Latest posts
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Dinah Washington and the Rhythmic Authority: The Queen, the Max Roach Precision, and the 1954 Dinah Jams Masterwork
The Chronicle of an Era: The Mid-Fifties Studio Jam Session Vanguard and EmArcy’s Pure Captive Energy By the arrival of 1954, the recording of vocal jazz was largely dictated by tight, commercial radio formulas. Record executives typically placed female vocalists behind rigid, highly polished pop orchestras, allowing them exactly three minutes to deliver a pristine,…
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Bessie Smith and the Acoustic Majesty: The Empress, Young Louis Armstrong, and the 1925 St. Louis Blues Foundation
The Chronicle of an Era: The Acoustic Era Twilight, the Primitive Horn, and Columbia’s Early Race Records In the freezing weeks of January 1925, the global recording industry was standing on the absolute precipice of its first massive technological revolution. The invention of the electric microphone was still a closely guarded laboratory secret at Western…
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Nina Simone and Pastel Blues: Where Blues, Protest and Classical Discipline Became One
There are albums that document a singer at a particular moment, and there are albums that seem to contain an entire artistic identity. Nina Simone’s Pastel Blues belongs to the second category. Released by Philips in 1965, it lasts little more than half an hour, yet within that relatively compact space Simone moves through blues,…
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Sarah Vaughan with Clifford Brown: When the Divine One Met the Brightest Trumpet in Jazz
Some jazz albums feel inevitable only after they exist. Sarah Vaughan with Clifford Brown is one of them. Sarah Vaughan had already established herself as one of the most technically extraordinary singers to emerge from the bebop generation. Clifford Brown, still in his twenties, had become the trumpeter whose combination of brilliance, warmth and melodic…
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Keith Jarrett — The Köln Concert: The Night Improvisation Became a World of Its Own
Cologne, January 24, 1975: A Concert That Almost Never Happened Few recordings in jazz history have accumulated a mythology as persistent as The Köln Concert. The circumstances seem almost designed for retrospective legend: a twenty-nine-year-old Keith Jarrett arrives in Cologne exhausted from touring, discovers that the piano prepared for him is not the instrument he…
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Freddie Hubbard and the Volcanic Valve: Brass Pyrotechnics, the Englewood Cliffs Soundstage, and the 1961 Ready for Freddie Manifesto
The Chronicle of an Era: The 1961 Pós-Bop Transition, Blue Note’s Sonic Architecture, and the Evolution of the Modern Trumpet By the dawn of 1961, the hard bop movement in New York City was beginning to stretch and fracture under the weight of its own creative ambitions. The standard, blues-based formulas of the late 1950s…
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Hamilton de Holanda and the 10-String Transfiguration: Afro-Brazilian Grooves, Modernist Choro, and the 2006 Brasilianos Monument
The Chronicle of an Era: The 21st-Century Instrumental Renaissance, The Evolution of Choro, and the Decentered Jazz Map By the dawn of the 2000s, global instrumental music was operating within a radically decentralized reality. The historic, Anglo-American monopoly on modern jazz improvisation was being systematically challenged by global sonic movements that fused their native, ancient…
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Pat Metheny and Bright Size Life: The Album That Redefined the Modern Jazz Guitar Trio
Before the Pat Metheny Sound Had a Name By the middle of the 1970s, the electric guitar occupied a complicated place in jazz. The instrument had already traveled an extraordinary distance from Charlie Christian’s pioneering amplification through Wes Montgomery’s melodic authority, Jim Hall’s conversational subtlety, Grant Green’s blues-centered directness, and the increasingly powerful influence of…
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Nat King Cole and After Midnight: When the Great Singer Returned to His Jazz Piano
Nat King Cole and After Midnight: When the Great Singer Returned to His Jazz Piano For millions of listeners, Nat King Cole exists first as a voice. It is one of the most immediately recognizable voices in twentieth-century popular music: warm without becoming sentimental, precise without sounding mannered, intimate even when surrounded by strings and…