Chris Searle
Lake's cosmic horn
Tuesday 13 March 2012
Here is a true horn of the elders and an audacious prophet of free jazz.
A dish to savour
Monday 05 March 2012
His gruff, fiery and super-adenoidal sound on the tenor saxophone made Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis immediately recognisable, whether his solos were suddenly roaring from the ensemble of the Count Basie Orchestra, whether he was partnering the fleet-reeded choruses of Johnny Griffin in a famous "tough tenor" twosome, or whether he was growling alongside Shirley Scott's bouncing Hammond organ, as he did with such clamour during his furious series of albums of 1958 - The Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis Cookbook sessions.
Threesome brilliance
Tuesday 28 February 2012
Edward "Kidd" Jordan, born in Crowley Louisiana in 1935, has combined his saxophone artistry with music education, mostly in New Orleans, for nearly 40 years, which includes stints in and out of jazz with figures as diverse as Ray Charles and Martha and the Vandelas.
Gung-Ho sax
Tuesday 21 February 2012
The reprieve in December of Mumia Abu-Jamal, one of the most high-profile US political prisoners, was only a partial victory for an innocent man and his supporters.
No sinking Shepp
Tuesday 14 February 2012
The reappearance of For Losers and Kwanza - two rare and long-deleted Archie Shepp records of 1970 and 1974 respectively - on one album reminds us how much jazz expressed the very spirit and vibrant political ideas of the era.
Bailey Swedens the deal
Tuesday 07 February 2012
Among the expatriate US jazz musicians who made a permanent home in Europe - along with fellow trumpeter Art Farmer, mighty tenorists Ben Webster, Dexter Gordon and Johnny Griffin and the arch-pianist Bud Powell - Cleveland-born Benny Bailey was less renowned but still among the finest.
Sheer sonic adventure
Tuesday 31 January 2012
It's too simplistic to say that jazz came from the United States.
Trio-X mark the spot
Tuesday 24 January 2012
The free improvising threesome Trio-X are regular visitors to The Spirit Room, the unique recording studio of CIMP records at Rossie, a rural venue in New York State which records music with its full integrity and honesty - gimmickless, pure and authentic, "capturing the full dynamic range one would experience at a live concert."
Alpha Boy
Monday 16 January 2012
From Jamaica, Guyana, Trinidad and all the jewelled islands in between they came after a world war. Migrants, nurses, teachers, soon to become railwaymen, bus drivers, factory wokers all Caribbean peoples whose families and forebears had so much taken from them during the 400 years of slavery, colonialism and imperial bondages.