Like most who’ve heard the young Aussie bassist Linda Oh, my starting point was hearing her fresh debut recording "Entry". Besides the fact that she just kind of materialized on the scene untethered to advance hype, the record was first of all curious because Ms. Oh took the hang-fly route and played her music with a lean [...]
Pianist James Weidman is a thoughtful, exceedingly pleasant man who is an understated personality but as versatile a pianist as you will find. Weidman’s discography as a leader is relatively short but potent. His current release is Three Worlds, on the Inner Circle Music label. On the heels of that release it was about time [...]
The inimitable Jackie McLean Shortly after posting the original Thinkin’ About Jackie (McLean) (please scroll down) remembrance from drummer Carl Allen, the National Jazz Museum in Harlem presented another of its ongoing Jazz for Curious Listeners programs at its Harlem Visitor’s Center, with a remembrance of the rich legacy of the great NEA Jazz Master Art Blakey. The conversation [...]
Jackie McLean At the recent and successful launch of the Mid Atlantic Jazz Festival (check Facebook for the Jazz Video Guy Bret Primack’s clips from the festival), successor to the mid-winter DC classic East Coast Jazz Festival, the event was capped off by a joyous Saturday night tribute to Charlie Parker. "Word on Bird" [...]
I remember posing the question in a BET Jazz interview to the late conguero and bandleader Ray Barretto about exactly what is meant by Latin Jazz and getting an earful, including what is NOT Latin Jazz. More recently I received a bit of a manifesto from the potent timbalero and bandleader Bobby Matos on the subject, [...]
In her second contribution to The Independent Ear, the uncompromising saxophonist-composer and budding music/socio- cultural commentator Matana Roberts details her personal grounding and addresses the issue of the black audience for jazz, music education, coping with judgmental educators and assorted other related matters on her fertile mind. Matana Roberts Black folks and Jazz Music? Why [...]
Fiercely independent aptly describes MATANA ROBERTS One of the more compelling young artists to have arrived on the scene the last few years is saxophonist-composer and AACM member Matana Roberts. She wrote recently to express her appreciation for the Ain’t But a Few of Us Independent Ear series conversations with journalist-author-educator Robin D.G. Kelly, he of [...]
DOUGLAS EWART: in a rare moment of relaxation for a man who seems never to sleep The group photo of modern day renaissance men should include Douglas Ewart. A saxophonist & all-round woodwind specialist and composer from Jamaica who emigrated to Chicago as a young man and currently splits his time between the Windy City and Minneapolis, is [...]
Though far from a recent phenomenon, considering the relative prominence and success of Joshua Redman’s current saxophone-bass-drums trio exploits, the creativity evident in the trio known as Fly (with Mark Turner on saxophone, Jeff Ballard on drums, and Larry Grenadier on bass) on the wings of their first recording for ECM, as well as what [...]
Mystery Man? Clarinetist Darryl Harper unveils his action figure/alter-ego with latest release… Amongst the usual blizzard of new releases, one of the more uncommon recent entries is Stories in Real Time (HiPNOTIC Records) from clarinetist-educator Darryl Harper. First sighting of Darryl Harper, who teaches at Virginia Commonwealth University, came courtesy of a Regina Carter tour a [...]