Browse some recent Origin Reviews.
Michael Dease - City Life: Music of Gregg Hill
by David R. Adler, JazzTimes
The Year in Trios, 2025
This is the eminent trombonist's third effort devoted to the music of Michigan composer Gregg Hill (who coproduced the set). It's a double album but the first half fits our mandate, with just trombone, bass (Linda May Han Oh) and drums (Jeff "Tain" Watts). Virtuosity, blues feeling, swing rhythm sharpened to a dagger's edge — need I say more? Don't listen to me, listen to... read more
Don Lanphere - Year 'Round Christmas
by Carol Swanson, christmasreview.com
Don Lanphere's Year 'Round Christmas arrived in my mailbox a few days ago as a delightful surprise. I had requested a different holiday release, and this pleasurable CD came along as an unexpected companion. I'm certainly glad it did.
Lanphere, a beloved jazz great who played with legends like Charlie Parker and Artie Shaw, was known as the "Seattle Jazz Grandpop." Sadly, the artist passed away in October 2003, but the fine music of this... read more
Marc Bernstein & Good People - Hymn For Life
by Robert Ratajczak, LongPlay: RadioJAZZ - Poland
[translated from Polish] The name Marc Bernstein, apart from concerts in 2012 and 2013 (ie 10.05.2013 at the Blue Note in Poznan) can be associated with such outstanding artists as Branford Marsalis, Michael Brecker, Billy Cobham and the famous Danish Klüvers Big Band (known even with the excellent album recorded with Mulgrew Miller, Grew's Tune, 2012). The list of famous musicians with which Bernstein has worked over the years is in... read more
Benjamin Boone with the Ghana Jazz Collective - Joy
by Chris M. Slawecki, All About Jazz
Benjamin Boone's set with this band born and grown in Ghana is a genuine cross-cultural jazz Joy.
The seeds of Joy were planted when composer-saxophonist Boone spent a year as a US Fulbright Scholar in Ghana in sabbatical from his professorship at California State University (Fresno), to study the country's music and musical traditions. The music Boone found made him feel at home: "These guys know American jazz inside and out—but with a... read more
Scenes - Along the Way
by John Kelman, All About Jazz
It's easier to impress listeners with virtuosity than subtlety and nuance, but thankfully there are those who take the road less traveled. Along the Way, the second release by Scenes, is the result of three musicians being comfortable in their own skins and having nothing to prove. The vibe may be relaxed and the delivery spacious, but this music proves that one should never mistake comfort for complacency.
Guitarist John Stowell has had a... read more
James Moody - 80 Years Young: Live at the Blue Note, March 26, 2005
by Will Friedwald, New York Sun
All-Star Celebration of James Moody's 100th Kicks Off the 2025 Blue Note Jazz Festival
The jazz great was born in Savannah and raised by a single mother in Newark, which is why that city's performing arts center names its annual fall jazz festival in his honor.
Somehow, my favorite bebopper, James Moody, was also my favorite rapper. In 1946, the 21-year-old veteran of the Army Air Corps joined Dizzy Gillespie's pioneering... read more
Hadley Caliman - Straight Ahead
by David Franklin, Cadence
Hadley Caliman recorded with the likes of Gerald Wilson, Don Ellis, and Mongo Santamaria in the 1960s and with such folks as Hampton Hawes, Joe Henderson, Freddie Hubbard, and a raft of other Jazz and Pop stars, as well as his own groups, in the ?70s. But the 78-year-old tenorist did not make another record until his return to the studio for a CD under his own name in late 2007. Gratitude was well-received with Straight Ahead... read more
EEA - The Dark
by David Kane, Cadence
Highly original is the fine music to be found on The Dark. EEA is a trio of a slightly unusual configuration: piano, trumpet, and sax. In the hands of these fine musicians, this combination reveals itself to be a most agreeable one indeed. The music consists of a handful of excellent originals penned by pianist Ake together with two lesser heard Ellington pieces, "Heaven" and "African Flower" together with a moody retelling of Gismonti's... read more
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