While reading reviews about the 2010 Winter Jazzfest in New York City, I experienced a sensory overload, despite the fact that I hadn’t even been in attendance. The list of musicians that performed at the event seemed too good to be true, as did many of the reviews, so I vowed to check it out for myself when the event rolled around again in January of 2011…
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Umbria Jazz Winter #18 Orvieto, Italia 29 de diciembre 2010–2 de enero 2011

En el jazz los sueA os existen. Uno de ellos se llama Orvieto.

Hermano menor del Umbria Jazz Festival que cada verano se celebra en Perugia, el Umbria Jazz Winter de Orvieto complementa de un modo sabio las programaciones de ambos festivales y, ademA s, contribuye al equilibrio buscado por el principal patrocinador del festival, la regiA^3n de UmbrA-a, que de este modo divide el acontecimiento en dos ciudades que pertenecen a las dos subregiones umbras, Perugia y Terni…
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Matt Haimovitz/Uccello Meeting of the Spirits Oxingale Records 2010

That the classical music world should visit jazz repertory is not without precedent. As the saying goes, there’s nothing new under the sun. However, the spirits summoned here belong to that of visionary musician and internationally renowned cellist Matt Haimovitz and respected composer/arranger David Sanford. Together with the eight-piece cello ensemble, Uccello, the duo reconfigure classics by jazz masters from the 1920s to the 1970s, their respect for the original compositions coupled with imagination and tremendous virtuoso displays from Haimovitz. The participation of guitarist m: John McLaughlin on one of two Mahavishnu Orchestra numbers, drummer m: Matt Wilson and keyboardist Jan Jarczyk, lends an added dimension and additional vibrancy to several of the tracks. At the end of the day though, it is the ingenious layers of so many cellos, with their singular timbre, which brings energy, swing and luster to these decades-old compositions…
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Meet Juergen Reiter:

Juergen hit the local music scene of his hometown, Munich, at age 17. Shortly after his debut as a bassist he played in an opening act for Ray Charles. He honed his skills at the Sweelinck Conservatory of Amsterdam, in Paris under John Cage colleague Joelle Leandre, and, finally, at SUNY Purchase, New York. He graduated with a Masters degree in music in 2001…
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Led Bib: a short, sharp shock of a name for one of the hardest-hitting bands on the UK jazz scene. But the name doesn’t tell the whole story, for this is also a band that’s capable of inventive and intensely emotive music as well as the riff-laden numbers that have helped it to earn the label of "Punk Jazz," among others. In the runup to the release of the band’s fifth album, Bring Your Own (Cuneiform, 2011), the band’s amiable and articulate founder and drummer, Mark Holub, spoke of Led Bib’s development and its growth as a unit, his thoughts about the Led Bib sound, and the secret imagery of the mysterious Bring Your Own cover art…
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Teachers must find it hard to leave their job in the classroom, like Olympic runners find it hard to take their time. The best teachers educate out of reflex, and for Michael Steinman that reflex transcends classroom or course listing. Whether it’s English at Nassau Community College or hot jazz on the World Wide Web, passion and pedagogy are one and the same for Steinman…
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After a mighty kickoff near the end of 2010, CTI Masterworks is pushing ahead full-steam with another set of six remastered reissues, beautifully packaged in soft digipak editions. Its first batch of reissues included a tremendous, four-disc retrospective box set, CTI Records–The Cool Revolution, and an expanded, double-disc version of 1971′s California Concert: The Hollywood Palladium, alongside a half dozen of some the label’s cream of the crop such as trumpeter m: Freddie Hubbard‘s influential Red Clay (1970), saxophonist m: Stanley Turrentine‘s career-defining Sugar (1971) and flautist m: Hubert Laws‘ popular Morning Star (1973). For its second round–hopefully the first of many in 2011–CTI Masterworks crosses a variety of styles with a half dozen more significant artists, with albums covering a five-year period and ranging from mainstream cool to orchestra-driven funk and a whole lot more…
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Marcus Miller is a master musician of calm wisdom and impeccable taste, whose talent has been exposed to the elements under different kinds of light through the years, only to magnify the evident supremacy he so gently seems to hold over the bass guitar in recent years. As a multi-instrumentalist of deep musical curiosity, he has also placed a difficult instrument like the bass clarinet as one of his most distinctive trademarks. His recordings are always surprising, and his soul remains wide open and well centered: you must never sacrifice what you believe in. His musical joy is in what he leaves behind for others to feel. This is his time and his place…
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Meet Mike DiRubbo: Born on July 25, 1970 in New Haven, Connecticut, Mike DiRubbo began his musical life as a junior high school clarinetist, and switched to alto saxophone at 12. A primarily self-taught saxophonist, he developed into a talented instrumentalist drawn inexorably to the notion of improvising. At a high school band concert, Mike had the opportunity to perform with the Dwike Mitchell–Willie Ruff duo, an experience that would add to his desire to be a professional musician and also spark his interest in jazz music…
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Donny Hathaway Someday We’ll All Be Free Rhino France 2010

Critical opinion has not always been kind to the singer Donny Hathaway, who died in 1979 at the age of 33. Some have decried an alleged bourgeoisification of soul; but more cruel, perhaps, is the general neglect of critical and commercial attention in which Hathaway’s records languish. Rarely is he–or indeed, was he, during his lifetime–mentioned in the same breath as Marvin Gaye, m: Stevie Wonder or m: Al Green, beautiful singers, all of them, but also complex, accomplished R&B musicians to whose artistic status Hathaway clearly aspired…
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