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Click image above to hear "On Green Dolphin Street"
Like many serious musicians, John Stein was trying to find a way to reach his audience during the Covid-19 shutdown. He had just released Watershed, a career-defining recording to mark his planned retirement from Berklee College of Music where he was an acclaimed educator. When the tour in support of Watershed was scrapped due to the pandemic, Stein and the indefatigable Neal Weiss at Whaling City Sound came up with the idea of bringing Stein and his trio—with Ed Lucie on bass guitar and Mike Connors on drums—to the New Bedford Art Museum for a live-streamed performance. The show was an enormous creative success. While it was skillfully documented on video, Stein also had sound engineer John Farrell capture and mix the audio. From the opener, a take on Sonny Rollins’ “Alfie’s Theme,” to the closing, upbeat “Happy Hour,” a Stein original, the recording is a pure celebration of bristling energy and brilliant, intuitive performances. It’s the sound of unleashed happiness as embraced by three musicians, accursed pandemic or not, born to play beautiful jazz music.
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Rale Micic has played with such artists as Tom Harrell, Don Friedman, Peter Bernstein, Eric Alexander, Greg Hutchinson, but it’s the striking originality with which he plays his own music that really distinguishes him from other jazz guitar talents. On his new recording, Only Love Will Stay, Micic creates layers of original sounds, featuring a backbone in acoustic jazz ala John Abercrombie, the intricate textures of his internal conversations, and continuing through the loving melodic rhythms of his native Serbia. The session, with Jared Gold on keys and Geoff Clapp and Johnathan Blake on drums, is both relaxed and substantial, joyful and chill, starring the filigreed sounds of Micic’s Sadowsky archtop and the tasty choices of empathic accompanists. The result, on tunes like the dark and dramatic title track which opens the record, right through to the lush, atmospheric closer “Lipe Cvatu,” in 7/8, is enrapturing without going too deep into the margins and intoxicating without over-exerting. Micic’s Only Love Will Stay is a joyful experience and a stunning excursion into the mind of a truly original artist.
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#1 on 5/31/21 Radio Chart
FOUR (4) WEEKS at #1!
There’s a beautiful marriage happening with Greg Abate’s Magic Dance. It’s the union between Abate’s multi-instrumental gift of bebop and Kenny Barron’s varied and sublime compositions. Abate, with Barron, who handles keys on this recording session, are soulmates sharing this epic musical space. On their own, Barron’s melodies are transcendent. In Abate’s skillful hands, thanks to his ability to shift between alto, tenor, baritone and soprano saxes and flute, the material takes on new tones, colors and patterns. One of the liberties Abate took with the material involved varying the choice and number of horns on these tracks. On two tracks, he even went so far as to arrange and overdub four additional sax parts, modeled on the reed section of the traditional big band, which give Barron's lush sounds even greater texture and intricacy.
Underneath it all is the hot-shot rhythm section of bass player Dezron Douglas and drummer Johnathan Blake, a New York City tandem born to support and elevate these arrangements. In fact, the ensemble work throughout this two-disc project is incredible, and reaffirms the health of 'real' bebop, a genre in which Abate has, through a five-decade career, been a dependable flame keeper. With this collaboration, Abate, with sidemen Barron, Douglas and Blake prove that the glory of straight-ahead jazz can still be purposeful, exhilarating, and, above all,like all great marriages, faithful and true.
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It is glad tidings indeed that Whaling City Sound announces the release of a new Greg Murphy recording. In fact, the news is almost as joyous as the sound of Murphy’s piano. Cool Water is both heartwarming and exhilarating. Greg’s fingers find delicate and exciting ways of expressing themselves across the keys. It is the sound of a blissful talent given a new lease in both life and career, as well as the opportunity to rediscover his true and glorious gift. The recording opens with the ebullient “Chim Chim Cher-ee,” segues into a chancy take on Steely Dan’s “Green Earrings,” careening through a battery of brisk melodies and beautiful playing, including the astonishing “Cuttin’ Trane’s Corners,” a dark, surprising cover of Wayne Shorter’s “Lost,” and the funk-filled closing celebration, “You Decide.” Featuring Murphy’s bandmates Jeff “Tain” Watts on drums, Eric Wheeler on bass, and a bevy of special guests, Cool Water is just that, long and fresh, a ride with the top down, rife with optimism and full of freedom and discovery. Greg Murphy is clearly glad to be back and playing music again, and we should all be thankful for it.
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It may or may not be a fact that jazz musicians age with grace and class. Perhaps someday we will understand this idea better. But in Miles Donahue’s case, the concept certainly bears out. His latest album, coming on the heels of The Bug (Whaling City Sound, 2017), Just Passing Thru is large in scope and beautiful in execution. From song to song, there are moments of tenderness, passages of grandeur, and fistfuls of exhilarating, technical wonder. He ventures out on a Celtic limb on “Ireland,” swings with verve on “Living Room Blues,” and demonstrates subtlety and passion on the opener, “A Man of Few Words.” Donahue, who is fluent on trumpet as well as tenor and soprano saxes, chooses notes boldly, exploring the full length of tonal potential. It is a joy to follow his risky explorations, as he makes his way through a labyrinth of unexpected turns. It certainly helps that he has an amazing crew behind him. Joe Santerre provides power grooves on electric bass as does Larry Finn on drums. They are joined by percussionist Ricardo Monzon, keyboard player Alain Mallet, and a handful of tracks featuring guitarist Mike Stern. With a vision that includes Crusaders’ style R&B, Weather Report fusion and lovely, soulful turns, Donahue is masterly here. More than simply Just Passing Thru, he’s making his permanent mark on today’s jazz landscape.
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