Browse some recent Origin Reviews.
Carlos Vega - Bird's Ticket
by Chris Spector, Midwest Review
With a foot in several worlds at once, sax man Vega can tear it up in Chicago while teaching in Florida while going straight ahead with Doc Severinsen after tearing it up Latin style with Arturo Sandoval. This is one cat that can make your head spin. Here we find him with some local Chicago cats mixing improv with experimental with free form tying it all up in a nice left leaning bow. High octane stuff with loads of genre blending for those... read more
Scott Reeves - Portraits and Places
by Chris Spector, Midwest Review
A flugelhorn player that has earned his spurs as an arranger and conductor while laboring in the vineyards for a long time for cats as disparate as Dave Liebman and Bob Brookmeyer, he knows his jazz and thanks those long gone for the music that inspired him as well as those still around that taught him. Not nearly a kid and playing like an adult, this is sitting down big band listening music that'll have you bobbing your head and tapping your... read more
Greta Matassa | Clipper Anderson - And to All a Good Night
by Lee Mergner, JazzTimes
In this beautifully recorded and produced album from the underrated Origin label, holiday music is given a set of exquisite and precise arrangements. The Seattle-based Matassa is the chief lead singer, although co-leader and bassist Anderson takes a turn in the spotlight on a few songs. The music could perhaps be described as West Coast cool jazz, but they mix up the rhythms pretty well. Matassa's voice has a purity something like June Christy... read more
Jessica Williams - Songs For A New Century
by Robert Doerschuk, Downbeat, December 2008
On Songs For A New Century (****) Jessica Williams proves that she excels in the solo format. These pieces may owe something to her decision to remove the music stand and fall-board, unfold the front part of the lid and lower the level of her seat. What matters more is the results of this tinkering, and while outside effects do crop up, such as the sparking string plucks on "Toshiko," the effect is one of consonance and elegance, more... read more
Brad Goode - Polytonal Big Band: The Snake Charmer
by Jack Bowers, All About Jazz
4 1/2 - STARS "Polytonal," according to Webster's, denotes "the simultaneous use of two or more musical keys." Denver-based trumpeter and educator Brad Goode makes full use of that technique on The Snake Charmer, the debut recording by Goode's well-named Polytonal Big Band. When all has been written and played, two things are clear: first, Goode is a world-class big-band composer-arranger and master of his horn; and second, polytonality... read more
New Stories - Hope is in the Air
by Jeff Krow, Audiophile Audition
New Stories, the piano trio made up of Marc Seales, bassist Doug Miller, and drummer John Bishop, have undertaken the daunting task of reviving eleven tracks from the brilliant bop composer and pianist, Elmo Hope. Hope was a much lesser known contemporary of of Bud Powell and Thelonious Monk. He only lived to be 43, but left a legacy of bop compositions. Elmo passed away in 1967, but his wife, Bertha, an excellent pianist herself, has continued... read more
Jared Hall - Influences
by Werner Stiefele, Rondo Das Klassic & Jazz Magazin (Germany)
Who remembers the trumpeters Woody Shaw (1944-1989), Roy Hargrove (1969-2018), Wallace Roney (1960-2020) or Tom Harrell (*1946)? Each of these four had their own style, and yet they seem to have been forgotten. However, jazz musicians can get just as much inspiration from them as from recognized trumpet greats such as Louis Armstrong, Clifford Brown, Dizzy Gillespie, Chet Baker or Miles Davis. For Jared Hall, born in 1985, the first four are... read more
Dave Liebman | John Stowell - Petite Fleur: The Music of Sidney Bechet
by Dan Bilawsky, JazzEd
Sidney Bechet is rightly hailed as one of the seminal figures of this music, putting his stamp on the NOLA clarinet tradition shortly after its dawn, codifying and expanding the soloist's language through his early recordings, and blazing a trail on soprano saxophone. But he was also a fine melodist, a fact which is often overlooked when his accomplishments are considered, weighed, and packaged for historical use. With this engaging duo date,... read more
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