Happy Birthday to the one and only Al Jarreau who is turning 75 today! The singer from Milwaukee whose latest CD is a dedication to his old friend and producer George Duke (“My Old Friend – Celebrating George Duke”, 2014), is still touring and I wanted to let you know where to catch him in…
For her third album, UK saxophonist and composer Trish Clowes was able to record three of her compositions together with the BBC Concert Orchestra under the direction of André de Ridder. The album is supposed to be about journeys and the adventure begins with “Radiation” which is, in fact, a pretty bright and luminous number…
The one-hour showcase concert was announced on a very short notice so that’s why this trio from Israel was playing before a half-empty room at A-Trane yesterday. Singer Irit Dekel, accordionist and pianist Eldad Zitrin and drummer and percussionist Elat Cohen Bonen are interpreting well-known standards in a quiet unusual way, not only because of…
Born in New York, raised in Croatia, singer Thana Alexa delivers her debut album “Ode To Heroes”. Thana, who took voice lessons at the Rock Academy of Zagreb and later enrolled at the New School in New York, is paying tribute here to her influences, by either covering standards or by writing her own, distinguished…
Jill Scott, Xavier Naidoo, David McAlmont and Max Mutzke on one album? German trumpet player Nils Wülker makes it happen. The 37 year old musician is probably best known for his music for the pretty popular “Space Night” in German TV and back in 2002, he was the very first German jazz artist on the…
Gefion, the 10:33 minute title track of the new ECM album by Danish guitarist Jakob Bro, slowly builds into a monumental, but silent and sometimes sinister piece, with transcendental qualities to it. The track is named after a goddess who is associated with prophecy. The track “Copenhagen”, Bro’s native city, also comes along as a…
The Louis Armstrong Museum in New York is among the many participants worldwide to celebrate the International Jazz Day (see report on these pages) on April 30th. The Museum, located in Queens, is showing “Louis Armstrong Live in Concert, East Berlin 1965″. Here’s what the museum’s homepage writes about the forthcoming event: “This concert was…
Lew Soloff, one of the busiest Jazz trumpet musicians, died unexpectedly yesterday after an apparent heart attack. He just turned 71 in February. It seems that he is on every second Jazz or Jazz-related LP from the 70s and beyond – his style always crisp and on the mark, with fiery solos and brimming high-notes,…
Just in time for the first real spring weekend with lots of sun and temperatures in the lower 60s here in Berlin, the folks at Real Side Records, the soul team that was founded in 2002, have come up with the third installment of their wonderful “Soul On The Real Side” Collection, a 20-track album…
The 22nd edition of this Festival which once hosted a rare German appearance of Rosemary Clooney, takes place this year from July 3rd to 12th in various locations throughout the city. The Mercedes-Benz Museum has Caro Emerald and Mario Biondi as opening acts on July 4th. Also appearing there will be Marcus Miller and Joshua…