In a music so heavily built around collective communication, there is something inherently special about a solo performance. Far too often, playing unaccompanied is perceived as a show of virtuosity. While true mastery is requisite for a solo performance to reach its full potential, the same can be said for any type of performance, from […]
One criticism occasionally levied against the more recent editions of the iconic Newport Jazz Festival is that it somehow abandoned its mooring in jazz. A pseudo-purist faction asserts that the music that first put George Wein’s festival on the map was discarded years ago. But this perspective is deeply flawed. For one, it ignores the […]
My review of emerging piano great Isaiah J. Thompson’s Power of the Spirit (Blue Engine, 2023) ended thusly: “a must-have for enthusiasts of straight-ahead, blood-pumping soul-jazz, 21st-century style. Thompson will be a force to be reckoned with well into the foreseeable future.” While there is still plenty of soul-jazz present in The Book of Isaiah: […]
We continue our conversation with Ivo Perelman and Matthew Shipp on ‘Armageddon Flower’ (TAO Forms, 2025). You can read Part One here. PostGenre: As far as focusing on the heart, does that go back to getting out of the way, too? Obviously, you need mental and technical skills to be able to make the music […]
In Lonely on the Mountain (Bantam, 1980), Western novelist Louis L’Amour wisely noted that “there will come a time when you believe everything is finished, that will be the beginning.” Instead, as Nicholas Copernicus’ heliocentric model posits, our universe is infinite; there is no real end. The concept of continuity is not truly foreign to […]
One never knows where drummer-composer Ches Smith’s muse will take him next. From the Haitian voudou of We All Break: Path of Seven Colors (Pyroclastic, 2021) to the uncategorizable mash-ups of Laugh Ash (Pyroclastic, 2024) to inventive trio albums with violist Mat Maneri and Craig Taborn to whatever else strikes his fancy, Smith is there. […]
A city that prides itself on being both outside of the status quo (“Keep It Weird”), and the Live Music Capital of the World, it should come as no surprise that Austin, Texas, has a fascinating avant-garde musical community. One central figure in that ecosystem has been Chris Cogburn. The percussionist – whose musical interests […]
In a 2021 interview, Henry Threadgill noted his belief that “[Marshall Allen] should have the highest award that can be bestowed on any artist for performing one-nighters at age 97. They should make up an award for such a person… he’s going unrecognized. It is a travesty. Can you imagine doing one-nighters at 97 years […]
Concepts of genre are odious as they defy human reality. Even the most ardent adherent to stylistic norms, if they are being honest, draws influence from elsewhere. While categorical boundaries may help in the marketplace, they fail to address the complexity of art or individual expression. One of the most blatant of these dividing lines […]
Scholarly analyses of the Blues tend to emphasize a specific style born of the African American experience, developed from spirituals, field hollers, and work songs. They focus on twelve-bar chord progressions with flatted notes and call and response. However, such narrowly defined conceptualizations of the Blues miss the music’s full significance. The great Blues masters […]
