Browse some recent Origin Reviews.
Richard Cole - A Glance Back
by Adam Greenburg, All Music Guide
The debut solo album from Richard Cole, a Seattle sax player with some pretty good chops. The tone is relatively high here, making use of squeaks and squeals as possible, and holding to a modern jazz ideal in general. The solos sometimes draw themselves out in a slow arc before moving on, but they showcase some very nice sensitivity in exploring the range. The jazz scene in Seattle picked up quite a bit after the release of this album, and this... read more
Joonsam - A Door
by Chris Spector, Midwest Review
The young, South Korean bass players that's been parked in NYC when not globe trotting or over achieving, takes it downtown for a trio date that wholly original. With augmentation from other well known downtowners, this is typical of the kind of muscular, angular jazz that New York is known for, but in essence, there's nothing typical about it. Hard charging stuff that lets everyone have some like this is a long time working band, it's fresh... read more
Brent Jensen with The Acoustic Jazz Quartet - The Sound of A Dry Martini
by Dave Nathan, All Music Guide
Educator, clinician, and A-one alto sax player, Brent Jensen honors one of the most self-effacing musicians in the history of jazz, Paul Desmond. The title comes from Desmond's ambition to "sound like a dry martini," probably very light on the vermouth. There are many "Desmond-isms" that he liked to use to describe his work. On the secret to his unique tone, he said "I honestly don't know! It has something to do with the fact that I play... read more
Jeff Johnson - Near Earth
by Dan McClenaghan, All About Jazz
The trio format without a chording instrument (a guitar or keyboard) tends to loosen the atmosphere, giving the music a more fluid feel. Bassist Jeff Johnson, joined by saxophonist Hans Teuber and drummer Tad Britton, achieves a compelling chamber-like fluidity on Near Earth.
Teuber's tenor saxophone approach here has a clean, clear, bracingly cool feel on its interplay with with Johnson's round bass lines and the intricate textures from... read more
Anthony Branker & Imagine - What Place Can Be for Us?
by Matt Collar, All Music Guide
Although he doesn't play any of the instruments on 2023's What Place Can Be for Us?, Anthony Branker's vibrant jazz sensibilities and identity as a first-generation Black American of Caribbean descent are at the core of the album's pulsing character. A longtime professor at Princeton and Rutgers, Branker started out playing trumpet, but health issues following two brain aneurysms in the late '90s forced him to refocus his attention on composing,... read more
Greg Yasinitsky - YAZZ Band: New Normal
by Chris Spector, Midwest Record
A proven swinger rallies his troops up to the fact that the tracks they started before Covid got started will have to be finished remotely if they are to be finished at all. This is one leader that doesn't have to worry about getting fragged by friendly fire as they rise to the challenge. Sounding delightfully seamless, this hard charging crew makes it easy to say that big band is hear to stay. A real pulse pounder that feels like a throw... read more
Florian Hoefner - Luminosity
by Rick Anderson, CD Hotlist
Here is another very fine example of modern straight-ahead jazz from the young pianist and composer Florian Hoefner, now recording for the first time with acclaimed saxophonist Seamus Blake. This all-original program finds Hoefner doing what he does best: writing tunes that contain small surprises within familiar structures, that challenge the ear without defying it to stick around, and that bring out the best in his carefully-chosen... read more
Andrea Brachfeld - Brazilian Whispers
by Dan Bilawsky, All About Jazz
4-STARS While Brazilian Whispers marks Andrea Brachfeld's first thorough exploration of the titular stream of sound, you'd never know it from the results. Teaming up with Bill O'Connell, her longtime pianist and sounding board, the veteran flutist, who's typically engaged in Afro-Cuban affairs or straight ahead suggestions, sounds like she's been playing this music all her life.
Rather than spread focus across a massive realm of... read more
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