Browse some recent Origin Reviews.
Benjamin Boone - The Poets Are Gathering
by George W Harris, Jazz Weekly
Benjamin Boone plays alto and soprano saxes with a core team of Kenny Werner/p, Ari Hoenig/dr and Corcoran Holt/b and a rotating group of guests on instruments and vocals with poems narrated by 11 different guests. The basic theme here is a result of the frustration from COVID-19 and the George Floyd trauma, with a mix of jazz and poetry that has been part of the tradition since "Strange Fruit". Boone and Werner compose most of the music, with... read more
John Wojciechowski - Focus
by Sean J. O'Connell, Downbeat
This date by saxophonist John Wojciechowski hangs in a tight classic '60s quartet formation, brimming with full-bodied horn work and assertive percussion. The leader penned seven of the 10 tunes and brought along three different horns to blow his way through them.
The album highlight is "Summon The Elders," an explosive statement full of dramatic entrances and freight-train drums honoring the muscle of trailblazers like John Coltrane and... read more
John Stowell - Solitary Tales
by George Fendel, Jazzscene, April 2009
Anyone who has witnessed a performance by master guitarist John Stowell, knows that he is far from your everyday guitarist. From the nearly vertical position of the guitar (not unlike the position of a cello) to the artist's expression and his closed eyes, Stowell is nearly one with the guitar. On this solo expedition, he plays both acoustic and electric guitars in the Portland, Oregon living room of his luthier, Mike Doolin. Stowell plays five... read more
Anthony Branker and Word Play - Uppity
by Ken Franckling, Ken Franckling's Jazz Notes
A medical condition that led to a seizure and two brain aneurysms in 1999 forced jazzman Anthony Branker to give up the trumpet, but not his talents as a conceptualist and composer. (He is also an educator ? the founder and director of the jazz studies program at Princeton.) His newest release, featuring his all-star sextet Word Play, is both beautiful and provocative. Favorites: ?Three Gifts (from a Nigerian Mother to God)? and the title track... read more
David Friesen - This Light Has No Darkness, Volume 1
by Dan McClenaghan, All About Jazz
4-STARS In 2020, David Friesen, an American jazz artist with Ukrainian roots, released his masterpiece, Testimony (Origin Records). The set was an orchestral, spiritual soundscape featuring Friesen's jazz quartet and the National Academic Symphonic Band of Ukraine. Recorded in Kyiv, in December of 2018—about three years before Russia invaded Ukraine—the music was a majestic testament to Friesen's faith, embracing tranquility... read more
Dawn Clement - Break
by Adam Greenberg, All Music Guide
She's a vocalist at times, but it's her ability on the piano that sets Dawn Clement apart from the crowd. The songs chosen for this, her sophomore album as a bandleader, are largely from the realm of the jazz torch song, but with a handful of original compositions and a few surprises thrown in. Clement has a tiny, gentle singing voice ? definitely youthful but with something of the breathy, kittenish quality of Portishead's Beth Gibbons as well.... read more
Ben Thomas Tango Project - The Hat with the Grin and the Chuckle
by Eric Olson, Earshot Jazz
Not quite an accordion, nor exactly an oversized harmonica, coming off somewhere between a blown reed instrument and a bowed string, the indelible, somewhat nasally bandoneon — the melodic mainstay of traditional tango music — is frequently a clarion call to the dancefloor.
But not always! On The Hat with the Grin and the Chuckle, the newest album from the Ben Thomas Tango Project, the bandoneon functions as the most outspoken member of a... read more
Phil Kelly & The SW Santa Ana Winds - My Museum
by Forrest Dylan Bryant, JazzTimes, February 2007
Like their meteorological namesake, this California counterpart to Phil Kelly's Seattle-based big band is breezy, warm, and unmistakeably L.A. The first half of the program finds the 19-piece ensemble working hard-swinging modern arrangements, until the title track slows things down with full strings and a soulful vocal by Greta Matassa. From there the band cruises along on some light funk and Latin numbers before coming full circle, ending... read more
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