Josef Woodard
Josef’s Contributions
10/18/09 Concerts
Big-Band Bash at the Hollywood Bowl
Roberta Gambarini shines at all-star L.A. show
10/06/09 Concerts
Monterey Jazz Festival
Versatile programming (and a surprise Sco-Lo set) at the world’s oldest continuous jazz fest
October 2009 Albums
Urbanus
Stefon Harris & Blackout
Stefon Harris and his group Blackout keep their jazz muse on while exploring a contemporary groove.
09/15/09 Albums
Live In Europe
Rashied Ali Quintet
The late drummer Rashied Ali was probably best known for his role as a ripe drum foil in the last, exploratory phase of John Coltrane’s career. But the fervent and imaginative drummer’s musical life went in intriguing directions and surfaced in various locales...
August/September 2009 Albums
Spirit Moves
Dave Douglas & Brass Ecstasy
Dave Douglas has long shown a dominant innovator’s gene in his varied work, right down to the dizzying diversity of projects he concocts and pursues. Simultaneously, though, Douglas is prone to paying affectionate tribute to influential masters. Both instincts...
April 2009 Features
Behind the Music: The Jazz Arrangers
Four master arrangers discuss their unheralded role
April 2009 Albums
Peter Bernstein Trio
Monk
A guitarist rescues the Monk songbook from predictability
April 2009 Albums
Mosaic: A Celebration of Blue Note Records
The Blue Note 7
Venerable old Blue Note Records, one of the last “major” jazz labels standing, has assembled in-house/road-show projects in the past, but this year’s “Blue Note 7” counts for something special. Here we have a versatile and hot aggregation of players, ably...
April 2009 Albums
Live at Newport
Christian Scott
From one perspective, it might seem a bit premature for young trumpeter Christian Scott to be releasing a live album, with only two major label studio albums out since his emergence on the scene in 2006. On the plus side, Live at Newport, with material drawn...
March 2009 Farewells
Paul Bley Remembers Jimmy Giuffre
In his long and wandering career, Jimmy Giuffre, who died on April 24, 2008 at age 86, defied easy, tidy summaries of his artistic vision. Moving from right to left and back, from swing to avant-garde, he wrote the Woody Herman tune “Four Brothers” but was...
March 2009 Albums
Bona Makes You Sweat
Richard Bona
The Cameroon-born Bona has become one of the most expressive bassists in jazz.
March 2009 Albums
Notes From the Village
Anat Cohen
Josef Woodard reviews the latest recording from Anat Cohen, the clarinetist and saxophonist orginally from Israel.
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ReportAbout Josef Woodard
Josef Woodard has covered jazz for JazzTimes and other magazines since the late 1980s, classical/contemporary music for the Los Angeles Times since 1993, opera for Opera Now, and pop and jazz for Rolling Stone, among countless other associations. At the moment, he is working on a book on Charles Lloyd. Also a guitarist, songwriter, co-owner of the 20-year-old Household Ink Records label (householdink.com) and general “situationist,” Woodard tries to maintain a balance between looking at music from the outside and burrowing into creative machinery.