Jazz
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New in The New York Times: my feature about Frank London, a trumpeter, composer, arranger, and bandleader who has played a major role in downtown jazz, the klezmer and Balkan music revivals of the ’80s, and a whole lot more.
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New in The New York Times Sunday Arts & Leisure section: my exit interview with the great trombonist and composer Jim Staley, who co-founded the essential new-music institution Roulette in 1978, and replanted it in his NYC loft in 1980, as he prepares to step away from leadership in June after 45 years.
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Endea Owens (Photograph courtesy Jazz at Lincoln Center and Bryant Park) The latest Weekend Arts Planner segment for WNYC, which aired on Weekend Edition on Saturday, July 29, covered items selected from a Gothamist story published on Thursday: "25 free things to do in NYC this August." David Furst and I talked about Free Shakespeare
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Endea Owens (Photograph courtesy of the artist) My contributions to "7 Picks a Week," the weekly Gothamist guide of arts and culture events and happenings in and around New York City. The complete article can be found here. Check out fast-rising bassist Endea Owens for free Detroit bassist, composer and bandleader Endea Owens is making
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Raphael Payare (Photograph courtesy Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal) My contributions to the latest installment of 7 picks a week, the arts and culture guide I compile weekly for Gothamist. See mysticism and melancholy through a world-famous painter's eyes "Exodus," an exhibition of recent works by the German painter and sculptor Anselm Kiefer, is so big
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Jason Moran and The Bandwagon (Photograph courtesy of the artists) My contributions to the latest installment of 7 picks a week, the arts and culture guide I compile weekly for Gothamist. See how the Great Migration inspired a cellist to make a move Already known as one of the finest young cellists of his generation,
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Nina Chanel Abney exhibition (Photograph courtesy Pace Prints) Here are my contributions to the latest installment of 7 picks a week, the arts and culture guide I compile weekly for Gothamist. Celebrate a hard-working jazz trio's 10th anniversary Serendipity had a hand in the formation of Thumbscrew, when bassist Michael Formanek filled in as a
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David Lynch (Photograph: Josh Telles) On Friday, Nov. 4, we rebooted the web post previously called Weekend Arts Planner. We moved it up to Friday, in hopes that it could serve to actually help folks plan their weekends and not just the days beyond. And we opened it up to more voices and perspectives from
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Mali Obomsawin (Photograph courtesy Jazz Gallery) Weekend Arts Planner took a break during the last weekend of October, chiefly due to on-air scheduling issues. But these are the items I prepared for the occasion, as they appeared in the Gothamist article "11 fun things to do in NYC that have nothing to do with trick-or-treating"
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Etienne Charles (Photograph: Lawrence Sumulong for Lincoln Center) The latest episode of Weekend Arts Planner, my weekly chat with Weekend Edition host David Furst that airs every Saturday morning on WNYC, covers noteworthy doings presented by the Museum of Modern Art, Lincoln Center, and the New York Philharmonic. Have a listen, or just read the
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Mayan Space Station by William Parker "The Best Music of July: NPR Staff Picks"NPR MusicAugust 3, 2021 William Parker: "Tabasco" from Mayan Space Station The veteran bassist, composer and community organizer William Parker is having an incredible year, with a 10-CD box set and an authorized biography already under his belt. He put out two
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I recall writing this review, which predates this blog by just over two years, but I don't remember for what outlet I wrote it. I located it today on a whim – after posting the image you see above on Twitter – on Acoustic Levitation, an online journal edited and published by Steve Koenig, a
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Change is upon us once again, and with it a fresh start for Night After Night—elsewhere. As of Thursday, April 23, the primary focus of my work has shifted over to a newly launched Substack newsletter, also called Night After Night. That title has provided my online identity – my "brand" – for more than
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Jon Christensen, a deft, sensitive drummer who embodied the "ECM Sound" and an enormously influential musician, has died at age 76. Read Ethan Iverson's tribute, here, for as beautiful a succinct summary of Christensen's contributions to music as you possibly could want, and then watch this live video of Christensen playing in Keith Jarrett's storied
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Word has come that Lyle Mays – an extraordinary pianist, composer, bandleader, and a longtime member of the Pat Metheny Group – has died after a recurring illness. Nate Chinen, in an obituary written for WBGO, gets to the heart of Mays's creative persona: Mays was a musician of clear, analytical temperament, but within the
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Max Roach – "The Dream/It's Time," from Chattahoochie RedMax Roach, drums, composer; Odean Pope, tenor saxophone; Cecil Bridgewater, trumpet; Calvin Hill, bassColumbia; 1981 Joseph Schwantner – New Morning for the World ("Daybreak of Freedom")Willie Stargell, narrator; Eastman Philharmonia/David EffronMercury; 1983
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Tiger Trio Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY January 4, 2020General admission Personnel: Joëlle Léandre, bass, vocalsMyra Melford, pianoNicole Mitchell, flute, alto flute, piccolo Back in the heyday of live jazz on New York City's 52nd Street, from the end of Prohibition in 1933 until the early '50s, the Three Deuces occupied a
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Up until about 15 years ago, I maintained a document whose existence I cherished: a near-complete listing of all the concerts I'd attended during my lifetime up to that point. "Near-complete," because I'm pretty sure it started with Spyro Gyra at the Agora Ballroom in Houston (Nov. 16, 1980) and not my actual first concert:
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I wrote for the Village Voice only one time, very early in my professional career, at the tail end of the full-time jazz journalism stage that preceded my return to classical music after around five years of estrangement. The article was published Feb. 27, 2001, or so the website tells me. That I never returned to
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Formed in 1966 in the city whose banner it would fly around the globe, the Art Ensemble of Chicago turned 50 in 2016. Of the longtime classic lineup – saxophonists Roscoe Mitchell and Joseph Jarman, trumpeter Lester Bowie, bassist Malachi Favors, and percussionist Don Moye – two, Bowie and Favors, have passed away, and one, Jarman,
Night After Night 