Toronto-based guitarist Galen Weston and his band are currently touring Europe with their acclaimed debut album “Plugged In”. In addition to his ten originals on the album, Galen with his yellow Stratocaster also plays arrangements of Keith Jarrett‘s “Country”, and the standard “Like Someone In Love” by Jimmy van Heusen. You can hear a lot of…
In 1962, Toots Thielemans wrote “Bluesette” which has become a standard now. He worked on many film scores, has recorded dozens of albums, has played with Benny Goodman, Charlie Parker and George Shearing in the early 50s and received countless awards. I first heard him on the 1981 Quincy Jones LP “The Dude” on “Velas”,…
One of the newer contemporary jazz festivals in Berlin in recent years is called Serious Series. Contemporary jazz as in modern, avantgarde, and experimental. This year’s line-up features musicians from Germany, the UK, Sweden, and Finland. The festival starts with a duo concert of two of Germany’s most promising, interesting, and imaginative performers: Christopher Dell on…
I remember a concert at Cologne’s Subway club back in 1990 with an elegantly dressed Bobby Hutcherson who seemed to echo his taste in clothes with what he was playing. Over the years, I’ve been lucky enough to dwell in a lot more concerts by this master musician. I first came across his music on…
He should have gained much more attention, but for some reason, always stayed somewhat under the radar inspite of a recording career that spanned almost sixty years and a plethora of fantastic recordings. My favorite is his solo recording released for the Maybeck Recital Hall Series. The 1993 disc features Don Friedman on numerous standards and…
The full programme for this year’s Jazzfest Berlin will be announced in September, but artistic director Richard Williams gave away most of the artists participating in the 2016 edition earlier this week. A total of 16 jazz bands will perform and five duo collaborations, some of which will play together for the first time. A lot…
Chick Corea turns 75 on Sunday. What better way to celebrate this milestone than a two-month stint at the Blue Note in New York. And to help him celebrate this special birthday, there will be a total of 80 shows, 15 legendary bands, and 60 legendary musicians performing between October 19th and December 12th. Since Chick…
There is the annual Django Reinhardt Jazz Festival in Samois-sur-Seine in France (June 22nd-26th) and there is the Django Reinhardt Festival in Hildesheim in Germany (July 1st and 2nd). And then there is the Django Reinhardt NY Festival which will celebrate its 17th season this year at Birdland (August 2nd-7th). Among the artists performing at…
This is just to let you know that Gina is currently on hiatus and will be back shortly with news, reviews and more. Thank you all for your kind messages and understanding!
I don’t want this to become an obituary page so I’ll return to reviewing new music soon since new stuff is piling up on my desk, but I’m sad to hear that we have lost yet another legendary musician and singer: Billy Paul has died at age 81. He is best known of course for…