Among Friends (1201 Music 5013-2; 42:55) finds guitarist Denny Jiosa in a sunny mood, which is well suited to his light, smooth-toned style of play. Jiosa has the unique ability to keep that sweet tone immediate and emotive, without over ornamenting a phrase. This quality can really take wing in a sparse acoustic environment, shown here most notably on “Gentle Spirit,” which offsets the singing guitar with acoustic piano and warm upright bass. Surprisingly, this type of arrangement is the exception on Friends, with busier keyboard-washed tunes like “Lisa” and “Y2GRUV,” which, though hooky and easy to listen to, mask some of Jiosa’s elemental work. But there are some interesting moments that do make an impression, like Jiosa’s spindly, note-bending solo on “Nic of Time,” and his spiking, crying, electric-tinged work on the mysterious “Spider Dance,” one of the album’s true departures.
Originally PublishedRelated Posts
Sonny Terry/Brownie McGhee: Backwater Blues
Start Your Free Trial to Continue Reading
Become a JazzTimes member to explore our complete archive of interviews, profiles, columns, and reviews written by music’s best journalists and critics.
Jonathan Butler: The Simple Life
Jonathan Butler’s optimistic music belies a dirt-poor childhood growing up in a South Africa segregated by apartheid. Live in South Africa, a new CD and DVD package, presents a sense of the resulting inner turmoil, mixed with dogged resolve, that paved the way to his status as an icon in his country and successful musician outside of it. Looking back, the 46-year-old Butler says today, the driving forces that led to his overcoming apartheid-the formal policy of racial separation and economic discrimination finally dismantled in 1993-were family, faith and abundant talent.
“When we were kids, our parents never talked about the ANC [African National Congress] or Nelson Mandela,” he says. Butler was raised as the youngest child in a large family. They lived in a house patched together by corrugated tin and cardboard, in the “coloreds only” township of Athlone near Cape Town. “They never talked about struggles so we never knew what was happening.”
Start Your Free Trial to Continue Reading
Become a JazzTimes member to explore our complete archive of interviews, profiles, columns, and reviews written by music’s best journalists and critics.
Scott LaFaro
Previously unavailable recordings and a new bio illuminate the legend of bassist Scott LaFaro
Kurt Elling: Man in the Air
Nate Chinen makes the argument that Kurt Elling is the most influential jazz vocalist of our time