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…

The Wood Brothers’ debut album is a tense and hushed affair full of weighted lyrics peppered with words like truth, faith, spirit, and soul and more angels than you can shake a stick at, and each song seems tipped right at the edge of indecision and confusion. These are…

The Little Willies took six years to deliver a second album, but For the Good Times sounds like it could have been cut the same afternoon as their 2006 debut. This is by no means a bad thing. The primary pleasure of The Little Willies, the uptown country cabaret…

Combining the talents of tenor saxophonist Joe Lovano, guitarist John Scofield, bassist Dave Holland, and drummer Al Foster, there is an uncredited fifth member on jazz supergroup Scolohofo’s debut recording, Oh! — Miles Davis. Every one of these musicians, except for Lovano, gained their first real success with the…

On her Blue Note debut (and eighth recording overall), vocalist Jackie Allen stretches her already crossover approach to where the seams show. Thank God. She is a fine jazz singer and has a way with ballads and standards that is her own to be sure — and she records…

This follow up to an earlier CD (Alone Together) with Brad Mehldau and Charlie Haden took place exactly one year later at the same venue, L.A.’s Jazz Bakery. Like the first release, the trio takes their time exploring each tune, whether it’s the leader’s opening blues or a favorite…

Alone Together, Lee Konitz’s first recording for Blue Note, is a special event. The saxophonist teamed up with legendary bassist Charlie Haden and young lion pianist Brad Mehldau, and the trio’s interaction on this set of relaxed bop is astonishing. On paper, the music on Alone Together — a collection of standards — should just be…