Mondo Jazz

NOVITA' DISCOGRAFICHE IN ARRIVO

Leggo sul blog di Peter Hum la notizia di una serie considerevole di uscite discografiche di primissimo livello. Gli rubo letteralmente la notizia, le copertine ed i commenti, adattando il tutto al pubblico italiano che legge l'inglese. Da parte mia sto già ascoltando alcuni di questi album e, compatibilmente con il (poco) tempo, mi riprometto di recensirne alcuni.

Cross Culture (Blue Note)
Joe Lovano Us Five

This one drops today in the U.S. It features Lovano’s double-drummer quintet that played in Confederation Park at the 2010 (minus bassist Esperanza Spalding), plus guitarist and Blue Note label mate Lionel Loueke guesting on six of 11 tracks.

From what I read here, the disc should be an especially colourful one, with Lovano playing not only an assortment of woodwind instruments but also percussion and drums from various countries.

Songs I Like A Lot (Sunnyside)
John Hollenbeck

Composer/bandleader/drummer John Hollenbeck’s latest disc, which is to be released Jan. 29, is to focus on his large ensemble arrangements of pop music by everyone from Jimmy Webb (Wichita Lineman, The Moon’s A Harsh Mistress) to Queen (Bicycle) to Imogen Heap (Canvas). (You can hear the last of those tracks here.)

On the disc, Hollenbeck’s joined by the Frankfurt Radio Big Band, as well as fellow Americans Gary Versace on piano and vocalists Theo Bleckmann and Kate McGarry. I heard some of this music performed by Hollenbeck’s own ensemble during a torrential downpour at the 2011 Newport Jazz Festival and it — the music not the storm — was powerful, dramatic and beautiful.

Gamak (ACT)
Rudresh Mahanthappa

Also due Jan. 29 is the latest is a from alto saxophonist Rudresh Mahanthappa, leading a slightly reconfigured version of the quartet featured on his 2006 disc Codebook. Bassist François Moutin and drummer Dan Weiss are back, but guitarist David “Fuze” Fiuczynski appears rather than pianist Vijay Iyer.

The Sirens (ECM)
Chris Potter

Saxophonist Chris Potter’s debut as a leader on ECM, which is also to be released Jan. 29, is reportedly inspired by The Odyssey and features pianists Craig Taborn and David Virelles, bassist Larry Grenadier and drummer Eric Harland.

The performance from last fall shown below features the Potter composition Nausikaa, which surely must be on The Sirens, played by Potter, Virelles, bassist Joe Martin and bassist Gerald Cleaver.

Without A Net (Blue Note)
Wayne Shorter Quartet

Word is that most of this disc, to be released in early February, was recorded in concert, as was Footprints Live!, the Shorter Quartet’s 2002 disc that featured some of the jazz of the last decade.

Another reason to get excited: British jazz writer Stephen Graham writes here that the disc’s studio track, Pegasus, a 23-minute creation that also features The Imani Winds, is the album’s “Corinthian pillar… a composition that stands tall with any of Shorter’s best work as a composer.”

Mirrors (Edition Records)
Kenny Wheeler

I hear from across the pond that the British trumpeter Kenny Wheeler will be releasing a new disc in mid-February featuring vocalist Norma Winstone and a 24-piece choir, and a British rhythm section. Featured on the disc is a previously unrecorded 11-track suite of music written by Wheeler in the late 1990s set to poems by Stevie Smith and Lewis Caroll and William Butler Yeats.

New Life (CAM Jazz)
Antonio Sanchez & Migration

The much-in-demand drummer’s latest disc as a leader, to be released in late February, features a powerhouse group that includes saxophonists Donny McCaslin and Dave Binney, pianist John Escreet and bassist Matt Brewer as well as vocalist Thana Alexa, who happens to be Sanchez’s fiancee.