Philippe Baden Powell: Notes Over Poetry
The album Notes Over Poetry seems to indicate that the pianist Philippe Baden Powell is ready for his jump off the cliff and that...
El Naán: La Danza de las Semillas
The title of this remarkable album La Danza de las Semillas by El Naán is both a metaphor and an extended allegory. The...
Idan Raichel: And If You Will Come To Me
Idan Raichel – once vilified for being on the wrong side of Israeli politics, is, nevertheless, a bona-fide international superstar. His last few recordings,...
Zucchero Presents New Album: Black Cat
Zucchero presents his November 2016 recording (released in the US in February 2017) entitled Black Cat. This is a mega project that features the...
Phil DeGreg & Brasilia: Brazilian People
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Among all of the musical idioms of the world Brasilian music must be one of the most seductive;...
Cuñao: Sangre y Arena
Blood and Sand is how this title translates into English; couple that with the fact that my copy of the disc has no notes...
David Helbock’s Random Control: Think of Two
The Europeans have almost always been adventurous first. After all, it was the Europeans who sailed to the New World and not the other way around. So also with Charlie Parker; it was Boris Vian who was among the first to really appreciate his music...
Karrin Allyson: Many A New Day
I am mandated – no, must write a review with at least 500 words. My other review would have a mere five words: “This...
La República Offers an Elegant Fiesta
Explosion of Latin taste and enjoyment is what La República brings us with his new album “Fiesta Elegante”. Led by the brilliant composer, arranger and pianist Juancho Valencia, this work is the sound of many lands and regions including the Caribbean coast...
Benji Kaplan: Chorando Sete Cores
Benji Kaplan is an American, a New Yorker to be precise, but listening to his music you would never know that. He plays as...
Sofía Rei Presents: El Gavilán
The word “ethereal” is often used to describe poetry and/or music that is particularly otherworldly. But rarely does one come across a volume of...
Jayme Stone: The Other Side of Air
The banjo in any other idiom of music—other than bluegrass, or country and western, that is—is such a novelty that the numbers of practitioners in the idiom of jazz, for instance, can be counted on the fingers of two hands; and good players on the fingers of just one hand...
Carol Saboya, Antonio Adolfo, Hendrik Meurkens: Copa Village
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The concept of a kind of Rio de Janeiro/ New York mash-up—Copa Village—as it is called might not...
Newpoli: Nun Te Vutà
This is the fourth disc by the magnificent ensemble, a group that specialises in repertoire that few other do; not Anonymous 4 or Heinavanker,...
Daniela Mercury: Virtual Vinyl
‘Alluring,’ ‘mesmerising,’ ‘bewitching’ none of these epithets even begin to capture the attraction of Daniela Mercury and yet they all do, because Mercury is...
Dan Costa: Skyness
The pianist Dan Costa might surprise – even shock – some of his contemporaries by inventing harmonies and chords that effectively reinterpret tonality on...
Banda Magda Presents: Tigre
Of all the vocal-driven ensembles in the world of contemporary music there is none as compelling or beckoning as Banda Magda. In the music...
Will Duchon Presents: La Valse
Maurice Ravel: Valses nobles et sentimentales, M. 61: I. Modéré - Très franc - II. Assez lent - III. Assez animé - IV....
Victor Prieto: The Three Voices
It is not often that you come across pure musical genius. But a few do exist: Martha Argerich, for one. And then is the...
Pianist, Composer Sérgio Mendes Presents: “Magic”
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Maestro Sérgio Mendes could not have named this album any differently; this is pure magic, enchantment and creativity. Magic is...
