Browse some recent Origin Reviews.
Piet Verbist - Flamenco Jazz Summit: El Mar Empieza Aqui
by Russ Hubert, Adult Music Podcast
Piet Verbist shares his immersive experience into flamenco music through this satisfying melding with jazz. His original compositions cover a variety of traditional flamenco styles and rhythms, but also seamlessly flow into swinging sections in the songs. Thad Jones' "A Child Is Born" also gets an inventive reimagination. The instrumentation has a unique charm with Muriel's earthy bansuriney and Van Dyck's alto and soprano sax leading the... read more
John La Barbera Big Band - Grooveyard
by Jack Bowers, All About Jazz
4 1/2 STARS Composer/arranger John La Barbera has been at the top of his game for more than half a century, and Grooveyard is simply another example of his undiminished artistry. Besides arranging everything—superbly, as always—La Barbera wrote six of the session's ten charming songs, escorting other treasures by Carl Perkins, Dave Brubeck, Curtis Fuller and Elvin Jones.
As he writes his handsome and colorful big-band charts, La... read more
Les DeMerle - Cookin' At The Corner, Volume 2
by Edward Blanco, All About Jazz
On November 11 and 12, 2005 drummer Les DeMerle and his band recorded a two-session live performance at The Jazz Corner in Hilton Head, South Carolina, producing his fourth and fifth recordings, Cookin' at the Corner, Volume One and Volume Two for Origin Records. Recording a total of thirty songs, Volume Two represents the second half of this project.
As with the first session, this follow-up release features vocalist and wife, Bonnie... read more
Jessica Williams - Touch
by Michael Steinman, Cadence Magazine
Pianist Jessica Williams thinks deeply about her spiritual relationship with the instrument, and the deep cohesive bond is evident in her recordings. Touch finds her at one of her two favorite pianos in a comfortable space in Seattle, The Triple Door, where the audience is quietly attentive. Williams is a serious blend of the romantic experimenter, in love with the expansive sounds of the piano, and the player who knows the value of space and... read more
Ben Thomas Tango Project - The Hat with the Grin and the Chuckle
by Jack Bowers, All About Jazz
On The Hat with the Grin and the Chuckle, his sixth recording as leader of the Tango Project, composer and multi-instrumentalist Ben Thomas once again invites his audience to put on their dancing shoes and sway to Argentina's unique and emblematic musical genre. In doing so, he affirms that there is far more than one way to tango, eliciting all the warmth and color he possibly can within eight of his luminous and rhythmic... read more
Scenes - Variable Clouds: Live at the Earshot Jazz Festival
by Dan McClenaghan, All About Jazz
4-STARS - The group Scenes has released seven excellent albums over two decades of recording together, beginning with their eponymous debut (Origin Records, 2001). All of those are studio efforts. The group's 2022 outing, Variable Clouds is a first for Scenes—their first album recorded live in front of an audience, in 2021 at the Earshot Jazz Festival.
This is a return to the group's original line-up. Saxophonist Rick Mandyck sat out... read more
Chris Walden Big Band - No Bounds
by Adam Greenburg, All Music Guide
The follow-up to a particularly successful debut album, No Bounds brings more of what could potentially be referred to as "contemporary" big band. Big band as a major force disappeared decades ago, and those playing now are almost entirely nostalgia-based groups playing the old standards. Chris Walden is one of a very few that has adapted the genre to fit some more contemporary ideas, and takes new directions with the large-scale format. Here,... read more
Benjamin Boone - The Poets Are Gathering
by John Pietaro, The New York City Jazz Record
Jazz has had a century to flourish in the company of poetry—Langston Hughes and the Harlem Renaissance through the Beats, Umbra, Bob Dorough, the Barakas and Black Arts, Ishmael Reed, David Henderson, William Burroughs, Anne Waldman, John Giorno, Louis Reyes Rivera, Philip Levine and voices well beyond—and yet this commix stands boldly tenacious, seeking further expanse. Especially now, during National Poetry Month.
In his foray through... read more
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