jazz2love

  Days of Gypsy Nights from Doug Wyatt Label:  Sonosphere Music Release Date:  April 18, 2024 Website: https://www.dougwyatt-music.com A refined smorgasburg of ambient strings, silky keys, tightly-knit percussive beats, and wavy saxophone tweets, Days of Gypsy Nights from pianist-composer-leader Doug Wyatt is a dreamy escape into an incorporeal textured ether.  Suspended strings swerve and twist smoothly across "Katy's Spring" as Wyatt's keys prance lightly, treading a tender pulsing along the melodic course.  The soft vibrations of Wyatt's keys are encircled in fluttering strings across "The Pseudo-Iterative," producing an angelic atmosphere, traversing into the portly throbbing of Michael Rosen's tenor saxophone through "Mythaka," as the breathy strokes of Wyatt's keys ruminate blissfully.  Wyatt's lilting keys imprint a poetic versing along "Return To The Sea Beyond," perusing delicately as wispy strings swirl and swis...

  New Release:  Steppin' Out from Mike Davis Label:  Turtle Bay Records Release Date:  April 5, 2024 Website: https://mike-davis-jazz.com/ Traditional ragtime transcribed in a modern language for contemporary listeners is cornetist and arranger Mike Davis's forté.  His new disc Steppin' Out has the leisurely lollygagging gait of vintage 1920's jazz and the liberating romps of flapper era kicklines, popularized through the Roaring Twenties.  Davis's music takes audiences back in time to the halls of speakeasies like 21 Club, the Stork Club, and the Cotton Club in New York City.   Recalling of artists like cornetist Bix Beiderbecke and pianist Jelly Roll Morton, the compilation is a blend of New Orleans jazz, Dixieland swing, and Tinpan Alley ragtime.  Davis sprouts a jubilant collection of standards and one original, “Half-Seas Over,” created by the band's pianist, Andy Schumm.  The arrangement nestles flaring horns beside a kickline rhy...

  New Release:  Zero Point from Hadar Noiberg and Katia Toobool Label:  Self-Released Release Date:  August 29, 2025 Website:  www.hadarnoiberg.com Stories woven from musical notes flittering, floating, frothing, and furling through improvised exchanges, hoist sonic passages that offer audiences a transcending experience with the recording Zero Point from award-winning flutist, composer, arranger, and producer Hadar Noiberg and pianist/composer Katia Toobool.  The duo is backed by a string quartet that brings out the warm luster of Noiberg and Toobool's original scores, showcasing a mixture of intimate reflections and aurally picturesque vistas, employing a wide range of influences, including classical music, Brazilian rhythms, and ambient jazz.   Performed live, the recording is filled with lyrical patterns, lobbing strings, and resonating spirals from Noiberg's flute.  The melodic musings explore the interplay between keys, strings and flu...

  New Release:  Bluer Than Blue from Sweet Megg Label:  Turtle Bay Records Release Date:  May 24, 2024 Website:  https://www.sweetmegg.com Dixieland jazz is revived by vocalist Sweet Megg on her new recording Bluer Than Blue from Turtle Bay Records.  Fusing western country with jazz swing is a special combination that is thoroughly American.  A Dixieland jazz shuffle whips through the title track with unbridled enthusiasm, switching to a Tex Mex fluster across "I Wander Where You Are Tonight."  The Tinpan Alley-inspired melody of "Someday Sweetheart" fashions a vaudeville-like shimmer reminiscent of the theme songs from the Broadway show Chicago, turning to a lulling country folk stroke along "Please Help Me I'm Falling," as vocalist Timbo joins on harmony.  The country swing rhythm of "Little Bit" is augmented by a twangy fiddle, moving into a cozy sway along "In A Sentimental Mood" igniting an intimate setting.  Collaborating wit...

  New Release:  The New Jersey Sessions from Jeremy Monteiro Label: Jazznote Records Release Date:  May 31, 2024 Website:  jeremymonteiro.com Pianist, composer and leader Jeremy Monteiro celebrates his 48th CD, The New Jersey Sessions , accompanied by tenor saxophonist Sean Hong Wei and featuring saxophonist Houston Person, bassist Jay Anderson, drummer Evan Sherman, and Alex Sipiagin on trumpet.  There is a big band feel to the arrangements, made by a handful of musicians on deck.  The posh ambience that Monteiro creates with the keys in tracks like "A Weaver of Dreams" and "Dewey Square" enshrouds the listener in waves of elegance.  The swinging rhythm bodes nicely with the refined extemporizing from the saxophone, giving these numbers a lively vibe.  Slow simmering tunes like "I Want To Talk About You" and "Life Goes On" pave the way for stirring dialogues performed by the saxophone.   The graceful phrasing of Wei's sax enlivens the w...

  New Release:  My Universe from Maria Puga Lareo Release Date: October 18, 2024 Label: My Keter Records/Outside In Music Website:  https://www.mariapugalareo.com Pensive and palliative, Maria Puga Lareo's vocals are very soothing on the aural senses, which she demonstrates prolifically on her third release My Universe .  Co-produced by her husband Bob Sheppard, whom she wrote two original tracks with for the recording, Lareo performs 8 tracks as interpretations of jazz standards.  Backed up a litany of Los Angeles based musicians, including pianist Josh Nelson, bassist Mike Valerio, drummer Christian Euman and guitarist Leo Amuedo, in addition to her husband on saxophone and woodwinds, the album has an easy flow that embraces the charming attributes of classic jazz.  From Lareo's soaring vocals driving "Depois de Tanto Tempo" to the sleeky flutters of Sheppard's sax splayed across "The Song Is You," the album puts listeners in a dreamy state of mind. ...