Remembering Pharoah Sanders (1940-2022)
The Creator Has a Master Plan
Pharoah Sander’s approach to jazz is not always easy to follow, yet full of beautiful and melodious surprises. Born Farrell Sanders, he was known for his mastery of the saxophone and for being one of the enlightened, having played with John Coltrane and lived through the turbulences of free jazz «when music was still a religion» (Neue Zürcher Zeitung). Born in Little Rock, Arkansas, he began his career by playing the clarinet in church. Upon finishing high school, he moved to Oakland where played in both black and white clubs until he met avant-garde pianist Sun Ra who introduced him to the jazz scene. (sgs)
Verve
Ahmad Jamal
Autumn Leaves
Another great: born 1930, in Pittsburgh, Ahmad Jamal is a jazz pianist, composer, and arranger of African American descent. He began playing piano at age three and was named Frederick “Fritz” Russell Jones before converting to Islam around 1952. A scientist of sound, his use of space and dynamics, along with his tight, intricate arrangements, were a big influence on generations of pianists. «Jamal knocked me out with his concept of space, his lightness of touch, his understatement and the way he phrases notes and chords and passages.» (Miles Davis) At 92, Mr. Jamal says it’s too early to look back because he’s still learning.
Ansonia Records
Romeo Santos
Bebo
Santos is the lead member and vocalist of the bachata band Aventura. Bachata emerged as a popular style of music in the early 1960s, a variation of the Cuban and Caribbean boleros. It is played by three guitars, bongos and a percussion instrument called güira, looking somewhat like an oversized muscat rape. Long disrespected as the music of the Caribbean underclass, it is presently the music most danced to around the Americas. «The third instalment of Santos’ Formula series continues to show off his soft, persuasive voice and versatile vocal chops as he explores a diverse mix of genres with ease.» (Rolling Stone)
Sony Latin
Heilung
Anoana – from the upcoming album Drif
The experimental music collective Heilung (“healing”) is made up of members from Germany, Denmark, and Norway. Their music encompasses elements of folk or neofolk, folk metal, ethnic, and grunge and is usually dedicated to Germanic deities of old. Heilung was founded in Copenhagen, in 2014, by vocalist Klaus Uwe Faust, a German tattoo artist, specializing in Old Norse subjects, and Danish producer Christopher Juul. They were joined one year later by Faust’s girlfriend of long standing, Maria Franz, a vocalist, and percussionist. Heilung have released three studio albums to date and have toured extensively, accompanied by session musicians.
Season of Mist
Jean-Efflam Bavouzet
Haydn
French pianist Jean-Efflam Bavouzet has released a rare, eleven-volume collection of Joseph Haydn’s sixty-two piano sonatas. What we are hearing here is Haydn’s most delightful Sonata No. 31 in A Flat Major, Hob XVI 46. “Cleanly articulated, a little cheeky and taking the composer seriously but never too seriously” (The New York Times), Bavouzet’s style has aptly and humorously been characterized by the Hungarian star pianist Zoltán Kocsis who called it: “Haydn Without the Wig.” Bavouzet loved Haydn from an early age when the latter’s genius was considered as being far inferior to Beethoven’s, a notion Bavouzet amply disproved.
Presto Music