Jazz in Elsewhere

CHARLES LLOYD, CONSIDERED (2022): The 21st century man

31 Jul 2022 | 2 min read

As the Sixties ended, tenor saxophonist and flautist Charles Lloyd should have been a happy man: his 1967 album Forest Flower – recorded live at the Monterey Jazz Festival the previous year – had sold exceptionally well. His quartet had brought bassist Cecil McBee, the young pianist Keith Jarrett and drummer Jack DeJohnette to wide attention. They'd toured Europe and Russia to... > Read more

Endeavour Jazz Orchestra New Zealand: Solipsis, The Music of Ryan Brake (bandcamp)

25 Jul 2022 | 1 min read

Although this country has had a lineage of big bands and a few jazz orchestras, the economies of touring and recording have meant our albums have mostly been of smaller groups. This one in the age of digital releases however – recorded by Dave Lisik at the NZ School of Music at Victoria University in Wellington – is a no-holds-barred, widescreen blockbuster with a large ensemble... > Read more

Triplets: The Triplets Book (iii/bandcamp)

4 Jul 2022 | <1 min read

Another installment in the on-going release of live recordings by the busy saxophonist Jeff Henderson of Auckland who appears as a soloist but also within small ensembles (where it seems only the names change to protect the innocent, or guilty). So here is Triplets: Henderson on various saxophones, bassist Eamon Edmundsen-Wells and drummer Joseph McCallum. Recorded live at the Audio... > Read more

New Folk

Charles Mingus: The Lost Album from Ronnie Scott's (Resonance/digital outlets)

3 Jun 2022 | 2 min read

When the great bassist/composer Charles Mingus performed at Ronnie Scott's club in London in 1972, his career was in limbo. He was hugely respected but his studio sessions had dried up after the mid-Sixties and such albums as there were, were all live recordings. Okay, jazz is a live idiom, but it also says something of the struggle he was going through at the time: respected but not... > Read more

MILES DAVIS. ON THE CORNER, REVISITED (2022): Jazz-funk at 50

16 May 2022 | 3 min read

The cliche has become so embedded that hardly anyone questions it: “indie label good, major label bad”. As with most generalisations it doesn’t stand much scrutiny: small indie labels may be more comfortable for musicians because they know the boss, but they can also be woefully amateurish, financially incompetent and unable to get the music to the audience which deserves... > Read more

One And One

Vein: Our Roots (bandcamp)

28 Mar 2022 | <1 min read

Here's something for those who enjoy that music which falls between classical and jazz as this Swiss trio of pianist Michael Arbenz, his brother/drummer Florian Arbenz and bassist Thomas Lahs brings improvisation to their influences from European chamber music. And punch in This Is Beat-O-Vein which spins off from Beethoven's 5thSymphony. Many decades ago the pianist Jacques Loussier... > Read more

Tomasz Dabrowski and The Individual Beings (April/digital outlets)

28 Feb 2022 | <1 min read

Albums by the late Polish trumpeter/composer Tomasz Stanko have long been among Elsewhere's favourite jazz releases (we interviewed him in 2009 also), as have been albums by his group, Marcin Wasilewski Trio. That trio paid tribute to Stanko on their recent En Attendant album and now this trumpeter (also Polish and who was lent one of Stanko's trumpets for this project by the family) also... > Read more

Spurs of Luck

Wabjie: Lull (bandcamp)

28 Feb 2022 | 1 min read

Prompted by Elsewhere's recent article about the Meredith Monk album Dolmen Music, a Swiss jazz-cum-elsewhere trio asked if we might be interested in their work. They go by the name Wabjie -- pronounced Wab-Gee – which apparently is the name of those herbs and mosses which grow through pavement and wall cracks. And that seem appropriate given they too slip between the cracks.... > Read more

Cooper-Moore/Gauci: Conversations Vol. 2 (577 Records/bandcamp)

7 Feb 2022 | <1 min read

Two years ago we pointed listeners in the direction of the first volume of these aural Conversations between New York pianist Cooper-Moore and tenor player Stephen Gauci. Of the six improvisations on that first volume we said, “if you were to impose a vague concept on this you could hear these pieces charting a dawn to late evening course as the final, slower bluesy improvisation... > Read more

Improvisation Eight

Stephen Galvin: Modal Behaviour (ABC Studios)

20 Jan 2022 | 1 min read

Guitarist, singer and educator Stephen Galvin runs Auckland's ABC Studios and freely admits that this album is a showcase for himself and the many excellent musicians who appear on it. Among them are longtime jazz saxophonist Paul Nairn, percussion player Miguel Fuentes, trumpeter James Guildford-Smith, keyboard player Phil Hornblow, bassist Paul Mouncey and drummer Jacob Randall. My... > Read more

Free Palestine

A LOVE SUPREME, LIVE IN SEATTLE (2021): Another rediscovered session by John Coltrane

8 Nov 2021 | 3 min read

Even those with little knowledge of jazz know to nod sagely when trumpeter Miles Davis' Kind of Blue (1959) and tenor saxophonist John Coltrane's A Love Supreme (recorded in December 1964 and released a month later) are mentioned. These albums transcend the genre and -- the Davis in particular which remains the best-selling jazz album – are often on the shelves of those who find jazz... > Read more

Resolution (Live)

Bruce Aitken: Once Upon a No Name (bandcamp)

7 Oct 2021 | <1 min read

Elsewhere recently took a close listen to The Face Vol 1 by Sydney-based expat Kiwi percussionist Bruce Aitken (and some excellent friends) and were mightily impressed by the improvised diversity on display We look forward to Vol 2 (if there is one, Aitken's a bit eccentric in that regard) but meantime Aitken has started a new series loosely based on the spaghetti westerns of Sergio... > Read more

Jane Ira Bloom/Allison Miller: Tues Days (Outline/bandcamp)

3 Oct 2021 | <1 min read

On five consecutive Tuesdays in March and April, New York soprano saxophonist Jane Ira Bloom (who has appeared a few times at Elsewhere) and drummer Allison Miller got together in their respective home studios to record some improvised sax and drum duets together . . . as is the way of it in the 21st century under lockdowns. The idea wasn't to record an album particularly, but once the... > Read more

Marcin Wasilewski Trio: En Attendant (ECM/digital outlets)

13 Sep 2021 | <1 min read

Although this trio have recorded recently with Joe Lovano and under their own name, you can't help but wonder if the subdued mood here is a response to the death in 2018 of trumpeter Tomasz Stanko who this group had a long, profitable and beautiful relationship with. Even their treatment of the Doors' Riders on the Storm is taken at a melancholy, thoughtful pace with few of the menacing... > Read more

RECOMMENDED RECORD: Dexter Gordon: Go (Blue Note)

6 Aug 2021 | 3 min read

In one iconic photo by Herman Leonard taken in New York in 1948, the cool of Dexter Gordon -- his cigarette smoke coiling up above him -- came to symbolise and codify the image of jazz for many. At that time Gordon was in his mid 20s and his tenor playing had already been heard in Lionel Hampton's band but more recently when he was playing and recording alongside Charlie Parker whose bebop... > Read more

Where Are You?

Miles Davis: Merci Miles! Live at Vienne (digital outlets)

2 Aug 2021 | 1 min read | 3

The mercurial directions in trumpeter Miles Davis' career frequently confounded jazz writers. In the mid Seventies one announced Davis' output after the mid-Sixties as of little interest, thereby dismissing Davis' innovative In a Silent Way (1969) and the game-changing Bitches Brew (70). Another wrote of In A Silent Way, “It was like finding a raised... > Read more

Jake Baxendale and Jasmine Lovell-Smith: Sanctuary (Paint Box/digital outlets)

2 Aug 2021 | 1 min read

The title of this album lead by saxophonists Jake Baxendale and Jasmine Lovell-Smith became prescient when the world dived into various lockdowns. The two three-part suites here -- Baxendale's Whitman-inspired Leaves of Grass and Lovell-Smith's title piece reflecting on her return to New Zealand after years abroad – were all conceived before those events but were recorded in a window... > Read more

Leaves of Grass Suite: Opening

Don Cherry: The Summer House Sessions (Blank Forms/digital outlets)

24 Jul 2021 | 1 min read | 1

Trumpeter Don Cherry – step-father of Neneh and father to Eagle Eye – was right there in the avant-garde jazz movement on albums in the Fifties with Ornette Coleman (the presciently titled Something Else!!!, Tomorrow is the Question!, The Shape of Jazz to Come and Free Jazz among them). He had a long association with Coleman (one of his sons is David Ornette... > Read more

Auckland Jazz Orchestra: East of the Sun (AJO/bandcamp)

19 Jul 2021 | 1 min read

With CD sales in free-fall and jazz a minority music, why would the AJO (with singer Caitlin Smith) even bother with a professionally packaged, gatefold sleeve release like this? Yet this is much more than a vanity project but a warm showcase of these talented players recorded over a couple of days and mastered by Steve Garden (of Rattle). In the line-up are name players familiar... > Read more

Harbour Lights

Toine Thys/Orlando: Orlando (Hypnote/digital outlets)

1 Jul 2021 | 1 min read

It's a wee bit confusing: It seems this jazz quarter called Orlando but it is lead by saxophonist Toine Thys who also gets his name on the cover, but on digital outlets the album title is Orlando so . . . And while this came out digitally late last year we bring it to attention now because the French-Belgian group just won the Octave de la Musique jazz award in Belgium, and only now... > Read more