One of our favorite festivals just announced its first names for this year’s edition: named after Herbie Hancock’s eponymous hit from the early 80s, Rockit strives for an adventurous, innovative, and progressive programming. I had the chance to visit the last two rounds and both visits still resonate to this day. The festival will take…
I still remember seeing singer/songwriter Ledisi perform for the first time. It was way back in 2000 in San Francisco at a tiny little bar/café. At the time, she had just released her debut album “Soulsinger”, a set of brilliantly executed neo soul songs which still resonates up to this day. On April 25th, Ledisi…
19 year old Berlin-based singer, songwriter, producer, and multi-instrumentalist Cosmo Lautaro released his second album “AUTONOMIA” last Friday. We’ve already praised his four singles which came out in the last couple of months as a preview. This is really a pretty surprising output for such a young artist since it has a lot of ingredients…
One of the most pivotal moments last Monday at Amsterdam’s Paradiso happened during a guitar solo medley by guitarist Jubu Smith: among the three tracks he played was “Sweet Thing” by Rufus featuring Chaka Khan. And the whole crowd sang the lyrics out loud. No offense here but this is something that would never ever…
Singer Jane Monheit‘s latest, self-titled album came out last November. She concluded her European tour on Saturday at Hamburg’s new jazz club called Nica, which opened its doors in early November of last year. Jane included a handful of songs from her new album, and also threw in several tracks from her vast recorded repertoire,…
This year’s North Sea Jazz Festival will run from July 11th to the 13th. Yesterday, the festival organizers announced 50 additional acts to this year’s line-up. More artists will be announced at a later date, but here is the programme so far. We can’t wait to come back to Rotterdam: Friday, July 11th:ANOHNI & the…
Gina reviewed two previous ECM albums by Norwegian trumpeter Mathias Eick: “Midwest” from 2015 and “When We Leave” from 2021. For his latest album “Lullaby”, Mathias has worked with fellow ECM musicians Kristjan Randalu from Estonia on piano and Ole Morten Vågan on bass, with new drummer Hans Hulbækmo. And this is another one of…
Chicago-based singer Elaine Dame‘s cover of Donna Summer’s disco classic “Last Dance” is worth the trip alone here. The way she phrases the first words is simply stunning. And she keeps the vulnerability and the strength and the longing of the song for a total of six and a half minutes. She tackles the disco…
We have lost three major major voices of soul music in the last several days. This morning, the iconic Roberta Flack passed away en route to a hospital. The cause was cardiac arrest. Just a couple of weeks ago, she celebrated her 85th birthday. Just last Friday, Gwen McCrae passed on at age 81. She…
We’re still playing his amazing tracks from last year’s “1978” LP when singer José James just announced his next album “1978: Revenge Of The Dragon”, slated for release on his own Rainbow Blonde Records on May 9th. The first single, a tribute to Erykah Badu, whom he calls “one of the greatest living artists of…