Sample Features From This Month's Issue
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Jack DeJohnette - Rhythm Symbol Master drummer Jack DeJohnette is part of a continuum in jazz that stretches back to the 1960s when the Chicagoan was a member of Charles Lloyd’s seminal quartet and when he made his debut as a leader. The line continued the next decade via Miles Davis and the groundbreaking album Bitches Brew, and then into the 80s and on with his own influential group Special Edition. With the foundation of the Keith Jarrett Standards Trio, which recently celebrated its 25th anniversary, a new chapter in both DeJohnette and Jarrett’s career began, the birth of a group that would revitalise the trio format and then influence a myriad of jazz trios keen to break the mould just as DeJohnette and Jarrett had done themselves.  Read more...

Christine Tobin and Phil Robson - Coming of Age Daring to be different, singer Christine Tobin is set to delve still deeper into the consciousness of her fans and newcomers alike if the arrival of her brand new album Secret Life of a Girl is anything to go by. An emotional and personal stirring, one step beyond her previous album, the dark Romance and Revolution, Tobin on Secret Life inhabits the world of the young characters in the songs. The album is released at a time when her partner and regular musical colleague, guitarist Phil Robson, releases Six Strings and The Beat, a Bartók-infused strings album flavoured by post-modern jazz and African music alike. Stuart Nicholson talks to the pair about the story behind their albums.  Read more...

Sample Features From This Month's Issue
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The Neil Cowley Trio - Loud And Proud - The Neil Cowley Trio shook up jazz fans two years ago with debut album Displaced, which was a bolt from the blue at the time. Neil Cowley, Richard Sadler and Evan Jenkins grabbed the jazz trio format by the scruff of its neck while not forgetting the elements that made it great in the first place. Cowley, best known for his work with key jazz funk and chill out bands, had come up with a post-EST concept that was distinctly fresh and rooted in his jazz influences, including the music of Keith Jarrett.  Read more...

Chick Corea and Gary Burton - The Sound of Silence - More than 35 years have passed since Chick Corea and Gary Burton came together to record the classic album Crystal Silence. The two have now recorded once again, this time for Concord to produce a two-CD set with a big difference as the first disc of The New Crystal Silence finds Corea and Burton performing with a symphony orchestra using new arrangements by saxophonist Tim Garland. Read more...

Issue #116 Courtney Pine and Jazz Warriors
Sample Features From This Month's Issue
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Courtney Pine - Out Of Many, One People - the key jazz musician of his generation in the UK has formed a new version of the seminal 1980s big band, the Jazz Warriors. Instead of merely revisiting the past, the saxophonist has created the JazzWarriors Afropeans with the intention of reflecting through his music and ideas the 200 years since the abolition of the Transatlantic Slave Trade in the former British Empire. He achieved this aim by recording a live album last October recorded at the Barbican which will be released later this year.  Read more...

Horace Silver - Finger Poppin’ - Pianist Horace Silver is one of the most influential pianists in jazz and the very personification and creator of what has been called soul jazz, composing what are now standards such as ‘Sister Sadie’ and ‘Señor Blues’ and piloting a distinctive direction the Blue Note records sound would take. Initially making an impact with Art Blakey, who “borrowed” the name of Silver’s group to form The Jazz Messengers, Silver went on produce a series of classic albums for Blue Note in the 1960s, including the timeless Song For My Father with the infectious bossa style. Read more...