Tag Archives: CD music

May 2022

Blue Note Records B003456902
Format: CD

Musical Performance

Sound Quality

Overall Enjoyment

In the late 2000s, not long before Troy “Trombone Shorty” Andrews began landing gigs at the White House and on late-night network TV shows, I worked twice with the New Orleans musician at the Ottawa Jazz Festival, where I was the media resource. The first time Andrews appeared there, he was an unknown support act; the following year, he headlined. Both times, he put on astounding live shows that were equal parts Crescent City parade music and guitar-powered Southern rock.

April 2022

Jammin’ Colors 73374
Format: CD

Musical Performance

Sound Quality

Overall Enjoyment

Miles Davis was a firm believer that music is colorless. Despite having been an outspoken champion and defender of Black artists and their creative output, the trumpeter recognized that music transcends the petty political stances and systemic racism dominating life in Western democracies.

April 2022

Jammin’ Colors 73374
Format: CD

Musical Performance

Sound Quality

Overall Enjoyment

Miles Davis was a firm believer that music is colorless. Despite having been an outspoken champion and defender of Black artists and their creative output, the trumpeter recognized that music transcends the petty political stances and systemic racism dominating life in Western democracies.

March 2022

Melissa Aldana: 12 Stars

Blue Note Records B0034596-02
Format: CD

Musical Performance

Sound Quality

Overall Enjoyment

December 2021

Tangerine Records TRC-2107
Format: CD

Musical Performance

Sound Quality

Overall Enjoyment

Let’s begin with a quiz: There are 99 individual performances on this extensive six-disc overview of singer-pianist Ray Charles’s career. How many of the songs do you think he composed?

October 2021

Gearbox Records 1571CD
Format: CD

Musical Performance

Sound Quality

Overall Enjoyment

If you followed popular music in the late ’60s and early ’70s, you likely remember the hype surrounding so-called supergroups. Bands like Blind Faith, Derek and the Dominos, and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young were touted as truly special things by the rock media.

August 2021

Blue Note B096C185JM
Format: 8 CDs

Musical Performance

Sound Quality

Overall Enjoyment

Like me, you probably have a few recordings you’ve played so many times you know every note, every nuance.

July 2021

BAG Production BAG018
Format: CD

Musical Performance

Sound Quality

Overall Enjoyment

I credit my father for indoctrinating me with a love for the clarinet. As a young man, long before my time, he immersed himself in the music of Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw the way I would later cleave to Jimi Hendrix and Duane Allman. And before either of those guitarists were making records, my father was filling my ears every Sunday morning with the sounds of Goodman, Shaw, Jimmy Dorsey, Woody Herman, and others who had made the clarinet the equivalent of the Fender Stratocaster or Gibson Les Paul in his day.

June 2021

Modern Recordings
Format: CD

Musical Performance

Sound Quality

Overall Enjoyment

In a less-fragmented musical landscape, composer-arranger Vince Mendoza might be a household name on the scale of Burt Bacharach or Henry Mancini. After all, the 59-year-old has won six Grammy Awards (and been nominated for a total of 34) and worked with stars like Björk, Elvis Costello, Sting, and Joni Mitchell. As it is, Mendoza’s reputation is largely confined to the jazz community, where he’s made his name by furthering so-called “third stream” music with the Metropole Orchestra and soloists like trumpeter Randy Brecker.