaciones recibidas con entusiasmo en el Blue Note de la ciudad de Nueva York. Luego tocaron en varias fechas antes de ingresar al estudio en 2014 para grabar su álbum debut, The Bad Plus Joshua Redman, que Nonesuch lanzará el 26 de mayo de 2015 (8 de junio fuera de Norteamérica). Siete de las nueve pistas de The Bad Plus Joshua Redman son nuevas composiciones de los miembros del cuarteto que incluyen al saxofonista Joshua Redman y al bajista de The Bad Plus Reid Anderson, el pianista Ethan Iverson y el baterista David King. Las otras dos canciones del álbum, "Dirty Blonde" y "Silence Is the Question", son nuevos arreglos de los favoritos de Bad Plus.

El álbum es espectacular", exclama el New York Times. "Es impresionante cuánta presencia vital aporta [Joshua Redman] a Bad Plus sin alterar la dinámica de la banda". Es ""una reunión cumbre hermosa y rugiente", dice NPR. ""Las ideas son impresionantes por sí mismas, pero se vuelven más poderosas a medida que Redman y la sección rítmica las desarrollan... [E]l verdadero triunfo de The Bad Plus Joshua Redman: exhibe un pensamiento genuinamente fresco".

[howlingmoonradio]

January 11th Playlist

I recently finished this terrific memoir from James Fearnley, accordion player and founding member of the Pogues. So that was one of inspirations behind this week’s episode. The rest of it? No idea, but I think it hangs together pretty well. As always we welcome your perspective, drop us a note at howlingmoonradio@gmail.com Now without further nonsense…

Side A

Howling at the Moon-Hank Williams

Streets of Philadelphia-Joshua Redman featuring Gabriel Cassava

Angel-Charles Lloyd Quartet featuring Lucinda Williams

Sabu Yerkoy-Ali Farke Toure

Horse With No Name-America

Simple Things-Amos Lee

Falling in Love Again-John Prine & Allison Krauss

Side B

Levi Stubbs Tears-Billy Bragg

Ascension Day-Elvis Costello and Allan Touissant

Johnny Come Lately-Steve Earle & the Pogues

London Calling-Joe Strummer & the Pogues

I’m Moving On-The Rolling Stones

If You Need Me-The Rolling Stones

Little by Little-The Rolling Stones

Confessing the Blues-The Rolling Stones

More than a Friend-All too Much

Prblms-Aloa Input

[sinceileftyoublog]

Christian McBride’s New Jawn Live Show Preview: 3/23, Constellation, Chicago

Photo by Ebru Yildiz

BY JORDAN MAINZER

Jazz bassist Christian McBride has been especially prolific the first few years of this decade, whether leading his own bands or playing as part of Joshua Redman’s venerable quartet. His latest offering is Prime (Mack Avenue) the sophomore record from the wonderfully named New Jawn, a band made up of trumpeter Josh Evans, saxophonist and bass clarinetist Marcus Strickland, and drummer Nasheet Waits. It’s a balanced affair, consisting of 8 songs, 5 of which are originals, at least one written by each member. The diversity in artistic voice shines through, some tunes chaotic and boisterous, others deliberate and contemplative, always stunning.

There’s a self-assuredness to the playing on Prime, an album named after the idea that each band member is close to reaching their creative apex. The Strickland-penned title track exemplifies the record’s strutting attitude, as each of Strickland, Waits, and Evans showcase their skittering expressions. The band’s performance of Larry Young’s “Obsequious” is a limber free bop workout, Evans’ dazzling, flitting trumpet and Waits’ careening drums leading into a syncopated, harmonic jam. Evans’ “Dolphy Dust” clearly harks to the fluttering trumpets of Eric Dolphy, Evans’ chemistry with Strickland recalling that of Dolph and Booker Little on records like Far Cry.

Yet, it’s no coincidence that as the band leader, McBride wrote the album’s two best songs, and that they occupy each end of the album’s spectrum. Opener “Head Bedlam” is a topsy turvey crash of horn squeals and drums before settling into a funk groove, led by his bopping bass line. And his bowed playing on the slowed, barroom lament “Lurkers” is Prime’s subdued highlight beneath all the noise, effectively proving once and for all that you can be in your prime while confidently paving the way for the future.

Catch Christian McBride’s New Jawn tonight at Constellation. The band plays two shows, one at 7:30 PM and one at 9:30. Tickets still available at time of publication.

[innervoiceart]

Joshua Redman Quartet - Blues on Sunday (with Brad Mehldau)

[drumrguy75]

Spirit of the Moment : Live at the Village Vanguard  -  1995

Track 1  -  Jig-a-Jug

Track 2  -  My One and Only Love

Track 3  -  Count Me Out

Track 4  -  Second Snow

Track 5  -  Remember

Track 6  -  Dialogue

Track 7  -  St. Thomas

Track 8  -  Herbs and Roots

Track 9  -  Wait No Longer

Track 10 -  Neverend

Track 11 -  Just in Time

Track 12 -  Mt. Zion

Track 13 -  Slapstick

Track 14 -  Lyric

[samuelabudiono]

REDMAN - MEHLDAU - MCBRIDE - BLADE A MOODSWING REUNION Joshua Redman, tenor sax; Brad Mehldau, piano; Christian McBride, double bass; Brian Blade, drums “A MoodSwing Reunion" is a reunion of old friends: Joshua Redman, Brad Mehldau, Christian McBride and Brian Blade, names capable of attracting the attention of the whole jazz community. It was in fact they, at the turn of the nineties and the 2000s, who defined, paraphrasing Ornette Coleman, the form of jazz of the future. And they did so by trying their hand at a variety of expressive contexts. It was Redman who brought this line up together: it is in fact the quartet with which he recorded his third album as a leader: MoodSwing (1994, Warner Bros.), one of the fundamental jazz records of the nineties, consecration of talent, of aesthetics music and the creativity of four musicians who today are considered among the most important masters of international jazz. At the time, the Redman quartet stayed together for about a year and a half. In reforming itself, for the release of RoundAgain (2020, Nonesuch), leadership has become collective: an inevitable evolution given the maturation of the personalities involved. In almost thirty years things have happened: each of these musicians, then simply young promises, has become an undisputed master. Just think of Mehldau, who at the time had not yet made his debut as a leader on record but who in a few years would have changed the rules of the game with the flurry of volumes of The Art of the Trio . Blade too would make his debut on record only a few years later, as well as rewriting the ranking of the best jazz drummers from the moment he joined Wayne Shorter in 2000. McBride, albeit very young, had already made it clear that he belonged to the elite of the double bass: his dazzling career as a leader also began in 1994. @SamuelABudiono #SamuelABudiono #Music #Architecture #MusicArchitecture (at Teatro EuropAuditorium) https://www.instagram.com/p/CkZqHMxoHO9/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[nonesuchrecords]

It was 10 years ago today: Joshua Redman’s Walking Shadows was released on Nonesuch. The album, produced by Brad Mehldau, was Redman’s first recording to include an orchestral ensemble. You can hear it here.

The record's core ensemble is a quartet featuring Mehldau, Larry Grenadier, and Brian Blade. Walking Shadows includes original tunes from both Redman and Mehldau along with works by a wide range of composers, like John Mayer and Pino Palladino, Kern and Hammerstein, Lennon and McCartney, Billy Strayhorn, Wayne Shorter, and Hoagy Carmichael.

"An unmitigated triumph." —Buffalo News

[jazzstandardspoll]

Descriptions & Propaganda

St. Thomas

Composed by Sonny Rollins

Notable versions: Sonny Rollins and Tommy Flanagan (x), Ron Carter and Jimmy Hall (x), Joshua Redman Quartet (x)

Propaganda: When I was in highschool this was the audition piece for saxophone players looking to join the jazz band. I remember sitting at the theory bar (a cozy little nook in the music room with fairy lights and posters of all Miles Davis, Ella Fitzgerald and etc.) listening to St. Thomas seep through from the practice rooms. Deeply beautiful and nostalgic piece.

All Of Me

Composed by Gerald Marks and Seymour Simons

Notable versions: Louis Armstrong (x), Billie Holiday (x), Charlie Parker (x)

Propaganda: an obvious pick maybe, but hey, this is obviously an all time classic. I've always been kind of low key obsessed with the chord progression in this song, even though it's kind of simple it works so well. Just a fantastic classic tin pan alley composition.

[dustedmagazine]

Keefe Jackson / Oscar Hoogland / Joshua Abrams / Mikel Patrick Avery — These Things Happen (Astral Spirits)

Photo by Geert Vandepoele

These Things Happen by Keefe Jackson / Oscar Jan Hoogland / Joshua Abrams / Mikel Patrick Avery

Gazing back through history is every bit as viable a strategy in jazz as is pushing forward. But whenever musicians deal with history, it’s fair to ask what they’re bringing to the table, especially when they’re dealing with a subject as oft-investigated as Thelonious Monk. 

In the case of this Chicago-meets-Amsterdam quartet, which went on to claim the name of this record as its own sometime between the date of the recording session (April 29, 2016) and its ultimate release in August 2022, Monk’s material multitasks. The way they amplify Monk’s potential for rhythmic clunkiness on “Epistrophy” is not only an opportunity to take to task every slick session that’s smoothed out the master’s eccentricities, but also an opportunity to celebrate the wooden shoe timing of noted Monk afficionado and ICP Orchestra founder Misha Mengelberg. When this record was made, Hoogland, whose 1983 birthday makes him the youngest guy in the band, seemed a likely candidate to inherent Mengelberg’s prankster-genius mantle. While he’s since proved too restless to stick to jazz, his approach to “Bemsha Swing” shows why he could have done the job. He and drummer Mikel Patrick Avery show an acrobatic team’s aplomb as they exaggerate the tune’s jagged cadence into a lurching, airborne spectacle.

Monk’s music is also simultaneously challenging and a kind of lingua franca, which is a handy thing to draw upon when your band’s members have complicated schedules and far-flung addresses, but don’t want to just cruise their way through some simple tunes. The melodies that Keefe Jackson’s tenor saxophone navigates on “Epistrophy” amount to a 3-D chess abstraction of lines that are already way more jagged than you might remember them to be. And Joshua Abrams’ bass hops through the trickiest parts of “Bemsha Swing” like a jiujitsu-trained ballet dancer skipping from one lily pad to the next, crossing the pond without once wetting his feet. 

All this attention paid to the Monk material should not be interpreted as shade cast upon the record’s other four performances. The way they saunter and lurch through Herbie Nichols’ martial “The Happenings” is so broad and sure-footed, one suspects that they must be trying to hide something with big smiles. The rises and falls of Dewey Redman’s “Gotta Get Some Sleep” are so fitful, it’s an honorary Monk tune. And Hoogland’s two contributions stand tall in lofty company. “Wimpel” covers a lot of ground in a short time, starting out romantic, turning abstract, then coming back with double ardor. And the antic zigzags of “Aanhanguis” will have you grabbing the sides of your chair just to keep from falling off. One caveat — this album lasts just 22 minutes, and you may find yourself wishing there were 22 more. But the choice to cut the LP at 45 RPM brings out the best in a very good sound.

Bill Meyer

[justforbooks]

The 10 best jazz albums of 2020

Alongside archive recordings from Sonny Rollins and John Coltrane, and inventive new releases by Maria Schneider and Carla Bley, 2020 had plenty of spectacular fusions

10

Pat Metheny – From This Place

Being both a bestselling jazz-fusion superstar and an experimental collaborator with John Zorn and Ornette Coleman takes rare agility, but guitarist Pat Metheny has managed both. Metheny’s 2020 album, performed by his current live band (UK pianist Gwilym Simcock, bassist Linda May Han Oh, and drummer Antonio Sánchez) with guest appearances from vocalist Meshell Ndegeocello and harmonica virtuoso Gregoire Maret, showcases his famously cinematic compositional muse, shrewdly balanced with the group’s off-the-leash inventiveness, and for the most part subtly applied synthesised orchestral effects. Read the full review.

9

John Coltrane – Giant Steps: 60th Anniversary Deluxe Edition

Recorded in 1959 – a year of landmark jazz releases including Miles Davis’s Kind of Blue – John Coltrane’s Giant Steps set a scorching new standard of expressiveness on a saxophone. The album’s 60th anniversary was celebrated by Rhino’s luxurious, outtakes-packed release, detailing Coltrane’s quest for a spiritual new music – built here from a fusion of massively enhanced bebop harmonies over relatively orthodox swing, as the great Coltrane quartet including McCoy Tyner was still 18 months away. Thrilling accounts of the title track, Mr PC and Countdown join the exquisite ballad Naima, enriched for close listeners by the alternative takes. Read the full review.

8

Joshua Redman – RoundAgain

American sax star Joshua Redman’s 1994 quartet with pianist Brad Mehldau, bassist Christian McBride and drummer Brian Blade was one of the standout lineups of that decade – but short-lived, because all the members were on the brink of breakouts into their own fertile careers. They reunited in 2019 to record RoundAgain, with decades of experience recharging their old synchronicity. Redman’s and Mehldau’s inventiveness across multi-chorus solos, underpinned by McBride’s and Blade’s headlong energy, matches a captivating balance of rootsy soul figures, graceful waltzes, and flat-out postbop flights.

7

Blue Note Re:Imagined

Not exactly a landmark in the kind of out-of-nowhere improv phrasing that makes you jump out of your skin, but a fascinating snapshot of young jazz-fascinated UK R&B, grime, hip-hop and electronics. Sixteen tracks span a song-centred account of St Germain’s loop-driven Rose Rouge from vocalist Jorja Smith, Ezra Collective’s cool distillation of Wayne Shorter’s Footprints, powerful saxophonist Nubya Garcia’s version of Joe Henderson’s A Shade of Jade, Melt Yourself Down’s blitz on Henderson’s Caribbean Fire Dance, and more. Read the full review.

6

Sonny Rollins – Rollins in Holland

In the 1960s, the unquenchably inventive tenor sax improviser Sonny Rollins often toured without a band, hooking up with local players in whatever town invited him. These previously unreleased 1967 recordings in the Netherlands mark the 36-year-old Rollins’s first meetings with the young Dutch bass and drums pairing of Ruud Jacobs and emerging avant-garde drummer Han Bennink. The audio quality is variable, but nothing can obscure how spontaneously communicative these takes are – tit-for-tat exchanges and long, zigzagging tenor odysseys shared between musicians whose listening powers match their instrumental panache. Read the full review.

5

Laura Jurd’s Dinosaur – To the Earth

Third release by Laura Jurd’s Dinosaur quartet – the most compatible vehicle for the prolific young British trumpeter/composer’s inquisitively evolving fusion of jazz and folk materials, global influences, and sophisticated absorption of 20th-century classical music. Jurd always seems blissfully and refreshingly indifferent to transient fashions, though invitingly songlike qualities remain even in her most exploratory music. Barely 40 minutes long, To the Earth nonetheless fizzes with surprises, and Dinosaur’s most explicit nods to the jazz tradition – from piano soulmate Elliot Galvin’s Monkish dissonances, to voicelike early-jazz dirges, and breezy Scandinavian jigs. Read the full review.

4

John Scofield/Steve Swallow – Swallow Tales

The partnership between guitarist John Scofield and electric bassist Steve Swallow goes back a long way, and they both have instantly recognisable identities on their respective versions of a guitar. Scofield plays jazz with a biting, sometimes dissonant bluesiness owing as much to Jimi Hendrix as to his teacher Jim Hall, and Swallow’s airily lyrical phrasing infuses his basslines and his composing. Accompanied by Bill Stewart on drums on nine Swallow pieces, the pair often take off in gleefully driving extended solos – Scofield in particular sounds as if he’s having a ball from the off.

3

Carla Bley – Life Goes On

The third of a sequence of moving trio recordings by the jazz-composing legend and pianist Carla Bley, with bassist Steve Swallow and UK saxophonist Andy Sheppard – a typically whimsical confection of slinky blues, impish tangos, Monk-like figures and oblique takedowns of patriotic anthems, linked by all-but-psychic ensemble improv. The title reflects on the octogenarian Bley’s recent recovery from brain surgery – but though these exquisite pieces understatedly span feelings from sensuality to late-life realism, nothing in this terrific trio’s long history has ever had a hint of sentimentality about it. Read the full review.

2

Django Bates/Norrbotten Big Band – Tenacity

A double celebration from the inimitable UK composer/pianist Django Bates – his own 60th birthday, and the centenary of the birth of Charlie “Bird” Parker, probably Bates’s biggest jazz hero, though one whose legacy he has explored and developed in the most wilfully devious ways. Tenacity, recorded with Sweden’s loose-limbed and free-thinking Norrbotten Big Band, reworks Parker classics such as Donna Lee (as a mix of bebop, free jazz, and South African township riffs), My Little Suede Shoes, and Ah Leu Cha, alongside four characteristically capricious Bates originals. Read the full review.

1

Maria Schneider Orchestra – Data Lords

The sensibilities of the great American composer, bandleader and musicians’-rights campaigner Maria Schneider have usually been turned outwards – toward depicting spacious landscapes and the sounds and movement of the natural world, in jazz parallels to Aaron Copland’s American vistas. For 2020’s Data Lords double-album, Schneider enters a darker realm, themed on corporate tech’s erosion of private spaces and artistic independence, expressed in more rugged, metallic tones, fierce horn solos, and connections with the music of David Bowie, her most famous fan. But the old pastoral Schneider is still delicately and playfully present in the later passages of this rich and eloquent session. Read the full review.

✔ What were your favourite jazz releases of 2020? Share your tips in the comments.

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at http://justforbooks.tumblr.com

[thechanelmuse]

2019 Albums/EPs I’ve Enjoyed

Umm...Cleary I’ve been listening to a lot of music this year. I did not expect my list to be this long lol. Anywho, hopefully some of these are new to you all and you enjoy them as well. 

JAZZ

Catherine Russell - Alone Together

Chick Corea, Christian McBribe & Brian Blade - Trilogy 2

Emilio Solla Tango Jazz Orchestra - Puertos: Music from International Waters

Jazzmeia Horn - Love and Liberation

Joshua Redman - Come What May

Joshua Redman and Brooklyn Rider - Sun on Sand

GOSPEL

Kirk Franklin - Long Live Love

RAP

Gang Starr - One of the Best Yet

GoldLink - Diaspora

Denzel Curry - ZUU

Doja Cat - Hot Pink

Duckwrth - The Falling Man

Little Brother - May the Lord Watch

Little Simz - GREY Area

Megan Thee Stallion - Fever

Rapsody - Eve

Tyler, The Creator - IGOR

BLENDED GENRES

Anderson .Paak - Ventura

Beyoncé - The Lion King: The Gift

Brittany Howard - Jamie

Burna Boy - African Giant

Caroline Shaw and Attacca Quartet - Orange

Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah - Ancestral Recall

The Cinematic Orchestra - To Believe

Flying Lotus - Flamagra

FKA twigs - MAGDALANE

Hozier - Wasteland, Baby!

Jacob Collier - Djesse Vol. 2

Michael Kiwanuka - KIWANUKA

Solange - When I Get Home

Tank and the Bangas - Green Balloon

POP/ELECTRONIC

Billie Eilish - When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?

Hayden James - Between Us

Labrinth - Imagination & the Misfit Kid and Euphoria (2 projects; the second one is technically a soundtrack but I’m adding it here)

Lizzo - Cuz I Love You

Lucy Rose - No Words Left

Tori Kelly - Inspired by True Events

Yuna - Rogue

R&B/SOUL

Alex Isley - The Beauty of Everything, Pt. 2 and Wilton (2 projects)

Ari Lennox - Shea Butter Baby

SiR - Chasing Summer

Emily King - Scenery

Emotional Oranges - The Juice: Vol 1

Eryn Allen Kane - a tree planted by water

India.Arie - Worthy

Jerome Thomas - Mood Swings

Jordan Rakei - Origin

Leven Kali - Leven Kali: Low Tide

Lucky Daye - Painted

Nicole Bus - KAIROS

Raphael Saadiq - Jimmy Lee

Sinead Harnett - Lessons in Love

Snoh Aalegra - Ugh, those feels again

Xavier Omär & Sango - Moments Spent Loving You