05/18/13 By Lloyd Sachs

Kris Davis
Capricorn Climber
Clean Feed

Which comes first, the pianist or the composer? Even on Kris Davis’ exceptional 2011 solo album, Aeriol Piano , the answer was elusive, the ingenuity of her writing and arranging seizing as much attention as her playing and improvising. On Davis’ new quintet...

05/18/13 By Jeff Tamarkin

Miho Hazama
Journey to Journey
Sunnyside

Journey to Journey is big and busy music, layers of sound that alternately complement, tag-team and overlap. New York-based, Japanese-born Miho Hazama employs more than a dozen musicians on this recording and she keeps them active. The composer and arranger...

05/17/13 By Thomas Conrad

Jacky Terrasson
Gouache
Sunnyside

Between 1994 and 2007, Jacky Terrasson made 10 Blue Note albums. They established him as one of the most talented pianists of his generation. Terrasson’s relationship to a piano was like LeBron James’ relationship to a 10-foot-high basket. They both lived...

05/16/13 By Christopher Loudon

Tine Bruhn & Johnny O'Neal
Nearness
Burner

Despite a multifaceted career than spans several decades, pianist Johnny O’Neal is still known to many only for his brief but authoritative appearance as Art Tatum in the Ray Charles biopic Ray . So musically accurate was O’Neal’s portrayal that first-time...

05/16/13 By Mike Shanley

Alex Cline
For People In Sorrow
Cryptogramophone

Too often tribute albums are based on reverence that leaves the heart and soul of the honoree behind. Other times, the subject’s material gets re-contextualized to the point of absurdity. Alex Cline approached Roscoe Mitchell’s “People in Sorrow” hoping...

Melody Magic Frank Vignola & Vinny Raniolo

05/15/13 By Mike Joyce

Frank Vignola & Vinny Raniolo
Melody Magic
Azica Records

Melody Magic may not boast as high a profile as Frank Vignola’s pairings with Les Paul or Tommy Emmanuel or David Grisman, but this collaboration with fellow guitarist Vinny Raniolo offers similar rewards. By Vignola’s reckoning, the two have shared the...

05/14/13 By John Murph

Gerald Clayton
Life Forum
Concord Jazz

Gerald Clayton switches up his game on this thrilling disc. He ups the conceptual ante and widens his sonic palette to include trumpeter Ambrose Akinmusire, saxophonists Logan Richardson and Dayna Stephens, and singers Gretchen Parlato and Sachal Vasandani...

Venture Inward David Weiss & Point of Departure

05/13/13 By Steve Greenlee

David Weiss & Point of Departure
Venture Inward

Let’s call bunk on the claim that jazz should always find new things to say. Venture Inward , the new platter from trumpeter David Weiss and his quintet Point of Departure, is steeped in 1960s postbop—specifically that of Miles Davis—and it would be futile...

05/12/13 By Thomas Conrad

Stefano Battaglia
Songways

The five albums that Stefano Battaglia has made for ECM since 2005 contain the strongest work released by an ECM pianist during that period. That claim will be controversial, given that pianists like Keith Jarrett, Stefano Bollani, Bobo Stenson and Craig...

Long Story Short: Curated By Peter Brötzmann Various Artists

05/11/13 By Steve Greenlee

Various Artists
Long Story Short: Curated By Peter Brötzmann
Trost

The five-CD set Long Story Short is a distillation of the 2011 Music Unlimited festival in Wels, Austria, curated by angry-jazz saxophonist Peter Brötzmann. The box set presents more than six hours of free jazz performed by 18 different configurations, some...