New York Beat

The legendary musical power of Pat Martino was on display at Birdland on April 4, 2013, in all its glory. The myths that have arisen about this formidable guitarist will have new layers when the jazz cognoscenti begin commenting on his latest feats.

Martino's burning swing, long the trademark of his improvisational wizardry, acquired added zip, ...

Celebrating the release of Black Orpheus (Motéma, 2013), bassist Nilson Matta brought his band into Dizzy's Club Coca-Cola on February 13, 2013. Along with pianist Klaus Mueller, percussionist Fernando Saci, drummer Alex Kautz and saxophonist Steve Wilson the show featured legendary singer Leny Andrade, who also performs on the CD. Although Brazilian music has enthralled American ...

The onslaught of compelling Latin jazz concerts, club performances and recordings here in Gotham are attracting audiences all over town. Here are a few highlights.

On Friday, January 11, Catalonian pianist Chano Dominguez appeared at Dizzy's Club Coca-Cola accompanied by drummer Dafnis Prieto. Selections from Dominguez's critically acclaimed Blue Note CD Flamenco Sketches (2012)--a tribute to ...

Although pianist Ellis Marsalis has garnered countless plaudits for his teaching at the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts and as chair of the Jazz Studies department at the University of New Orleans he rarely gets critical notice in these parts for his pianism. For decades, he has shaped the lives of countless jazz musicians including ...

In jazz history, the often ignored contributions of the great arranger/orchestrators can never be overestimated. It was Jelly Roll Morton's orchestral writing that enabled “Black Bottom Stomp" to soar. In trumpeter Miles Davis' Sketches of Spain (Columbia, 1960), it was Gil Evans' pen that created the magic. At Town Hall, it was Hall Overton's arrangements that ...

Very often writers ignore popular jazz artists and groups on the theory that they have sufficient exposure and don't need further praise. As a result, some of the subtler, finer points of the aesthetics go unnoticed. In addition, popularity and high success can be a curse, bestowing certain problems lesser performers don't have.

In recent months, ...

For decades, Stephanie Nakasian has been swinging through an immensely challenging jazz repertoire with astonishing aplomb. Her audacious ventures into vocal territory that others have carefully avoided have resulted in recordings and performances of unrivaled excellence. From pioneering vocal efforts with singer Jon Hendricks and Annie Ross to the rigorous charts of The Danish Radio Big ...

From its inception, one of the goals of this column has been to record the impact that jazz has made on the myriad musical traditions of our planet. Since I started writing about this subject a couple of decades ago, the amount of international folk music, dance forms, vocal stylings, variant scales, and other often spurious ...

In the midst of Jazz at Lincoln Center's May celebration of New Orleans music, Marcus Roberts and his trio, accompanied by a choir of horns, constructed a tribute to Jelly Roll Morton. The concert featured classic Morton compositions performed with some enterprising improvisations. Morton's importance as a jazz pioneer cannot be overstated, and the extent of ...

Continuing in the tradition of Thad Jones, Bob Brookmeyer)) and {{Jim McNeely, pianist/composer Kenny Werner has recently employed a leading European orchestra to perform his compositions. The resulting serendipitous marriage between Werner and The Brussels Jazz Orchestra (featured on the Academy Award-winning soundtrack to the 2011 movie, The Artist) produced an evening of intriguing music on ...

Tadd Dameron was born on Feb. 21 in 1917, and for the past few years, Smoke has celebrated his birthday over President's weekend. This year the tribute featured tenor saxophonists George Coleman and Eric Alexander on alternating nights, with a rhythm section of drummer Joe Farnsworth, bassist John Webber and pianist Rich Wyands.

Tadley Ewing Peake ...

When an artist comes along who convolutes traditional form, it sometimes takes eons for that artist's contribution to be understood, evaluated and finally appreciated. Initially, composer Igor Stravinsky was thrown out of Paris at the premier of “Le Sacre du Printemps," author James Joyce was banned in Boston for Ulysses," and composer John Cage ridiculed for ...

Any discussion of a jazz figure's importance must include an analysis of the breadth of his or her talents. No one doubts trumpeter Louis Armstrong's stature in the origins of Dixieland. But attempts to place Jelly Roll Morton next to him in the pantheon of the genre often meet with resistance. Yet, in addition to being ...

Last weekend my myriad travels took me to Pittsburgh, where I was able to visit Heinz Hall to watch Tony Bennett defy nature and astound a packed house with his latest concert wizardry. Heinz Hall sits in the middle of a revitalized downtown Pittsburgh and has been wondrously restored, with gold-leafed columns, plush red carpeting and ...