Last year when I reviewed Mars Williams An Ayler Xmas Vol 3, I wrote that I was hoping that this would continue to be an annual event – a new collection of Ayler/Holiday mashups to counteract the deadly ear-poison of ‘All I Want for Christmas (is you)’. I also secretly wondered how Williams could keep finding new inspiration with the theme. Now, k…
Elsa Nilsson, a New York City based Swedish flutist, has released an album that celebrates the music surrounding the holiday of Lucia, a festival of lights, held on the Dec 13th, the Winter Solstice (according to the Gregorian calendar). So, it’s a holiday album, but not one of the typical ones that you may expect at this time of year. Nilsson and…
Matthew Shipp @ Roulette, June 14, 2019. Photo by Peter Gannushkin
by Paul Acquaro
Today we celebrate the 60th birthday of pianist Matthew Shipp. An influential presence on the Downtown NYC music scene since the 1980s, Shipp is a creative and prolific musician who leads and appears on many projects. In the following Q&A, Shipp talk…
The Rewardis an aptly titled recording. For one, the recording, an LP from the French label RogueArt, which has been instrumental in releasing several recordings from the New York based pianist this year alone, is being released to coincide with Matthew Shipp’s 60th birthday. Then, it is also Shipp’s first LP only release since Sonic Exploration, a…
Saxophonist Rich Halley, hailing from Portland, has a background that begs metaphorical reading: he’s a trained biologist who conducted research on rattlesnakes, likes to spend time in the wilderness, and ended up in the music business. Somehow his 2019 outing with pianist Matthew Shipp, bassist Michael Bisio, and drummer Newman Taylor Baker, Terra…
and Stef GijsselsAs Covid has continued to wreak havoc on the lives of musicians (yes, actually that could be expanded to the the world, but that’s for another day) some have sought other ways to express themselves, make some income, or work on something that that has been in the “if I just had time to…” category. Here are just a few that have c…
Well, it’s a stream, I can bring it to wherever I am, and just as easily as I pick it up, I can drop it. I’m not in the concert hall, rather I’m in the kitchen, or in the home-office, or who knows where. I’m not packed into a seat, and I’m not exactly glued to one either. What does it mean? It means that no one would notice if I showed up late for …
The connection between Berlin and New York for Jazzfest Berlin 2020 was fully realized today. Starting at 4 p.m. CET (Central European Time) or 10 a.m. EST (ya know, New York Time), WBGO’s Nate Chinen introduced alto saxophonist Lakecia Benjamin who led her group through a set of John and Alice Coltrane’s music.Lakecia Benjamin ©Wolf DanielSuffice…
Jazzfest Berlin opened with a 90 minute live-cast ‘show.’ Of course, it was not supposed to go down this way. The previously scheduled meet the artists panel had to be swiftly reconfigured as a broadcast event, and the result was an inviting tour of the long weekend of music ahead. Streamed live, the event took on a variety show format with the fe…
If anything, Jazzfest Berlin’s curator Nadin Deventer and the team behind the Jazzfest Berlin have taken the constraints and unpredictability of these Corona ravaged times and crafted them into something even bigger. Other mediums that had already played a part in the previous two festivals have become core elements: namely the extension of the con…
We had to do some digging in our archives to find percussion duets. We found the following:Michel Lambert & Rakalam Bob Moses – Meditation On Grace (FMR 2008)Lucas Niggli & Peter Conradin Zumthor – Profos (Not Two, 2009)Hamid Drake & Jesse Stewart – Timelines (Art Stew, 2013)Dane (Claire) Rousay & John Kennedy – Audit (Congruence, 2…
This may be the Terje Rypdal album I have been waiting for, how did they know?Conspiracy is the first since the Norwegian guitarist’s 2013 classical album Melodic Warrior(with the Hilliard Ensemble and Bruckner Orchester Linz, which never really struck a chord with me), and suffice to say, I am quite happy to hear Rypdal back in the small group ter…
