Pianist Junko Onishi’s CD has the feel of a Charles Mingus date, a condition helped out by the inclusion of two Mingus tunes, Billy Strayhorn’s “Take the ‘A’ Train” (here attributed mistakenly to Duke Ellington) and the episodic “Piano Quintet Suite.” Onishi is a strong pianist who retains tight…

Onishi gets into a classic rock groove on this disc, rendering Hendrix‘s “Hey Joe,” Cream‘s “Sunshine of Your Love” and even the Righteous Brothers‘”You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin’” into exciting jazz workouts, while keeping the gritty sprit of the originals. Her fervent piano attack in particular keeps the disc consistently interesting. 01 Phaethon…

When Willie Nelson took the unexpected step of releasing Stardust in 1978, many predicted that the album of popular standards would severely derail the outlaw country singer’s career. Confounding the critics, the disc became Nelson’s best-selling effort, and spawned a whole subgenre of modern singers covering the classics. Nelson…

History has proven that Willie Nelson will duet with pretty much anybody who comes along, and while this open-hearted open mind sometimes backfires, more often than not it results in some of his most sublime recordings. Two Men with the Blues, his album with jazz trumpeter Wynton Marsalis recorded over a two-night stand at Jazz at…

Willie Nelson and Wynton Marsalis first worked together at The Allen Room at New York’s Jazz at Lincoln Center for two nights in 2007, and while at first it would seem to be an odd pairing, it really isn’t: Nelson‘s singing and guitar playing have always fallen well to the jazz side of…

Wynton Marsalis, ever the protagonist and explorer, brings his love of the spoken word and the adolescent relations of the male and female persuasion during He and She, a collection of instrumental mainstream jazz pieces with poetry as preludes. Inspired by the tone of the Jon Hendricks epic Evolution…

On “Where Y’all At?,” the last track off trumpeter Wynton Marsalis’ 2007 studio album From the Plantation to the Penitentiary, Marsalis delivers a spoken word tirade against everything from the demise of socially conscious hip-hop and misguided politicians to America’s commercial and capitalist culture. He asks, “All you ’60s…

Live at the House of Tribes documents trumpeter Wynton Marsalis performing with his sextet at the intimate community theater space in New York City on December 15, 2002. Apparently an annual ritual of sorts for Marsalis, the performance makes for one of his best live recordings since 1986’s stellar…

As his first album of all-original material (performed with a quintet or less) since his 1988 release Thick in the South: Soul Gestures in Southern Blue, Vol. 1, and his first album for Blue Note Records, trumpeter Wynton Marsalis’ The Magic Hour is a disappointing return to progressive, small-group…

A Wood Brothers record will always be a fail-safe purchase, the reason being that the musical instincts of Chris and Oliver Wood are as solid and unyielding as a 100-year-old oak. Loaded, the duo’s second full-length, satisfies wholly, living up to and maybe past the promise of 2006’s Ways…