(Click on cover for issue PDF)
On The Cover:
JOHNNY O’NEAL
(by Marilyn Lester)
Truly unique, O’Neal offers a singular pianistic virtuosity melded with heartfelt vocalizing—and he’s collaborated with a veritable who’s who of jazz, including a short list of Art Blakey, Nancy Wilson, Ray Brown, Joe Pass, Kenny Burrell, Barry Harris, Dizzy Gillespie, Ron Carter, Harry Connick Jr., Wynton Marsalis, Roy Hargrove and many more…
Interview:
DIDA PELLED
(by Sophia Valera Heinecke)
Tel Aviv-born, Brooklyn-based Dida Pelled is known for her smoky vocal tone, highly personal guitar work and aptitude at wrangling a multiplicity of genres with the spirit of a rodeo rider…Her unapologetically blues-drenched, newly-released album is I Wish You Would, which gets its NYC album release concert this month at Joe’s Pub.
Artist Feature:
MICHAEL FOSTER
(by John Pietaro)
Consider: “What happened to transgression and a bit of playful vulgarity? Sexual innuendo within jazz has always been there. Art should provoke.”—Michael Foster.
Saxophonist Foster stands as an organizer, curator and performer of LGBTQIA+ culture within the wider avant garde. With roots in New York and then years spent in LA, he returned to NYC’s experimental music circle, helping to carve a new, queerer space in
the scene…
Encore:
LINDA FREDRIKSSON
(by Wif Stenger)
With stunts like playing 24 gigs in 24 hours and trading instruments mid-song without missing a beat,“punk jazz” trio Mopo put Finnish saxophonist Linda Fredriksson on the map—at least among fans of scruffy European improv—around 2012…
Lest We Forget:
BESSIE SMITH
(by Marilyn Lester)
Known as “Empress of the Blues,” Bessie Smith (1894-1937) is arguably one of the best known and enduring blues singers of all time…Smith has remained influential, an inspiration to her collaborators (Louis Armstrong, Coleman Hawkins,
Fletcher Henderson, James P. Johnson, et al.), as well as to vocalists who followed her…
VOXNews
(by Tessa Souter)
Vocal Pride in Jazz…NYCJR celebrates Pride Month in June. And there is a lot to celebrate, even in these difficult times…
Label Spotlight:
KOU RECORDS
(by Kurt Gottschalk)
In an era of nonphysical media, when music purchases are stored in a so-called “cloud” and can be played on an array of linked devices, vocalist-composer Charmaine Lee and producer-composer Randall Dunn are all about physical product…
NY@Night
Album Reviews
In Print, On Screen, Boxed Set, Drop The Needle Reviews, Globe Unity…
