Jazz Album Reviews – Discover all the reviews of the latest jazz albums released – Contemporary, avant-garde, free, bop, experimental:
When Miles Davis began recording Birth of the Cool he was only twenty-one years old. Recorded in the sacred period between the post-hard bebop era and the ‘cool jazz’ movement, the album is a listening necessity. Yet, the record was actually recorded eight years before its timely release. Seen as a key piece of recorded music at the end of the 1940s, the seminal record actually had a massive influence on the period of jazz music that followed its release in 1957.
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Breezin’ by George Benson – Song by Song Album Review
Breezin’ is George Benson’s fifteenth studio album released in 1976 and produced by Tommy Lipuma. Here you will find the complete song-by-song album review of Breezin’.
Breezin’ is one of the best albums for Benson and his group’s career. This 70’s masterpiece gave George Benson true popularity: he combined his softer focused R&B, funk, and jazz-flavored work for some kind of amazing smooth jazz.
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It is an instantly recognizable album cover; Davis in a blue suit, lips puffed, about to blow his trumpet; the black backdrop, the Columbia logo, and the album’s title typed in blue. Not only is Kind of Blue considered Miles Davis’s magnum opus and masterpiece, but it is also regularly billed as one of the best albums of all time, not to mention the greatest-ever jazz album.
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There is a well-known Latin phrase Omne trium perfectum which put simply, means “everything that comes in threes is perfect”. Nobody knows where the principle of the perfect set of three originally came from but it is a philosophy the Ancient Greeks recognized and carried into the future. It is a phrase still used today, albeit heavily paraphrased.
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Sometimes the most extraordinary things occur in the most ordinary of places. If you should drive past an unassuming health centre on a quiet residential street in New Jersey – or 25 Prospect Avenue, Hackensack, to be more exact – you would be forgiven for disbelieving the site’s place in jazz music legend.
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It is one of the most iconic openings in musical history. Those first few seconds of A Love Supreme are infinitely recognisable to jazz music aficionados and instantly alluring to those hearing it for the first time.
From the first few seconds of the record, Coltrane hints at something magic. With the opening Asian gong and cymbal washes, the listener is plunged straight into a curious album with many musical meanderings, missing meanings and the feel of a smoky late-night underground jazz club.
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Zurich Concert is a solo recording by bassist Joëlle Léandre. Zurich Concert was recorded live on March 17, 2022, at Taktlos-Festival at Kunstraum Walcheturm, in Zürich, Switzerland, by Willy Strehler, and it will be released on February 20, 2023, by Intakt Records.
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Eye of I is an album by tenor saxophonist James Brandon Lewis, with Chris Hoffman on cello and pedals, and Max Jaffe on drums and sensory percussion. Eye of I was released on February 3, 2023, by Anti- Records.
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Scenery Somewhere is an album by saxophonist Julia Strzalek and drummer Cornelia Nilsson, playing for the first time together. Scenery Somewhere was recorded live at Kapellet, Stockholm, Sweden, on September 3, 2021, by Johan E. Andersson, and it will be released on February 24, 2023, by Frim Records.
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Traction is an album in two parts by improviser, vocal artist, and experimental composer Casey Moir, with Elisabeth Coudoux on cello, Marcus Wärnheim on alto saxophone, and Jérome Fouquet on trumpet. Traction was recorded at SHARE Festival, on July 17th, 2021, in Denmark, and it was released on January 31, 2023, on HearHere Records.
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