Mark Sullivan for ALL ABOUT JAZZ- “At age 80 legendary saxophonist/composer Charles Lloyd shows no signs of slowing down. In addition to his New Quartet—most recently documented on Passin‘ Thru (Blue Note Records, 2017)—he has collaborated with the Greek singer Maria Farantouri on Athens Concert (ECM, 2011); played duets with Quartet pianist Jason Moran on Hagar’s Song (ECM, 2013); and produced a long-form suite commissioned by the Jazztopad Festival in Wroclaw, Poland, documented on Wild Man Dance (Blue Note Records, 2015).

Vanished Gardens marks the second recording of his guitar-oriented band The Marvels, following I Long to See You (Blue Note Records, 2016). The debut album employed a lot of traditional American songs (and modern “folk” tunes in the same tradition). This time the Americana aspect of the project is reinforced by the prominent contributions of singer/songwriter Lucinda Williams, who is featured on half of the ten tracks. Williams may not seem like an obvious choice, but she and Lloyd found a deep Southern connection; this collaboration was preceded by mutual live guest appearances (as well as performances by guitarist Bill Frisell and pedal steel guitarist Greg Leisz on Williams’ recordings)…

This collaboration has all the hallmarks of a star-crossed event. Williams’ singing and songwriting provide a focus for the entire album, inspiring the band and setting the tone for the instrumental tracks. Vanished Gardens should be a revelation to fans of both Charles Lloyd and Lucinda Williams.”

Read the full review on All About Jazz

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Gary Graff for BILLBOARD- With this week’s arrival of a second album from his Big Fun Trio — Something Smells Funky ‘Round Here, whose title track premieres exclusively below — Elvin Bishop feels like he’s establishing the group as a going concern.

“It’s just what I do now, I guess,” the guitarist and Rock and Roll Hall of Famer (as a founding member of the Paul Butterfield Blues Band) tells Billboard, unapologetically reveling that the BFT has proven its initial doubters wrong. “It looked like the odds weren’t too good at it succeeding,” he recalls. “It’s funny; I think the first instinct a lot of people have is that when you downsize to a trio it’s because of financial reasons. That really wasn’t it. I took my seven-, eight-piece band as far as I could and I couldn’t think of anything more to do with it. I’m a democratic kind of guy, wanting to keep people happy. I gave a lot of solos to the other guys, and when you do that you stand around with your thumb up your butt waiting for the trombone player to finish.”

That, he says, is not the case with the BFT.

“Oh, no — the trio is a lot more fun,” Bishop says of the troupe he formed during 2015 with guitarist/pianist Bob Welsh and percussionist Willy Jordan. “With the trio you’ve got to be there all the time. There’s no place to hide. You’ve got to be kicking something in there. It keeps you interested.”

 

Read the rest of the interview and listen to new music on Billboard

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Larry Blumenfeld for The Village Voice – An uninformed listener attending a late set at the Subrosa club on a Monday in April — one who knew nothing of Eddie Palmieri’s long career shaping Afro-Latin jazz into a uniquely New York sound — might have thought the solo pianist onstage was a straight-up avant-gardist. Palmieri crafted abstractions with a heavily amplified Yamaha hybrid piano. Single notes were piercing pokes. Complex chords became brash tonal washes. The logic was rhythmic, suggested as much as stated, and always of Afro-Caribbean lineage. Palmieri’s improvisations moved from formal to funky to funny. Here and there, he gracefully stitched in a passage of startling beauty, as with the melody of “Life,” a tender ballad from his new album, Sabiduría/Wisdom.

Palmieri went on like this for more than twenty minutes, relentless and riveting. You’d never have suspected he turned eighty in December.

Born in Harlem to Puerto Rican parents, and raised in the Bronx, Palmieri is the reigning patriarch of Afro-Latin music in the U.S. On opening night of “Eddie Palmieri Presents Afro-Caribbean Mondays,” a weekly series that runs through August, some audience members seemed old enough to recall the hard-edged innovations of Conjunto la Perfecta, which Palmieri formed in 1961, or Harlem River Drive, through which, a decade later, Palmieri braided together Latin, jazz, funk and soul. Palmieri’s new album and Subrosa residency don’t amount to a victory lap. Rather, they’re evidence that he still sets the pace.

 

Find the full article at The Village Voice

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Pat Metheny has been elected into the prestigious Royal Swedish Academy of Music. The news comes just months after the guitarist, composer, and bandleader received the National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master Award (the United States’ highest national award for a jazz artist) as well as Jazz FM’s “PRS- Music Gold Award” for lifetime achievement.

Founded in 1771 by King Gustav III, the Royal Swedish Academy of Music is one of the Royal Academies in Sweden. The academy’s purpose is to promote art music and musical life. It shall thus follow developments within Swedish and international music circles, take initiatives to advance musical culture as well as support education, research and artistic development in music’s various fields.

From The Royal Swedish Academy of Music Voting Board:

“The American Guitarist and Composer Pat Metheny is one of the world’s most significant living jazz musicians. He has an unmistakable sound and is an improviser with what appears to be an infinite flow of ideas. He has collaborated with most of the biggest names in the jazz, but also with composers and artists like Terry Riley, Steve Reich, Joni Mitchell and David Bowie. His discography is extensive. Metheny has driven many types of projects in the course of his career, both traditionally and experimentally. Some with a wide, inclusive appeal, others with a narrower, more searching side. Pat Metheny is also a diligent writer in all topics that appeal to music.”

 

Find Pat Metheny on TKA

Rich Juzwiak for JEZEBEL –

Today, Meshell Ndegeocello is debuting on Jezebel the video for her twangy cover of Ralph Tresvant’s simmering new jack swing classic “Sensitivity.” In a quietly radical decision, Ndegeocello keeps the gender-specific nouns of the original song in place, so that she sings things like, “You need a man with sensitivity, a man like me…” When Jezebel talked to her about the decision to faithfully cover the song in a wide-ranging conversation we had with her about her covers album Ventriloquism and career, this is what the out artist had to say:

 

“I mean, I’m called “sir” all the time, but if you know me, I’m a fragile flower. I forget that I’m a tatted up, braided, black person. I look like a dude. And sometimes I’m treated as such. I’m very aware of those realities. Also I love that song. Men need to have a conversation. What does it mean to be a man? I think we’re on a precipice right now. I just want to ask some other questions. What is it to be a compassionate human being in society and not be so influenced by our eyes? To really take time before we judge a person?”

 

Image credit: Charlie Gross

 

Watch the video on Jezebel

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Geoffrey Himes for PASTE – The 1960s were a time of upheaval in all corners of American culture, not the least in music. Lyricists such as Bob Dylan, Paul Simon, Curtis Mayfield and Lou Reed were revolutionizing songwriting by introducing new subject matter and literary techniques. Instrumentalists such as John Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Bill Evans and Charles Lloyd were upending all previous notions of harmony and rhythm.

Looking back, it seems strange that these two areas of innovation never merged. Occasionally a jazz soloist would sit in with bands such as Steely Dan and Grateful Dead, and jazz bands would sometimes cover the songs of Dylan and Simon. But you never had a major lyricist recording and touring with a true jazz band on an equal basis.

Joni Mitchell  did make a pair of studio records (Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter and Mingus) with Weather Report’s Wayne Shorter and Jaco Pastorius, and Sting made three (The Dream of the Blue Turtles, …Nothing like the Sun and The Soul Cages) with Branford Marsalis and Kenny Kirkland. But the albums were credited to Mitchell and Sting alone—and rightly so, for the jazz musicians were clearly sidemen and not full partners.

That’s what makes the new album, Vanished Garden, such a milestone. Not only is it credited to “Charles Lloyd & the Marvels + Lucinda Williams,” but the music within represents a true collaboration between the jazz musicians and the singer/songwriter. You can hear the saxophonist and his musicians respond to Williams’ words and melodies, and you can hear the vocalist react to the ever-shifting harmonies and rhythms beneath her. The collaboration is not compartmentalized into the jazz musicians cutting loose on the solos and the Americana musicians stepping forward in the vocal sections; it’s integrated from start to finish.

Image credit: Erik Jacobs, Ebru Yildiz for NPR

 

Find the full interview on PASTE

Find Charles Lloyd on TKA

Daylan Williams for dailymotion – Daylan Williams sat down with Charles Lloyd and Lucinda Williams do discuss the new release by Charles Lloyd and The Marvels ‘Vanished Gardens’. In the interview, Lloyd mentions how “forces of nature” brought him and Williams together.

Their affiliation began backstage at the Lobero Theater in Santa Barbara. Lloyd and The Marvels had finished their set and Williams had made it backstage after the show. Upon meeting, Lloyd and Williams had a common understanding of the love of their art.

 

Find the interview on dailymotion

Find Charles Lloyd on TKA

Pranav Trewn for STEREOGUM – I couldn’t wrap my head around all the Royal Wedding hoopla that took place last month. I mean, beyond my inherent wariness of celebrating a colonialist institution and the usual skepticism that comes with excessive interest in the lives of people notable for hardly any reason beyond wealth, I just can’t understand getting that excited about a white wedding. Don’t take offense, I’m sure those celebrations are as lovely and moving as they’re depicted in the movies. I even hope to go to one someday! But I’ve been raised on Indian weddings my entire life, and Indian weddings are a thoroughly different beast.

Without even mentioning the richer color palettes, food with actual flavor, and music holding a timbre far more amenable to really getting down (a daily facet of these ceremonies, which typically run a glorious five days on average), the core leg up Indian weddings have on their Western counterparts is the baraat. The greatest among nearly a dozen functions, a baraat is essentially a parade by the groom’s wedding party held as they journey to the venue. The baraat often features its own band and set of dancers, but everyone in the procession typically contributes to the spirit with singing, stomping, and handclaps, all while the groom rides above regally veiled on a mare encircled by his loved ones.

Carried by the infantry march of the dhol — a shoulder-slung dual-sided drum smacked loudly with sticks, the most perfect instrument ever created — the amalgam of participants marches without break to the bridal party, who await to greet them upon arrival. (I’ve participated in this ceremony in both parties, and it is considerably more enjoyable to be with the groom – it can take hours for them to make their way down.) What follows is the milni, where the corresponding family members from each side (i.e. father and father, aunt and aunt, second cousin and second cousin, etc.) embrace one another with garlands, before a pissing contest ensues to see who can lift the other higher in their hug. It’s a huge amount of fun, and the best symbolic ritual I’ve seen for the community-minded unification love brings.

It is from within these musically-expressive traditions that Red Baraat came to be. The Brooklyn-based bhangra-fusion ensemble rose out of bandleader Sunny Jain’s early attempt at an Indian brass wedding band in New York, before he realized the need to spread the jubilant sonics and energy of South Asian marital customs to the masses. As the concept took shape prior to their 2010 debut Chaal Baby, the group’s sound blew up considerably beyond the trappings of mere “wedding band” music, encompassing a jazz-approached riot of big band Panjabi instrumentation with singed edges of psychedelic rock and hip-hop.

Red Baraat’s trademark is how they conjure a storm of stampeding percussion, courtesy of Jain’s frenetic dhol, which is highlighted by breakneck melodies and a dynamic tonal palette, stimulating over headphones the spirit of a grand nuptial caravan while also boldly weaving in settings from across the globe. Throughout their now decade-long discography, the troupe — newly slimmed down to a six-piece, additionally comprising a guitarist, drummer, and three-piece brass section — has wielded their compositional acumen to remain true to their roots in the South Asian diaspora, while also reflecting just how wide of an experience that can embody.

Find the full review on STEREOGUM

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Hank Shteamer for Rolling Stone – Charles Lloyd’s engagement with rock is no passing dalliance: In the Sixties and Seventies, the saxist-flutist played the Fillmore, gigged with the Beach Boys and recorded with the post-Morrison Doors. But even that history doesn’t prepare the listener for how graceful and engaged the 80-year-old NEA Jazz Master sounds on this program – the second release by his genre-blurring Marvels quintet – half of which features the gorgeously weathered voice of Lucinda Williams.

On “Dust,” a new version of a song from Williams’ 2016 LP The Ghosts of Highway 20, the saxophonist and singer trade places in the spotlight like a pair of seasoned dancers. Lloyd’s molten, warbling phrases bubble up from the background during the final chorus, spilling over into a trippy instrumental coda.

The rest of the band is just as integral to the album’s savvy stylistic blend. On Williams’ new “We’ve Come Too Far to Turn Around,” drummer Eric Harland shadows the singer with impressionistic cymbal flutters and snare rolls, while on an expansive version of “Unsuffer Me” (originally from 2007’s West), guitarist Bill Frisell and pedal-steel player Greg Leisz color her lines with twangy accents and shimmery ambience, respectively.

The instrumental tracks here bring the hybrid approach Lloyd first explored on Sixties staples such as Love-In to new heights of invention. “Vanished Gardens” suggests a beautiful sort of roots-music/free-jazz fusion, with Frisell’s sparkling loops and Lloyd’s abstract murmurs and cries hovering over an airy groove.

 

Find the full review on Rolling Stone

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Dorris Duke Charitable Foundation – In a short film released today by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, the foundation’s president and CEO, Edward P. Henry, was joined by several previous Doris Duke Artist Award winners in announcing the 2018 recipients of the $275,000 award.

The new awardees include Dee Dee Bridgewater, Regina Carter and Stefon Harris for their continuing contributions to jazz; Michelle Dorrance and Okwui Okpokwasili for contemporary dance; and Muriel Miguel and Rosalba Rolón for theater. Each 2018 Doris Duke Artist is receiving $250,000 in flexible funding, along with up to an additional $25,000 to encourage contributions to retirement savings.

 

Find the full article on DDCF

Find Dee Dee Bridgewater on TKA