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Does jazz have a Jewish or Israeli voice?

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May 16th, 2012 – IMN Update:

Born out of the cultural preference for rhythmically complex syncopation, call-and-response song and chant and improvisation, jazz, our great indigenous American musical form, has its roots in the South, in African-American communities. But, as blacks moved “up north” post-emancipation, the form evolved and transformed – and, unsurprisingly, Jews became great contributors to and collaborators in the form. By the early 20th century, as blacks and Jews flooded urban centers like New York, Chicago and Boston, both cultural groups struggled to escape poverty and oppression – either the slavery of the South or the anti-Semitism and pogroms of Eastern Europe. Living side by side in poor inner cities in the early 20th century, they found common ground in music that expressed both joy and pain: jazz.

From Benny Goodman to Artie Shaw, Al Jolson to Mel Torme, Buddy Rich to Stan Getz, Al Cohn to John Zorn, Jewish jazz musicians have become a staple of the heady improvisational form. The question arises: does jazz have a Jewish voice? If so, why and what might it sound like? For Charles Fishman, a long-time jazz producer and promoter and founder of the DC Jazz Festival, which this year takes place June 1-10, jazz is the sum of a multitude of musical influences.

To read the full article click here

The World-Class Jazz Club Run By Volunteers

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May 16th, 2012 – IMN Update:

from npr.org/blogs/ablogsupreme

The World-Class Jazz Club Run By Volunteers
By: Patrick Jarenwattananon

As an acclaimed pianist and composer, Vijay Iyer is able to perform his music in concert halls and jazz clubs around the world. But few venues are quite like the one he played May 1-2 of this year.

Yesterday the BBC’s Jazz on 3 posted a live recording of a new song by the Vijay Iyer Trio — too new, even, for the band’s 2012 album Accelerando. The song is called “Hood”

“Hood” is a tribute to the Detroit techno pioneer Robert Hood, and I think you’ll agree it’s an incredible thing for an acoustic piano trio to do. (Iyer’s trio has actually been performing the song for a little while, as it did when NPR Music recorded a full concert in January.) If you listen carefully, you’ll notice the applause is that of an intimate room, not a cavernous performing arts center or theater. Indeed, the credits reveal: “Recorded at The Vortex, London on 1 May 2012.”

To read the full article click here

Kurt Elling Honors the Past and Looks to the Future

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May 15th, 2012 – IMN Update:

From The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review

Kurt Elling following in Sinatra’s vocal steps
By: Bob Karlovits

Singer Kurt Elling admits there are risks to doing tributes to great artists, but says it is “part and parcel” of being a jazz performer.

But he says paying homage to Frank Sinatra has its own special demands.

“Sinatra has his own cache,” he says about the shows he will do Saturday at the Manchester Craftsmen’s Guild on the North side. “But I think there will be people who will be happy to see me do some songs as he did them and those who will be happy to see me taking the music a different way.”

The Grammy award-winning Elling, 44, one of the leading singers in jazz, is a master of vocalise who can give lyrics to a famous solo by Freddie Hubbard or Dexter Gordon. But he also pays tribute to some of the classics songs and their performers, as in “Dedicated to You,” an album that was a tribute to the famous 1961 album, “John Coltrane and Johnny Hartman.”

But he says the Sinatra show is its own challenge because of the great popularity of the singer. He has only done the show three times and says this one could easily be the last because “I don’t want to hit up the old man for a cheap dollar.”

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REVIEW: Angélique Kidjo Spirit Rising

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May 15th, 2012 – IMN Update:

from BBC

Angélique Kidjo Spirit Rising Review
By Martin Longley

Although documenting the current state of Angélique Kidjo’s stage show, her first live album also acts as an alternative greatest hits selection. The bounding, charismatic singer from Benin has been increasingly active on the touring circuit in recent years, whether solo, or as part of her Sing the Truth! collaboration with fellow vocalists Dianne Reeves and Lizz Wright.

Spirit Rising was recorded live in Boston by PBS, hopping around from Kidjo’s oldest signature numbers to a clutch of diverse cover versions, interpreted with a swift flow of guest stars. The band operates as a solidly balanced wall of Afro-pop brashness, but there are still speedy flurries designed to spotlight bass, percussion, guitar or piano, even if these outbreaks are just as swiftly dispatched. The prime focus is the songs themselves, and Kidjo’s always absolutely central vocal, invariably as rhythmic and punchy as the surrounding drum work.

Any Kidjo performance is always inflated by her natural exuberance, and this quality is carried across by the recording. If ever a festival is flagging, Kidjo can reinvigorate its crowds. Afrika and Agolo are the best-known songs from her old repertoire, and they appear here in sleekly dashing form.

Dianne Reeves guests on two songs, particularly shining on the Afro-stomp reading of Gimme Shelter, before filling Monfe Ran E with gospel-soul emoting. Some of the other covers are less successful, partially due to an unimaginative selection of over-familiar works. Hence Redemption Song, which has lately become a most fashionable Bob Marley choice. Curtis Mayfield’s Move On Up is invigorated by the guesting saxophonist Branford Marsalis, but Summertime is another overdone ditty, and Ravel’s Bolero even more so, as Kidjo enunciates its rhythms in such a closely-shadowing manner. It’s the opposite of scatting subtlety. When Senamou kicks in towards the end, it’s clear to see that this typically pan-African propulsion is where Kidjo’s best work lies.

Read the full article here

Jason Moran: Letting It All Bleed

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May 15th, 2012 – IMN Update:

From The New York Times

Art, Ancestry, Africa: Letting It All Bleed
By: Ben Ratliff

Alicia Hall Moran is an operatic mezzo-soprano, and Jason Moran is a jazz pianist. They met at the Manhattan School of Music and married in 2003. Since then they’ve made a lot of their work separately. Mr. Moran has toured and recorded for 12 years with his trio, the Bandwagon. Ms. Moran has performed as a singer with Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company and is now the understudy to Audra McDonald in the role of Bess in “The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess” on Broadway. But they have worked together steadily, too, more than many people know.

From last Wednesday to Sunday on the fourth floor of the Whitney Museum of American Art, from late morning to evening each day, the Morans unspooled an extended collaboration, called “Bleed,” as a limited residency that was part of the museum’s Biennial. (Ms. Moran left every afternoon to report to the Richard Rodgers Theater, as she does six days a week.)

“Bleed” was neither about jazz nor about opera, per se, though it contained some of both, and much else: film, video, dance, poetry, lecture, diary, journalism and alternative medicine. It offered 26 performances, including Ms. Moran’s doing a version of Beyoncé’s “Run the World (Girls),” with Japanese taiko drummers, and singing operatic arrangements of Motown songs backed by harp, piano, guitar and percussion; a talk on “phenomenal listening” by the scholar Radiclani Clytus, who’s working on a film about the Morans; a series of voice-and-piano art songs dedicated to visual-artist friends; an open rehearsal by the Bandwagon, with each musician miked so the audience could hear the conversation; a solo-bass performance by Esperanza Spalding; Charles Blow, an Op-Ed columnist for The New York Times, reading a recent column he wrote on bullying; and Ms. Moran’s receiving acupuncture while talking, sometimes tearfully, about why she makes art. (“I’m looking for the story of me and you,” she said, supine, both to the acupuncturist and by extension to everyone in the room.)

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REVIEW: The Gloaming

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May 14th, 2012 – IMN Update:

from State

The Gloaming
By Niall Crumlish

There won’t be much in the way of arguments over this gig. There won’t be any bad reviews. The Gloaming – Thomas Bartlett, Dennis Cahill, Martin Hayes, Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh, and Iarla Ó Lionáird – are five stunningly gifted and diverse musicians and together they are more than the sum of their parts. They are currently playing a music that is so vibrant, emotional and elemental that to fail to be electrified by it would be, I think, to be missing something about what music is. As they blazed to the end of a twenty-minute opening salvo of tunes, building intelligently from the rich, meditative sean-nós of ‘An Chuil Daigh Ré’ to the swift, savage, dazzling climax of ‘Tom Doherty’s Reel’, it was all we could do not to howl with joy; some did. Michael D was there, and I’m pretty sure I heard him howling too.

The Gloaming are still a new outfit, with barely a recording to their name, but already they are acting as a Rosetta stone for people like me who know little or nothing about Irish traditional music, but feel that ignorance ever more acutely, and want a way in. Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh is probably the key member of the band for these people; over the last five years he has shown a willingness, even a need, to experiment with form and an ability to speak a language understood by those who have kept themselves at arm’s length from traditional music. He toured with Norman Blake and Euros Childs; he worked with Amiina; that kind of thing. So when he goes back to more classic forms, as he does here and with Martin Hayes in Triúr, we trust him and follow him, because he’s one of us.

In fact, I wrote something in State in 2009, now a bit embarrassing, to the effect that Caoimhín made a refreshing change from regular traditional musicians because his extraordinary 2007 album Where the One-Eyed Man is King did not stick “to the forms handed down like commandments over generations”, as if I even knew what those were. Don’t ask me to tell between a reel and a jig.* I even called Caoimhín “the most singular traditional musician of his generation”, which might imply that I had a list of singular traditional musicians, from which I had carefully chosen him. It wasn’t quite like that. Still, I was in Vicar St almost solely because of Caoimhín, so he is important if only because he has introduced the odd newbie to The Gloaming’s music, and by extension to the untold wealth of traditional music that’s out there, beckoning.

Read the full article here

Esperanza Spalding Performs for iHeartRadio Live Tonight!

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May 14th, 2012 – IMN Update:

From iHeartRadio

Esperanza Spalding will be performing a special intimate show at our iHeartRadio Theater presented by P.C. Richard & Son tonight. It’s too late to win tickets, but several iHeartRadio stations will be streaming live video of the show at 8:00pm EST.

Click here to learn more!

Joanie Madden's Folk & Irish Cruise

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May 14th, 2012 – IMN Update:

From Joanie Madden

Hello Folks!

I’m thrilled to announce that the booking has begun for my 2nd annual Folk ‘n Irish Cruise onboard the incredible Norwegian Epic that departs out of Miami, Florida on February 2nd to February 9th, 2013 with stops to the Eastern Caribbean ports of St. Thomas, St. Maarten and Nassau in the Bahamas.

Last January, I embarked on running my first Irish cruise to the Carribbean. It was an absolutely overwhelming success with almost 600 Celtic music fans from around the world joining us for an amazing week on the high seas. The wonderful group of fun-loving passengers and a line up of some of the greatest talent to be found anywhere on the planet, made for an amazing and memorable week of music, song, dance and craic!

I have assembled an array of talent with over 50 entertainers from Ireland, Scotland, the United States and Canada who will be covering the full spectrum of folk and traditional music, song and step dance. There is literally something for everyone from the nightly concerts and jam sessions to impromptu sing songs and revelry. To get everyone moving and work off the gourmet delicacies we will all be enjoying with the freestyle dining on board the Epic, we will have daily set dancing, ceili dancing, old time waltzes and jives with lessons to make sure you join in the fun! Due to popular demand, we are also arranging golf outings on some of the majestic islands!

Once again, I’m very proud of the lineup I have arranged for your listening pleasure and can assure you that everyone is artistically phenomenal in their individual fields and a joy to be around – which all adds up to making the journey that more enjoyable!

To read more click here

Brad Mehldau Turns Ivory Into Gold

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May 14th, 2012 – IMN Update:

from sfexaminer.com

Brad Mehldau turns ivory into gold
By:Jason Victor Serinus

Jazz pianist Brad Mehldau, 41, is held in such high esteem that when his forthcoming gig was announced at a recent SFJazz concert, a sizeable number of audience members began to applaud.

Known for his improvisatory genius — which informs not only original compositions, but also renditions of jazz standards and arrangements of rock hits by the likes of the Beatles, Radiohead and Paul Simon — Mehldau has just released “Ode,” his first CD with his trio in four years.

“‘Ode’ is a collection of originals that I wrote specifically for my trio with bassist Larry Grenadier and drummer Jeff Ballard,” Mehldau says. “I feel that what they bring to the music in the performance here is inseparable from the tunes themselves.”

Most of the 11 songs on “Ode,” which will figure heavily in the concert, are tributes to other individuals, real or imagined. As Mehldau was composing the pieces, he began to think of them as odes, or poems without words, that might be sung.

To read the full article click here

Kurt Elling Croons

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May 11th, 2012 – IMN Update:

From The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Music preview: Kurt Elling to croon classic Sinatra songs
By: Rick Nowlin

When vocalist Kurt Elling was last in Pittsburgh, he sang with the Bob Mintzer Big Band at the Manchester Craftsmen’s Guild Jazz Hall.

He’ll be back there for two shows Saturday but in a much different setting — with just a backing quintet. And the setting isn’t casual, either.

Saturday’s concerts recall the 50th anniversary of a 16-nation tour that Frank Sinatra did to raise money for children’s charities. Those shows represent “some of the very, very few recordings with Sinatra with a small group,” Mr. Elling says. “It was the original large group recording scaled down for a sextet. They hadn’t been released until about five years ago.”

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Benefit Concerts at Blue Note, Dizzy’s Fund Jazz Causes

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May 11th, 2012 – IMN Update:

from downbeat.com

Benefit Concerts at Blue Note, Dizzy’s Fund Jazz Causes
By: Russ Musto

“Nobody said it was going to be easy, and nobody was right,” declared Dizzy’s Club Coca-Cola Programming Director Todd Barkan, quoting the witty insight of the late pianist John Hicks into the life of a jazz musician. Barkan was introducing the Playing Our Parts concert benefiting the Jazz Foundation of America, which for more than 20 years has made the lives of countless jazz artists easier in times of need. The annual show, which has earned tens of thousands of dollars for the foundation’s Jazz Musicians Emergency Fund during the past five years, was instituted to raise money for the medical care of ailing bassist Dennis Irwin, who passed away on March 10, 2008, only hours before that evening’s poignant affair. Since then, saxophonist Joe Lovano and guitarist John Scofield, close friends of Irwin, have joined forces in a yearly event at Jazz at Lincoln Center that donates 100 percent of its proceeds to a foundation program that provides free cancer screening for musicians.

This year’s April 24 event got off to a scorching start with Lovano and Scofield, along with bassist John Patitucci and drummer Lewis Nash, firing on all four cylinders for the guitarist’s funky “Wabash III” and the tenorist’s gritty “Big Ben.” Playing with a tight, unified sound, the quartet set the tone for the artfully assembled evening. The music flowed on beautifully with the addition of trumpeter/flugelhornist Eddie Henderson to the foursome on a stirring rendition of “Jitterbug Waltz” that danced with grace and strength.

To read the full article click here

Esperanza Spalding to Play for Sold-Out Howard Theatre Crowd

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May 10th, 2012 – IMN Update:

From The Washington Examiner

Esperanza brings ‘Radio Music Society’ to Howard Theatre
By: Emily Cary

When classically trained jazz artist Esperanza Spalding walked away with the 2011 Grammy Award for Best New Artist, she was already a media darling for her unique way with the string bass, thoughtful vocals and stylish personality. By the time her third recording, “Chamber Music Society,” soared effortlessly to number one on Billboard’s contemporary jazz chart, she was waiting to release its companion album, “Radio Music Society.”

The nationwide tour highlighting her latest album arrives Saturday at Washington’s newly restored historic Howard Theatre, the nation’s first large music venue for blacks. Built in 1910, it predates the Apollo Theatre by two decades. The Beaux-Arts style, developed in Paris during the 19th century, is an ideal backdrop for Spalding’s bedazzling creativity.

“‘Radio Music Society’ is a sort of dialog about the diversity of radio,” she said. “Particularly with jazz music, since there’s so much a question of accessibility, it’s not the matter of the content of the music, it’s a matter of how people can access it. That’s why the concept of ‘Radio Music Society’ came to be. When people get a chance to hear it, it can become really well-loved.”

To read more click here

Jason Moran Documentary

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May 10th, 2012 – IMN Update:

From Kickstarter

Grammar: A Documentary project in Brooklyn, NY by Radiclani Clytus

SYNOPSIS

As a 2010 MacArthur Award recipient and triple-crown winner in Downbeat Magazine’s 59th annual critics poll, Jason Moran is by far one of the most talented musicians working in jazz today. A graduate of the acclaimed jazz programs at the Manhattan School of Music and Houston’s High School of the Performing and Visual Arts, Moran currently presides as the Kennedy Center’s Artistic Advisor for Jazz and serves on the piano faculty of the New England Conservatory. Moreover, while his trio The Bandwagon (bassist Tarus Mateen and drummer Nasheet Waits) is routinely lauded for its innovative musicianship, it’s quite clear that what matters most to this pianist is the preservation of the creative legacy imparted by his legendary mentors Jaki Byard, Andrew Hill, and Muhal Richard Abrams.

Since January 2011, Gregg Conde and I have been documenting Moran’s rehearsals and performances in order to reveal the ways in which the inherently improvisational and amorphous nature of jazz music is implicit within the language of creative and artistic expression. Because much of Moran’s ongoing oeuvre blurs the boundaries between jazz, rap, and performance art, our documentary, Grammar, will not only explain how his eclectic style of playing is informed by his coming of age during the emergence of electro music, 80’s funk, house, M-Base, and the culture of hip hop but it will also demonstrate how Moran’s hybrid sense of musicality portends a foundational shift in how we define jazz music. Coincidentally, Grammar purports that jazz never truly ceased to be America’s most popular art form. As our interview footage of pioneering rap producers and MCs from the 1990s will reveal, jazz, like its kindred genres soul and funk, migrated into the genetic structure of hip hop music through the inventive practices of sampling and beat making.

Watch a video about the project below and click here to learn more.

Kurt Elling Joins Forces With Fellow Jazz Vocalist

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May 9th, 2012 – IMN Update:

From The Washington Examiner

A fine pair of jazz vocalists combine forces at Strathmore
By: Marie Gullard

Two renowned jazz vocalists, John Pizzarelli and Kurt Elling, will share the stage at Strathmore. The two, who just happen to be buddies and perform the same genre of music, vow there is no competition between them because they are both firmly grounded in their own sense of style.

“John is a good musician — he’s a prince!” said Elling, who has received multiple awards including a Grammy. “And he is one of my favorite people to work with.”

And of his pal, Pizzarelli said, “I love what [Elling] does. I love being in the same room with him. We don’t usually plan our shows until we’re together at rehearsal. We do pretty much a little of everything from our [individual] records over the past 20 years.”

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President Obama Nominates National Council on the Arts' Kang for Key Administration Posts

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May 9th, 2012 – IMN Update:

from dc.broadwayworld.com

President Obama Nominates National Council on the Arts’ De Leon & Kang for Key Administration Posts

Today, President Barack Obama announced his intent to nominate the following individuals to key Administration posts: Maria Lopez De Leon, member, National Council on the Arts, and Emil J. Kang, member, National Council on the Arts.

President Obama said, “I am proud that such experienced and committed individuals have agreed to serve the American people in these important roles. I look forward to working with them in the months and years ahead.”

Emil J. Kang is the Executive Director for the Arts and Professor of the Practice of Music at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Previously, he served as President and Executive Director of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. He has also held positions with the Seattle Symphony and the American Composers Orchestra and was an Orchestra Management Fellow with the League of American Orchestras. Mr. Kang serves as Secretary of the Board of Directors of the Association of Performing Arts Presenters, and is a member of both the Nominating Committee of the International Society for the Performing Arts and Board of Advisors of the Kenan Institute for the Arts at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts. Mr. Kang holds a B.A. in Economics from the University of Rochester.

To read the full article click here