Tag Archives: mel minter

Chris Lightcap’s Bigmouth: Jazz Currents with a Rock ’n’ Roll Undertow

Chris Lightcap’s Bigmouth: (left to right) Tony Malaby (tenor sax), Craig Taborn (piano, Wurlitzer electric piano), Chris Cheek (tenor sax), Chris Lightcap (bass), Gerald Cleaver (drums, percussion). Photo by Nada Zgank.

Epicenter (Clean Feed Records ), the recent impressive release from bassist/composer Chris Lightcap’s Bigmouth, offers a sonic love letter to New York City, with ferocious references to the city’s raunchy rock ’n’ roll history (“Down East”) to delicate love songs that recall tender moments in Lightcap’s personal history (“Arthur Avenue”). Along the way, the composer tips his hat to a wide range of influences that stretches from Velvet Underground to Ornette Coleman, and his layered compositions are ably fulfilled by Bigmouth’s sterling personnel—Chris Cheek and Tony Malaby (tenor saxes), Craig Taborn (Wurlitzer electric piano, piano, organ), and Gerald Cleaver (drums, percussion).

This Thursday at the Outpost, this stellar quintet, touring in support of the new release, will grab you by your musical lapels for a tour up and down the boroughs and byways of New York City. Continue reading →

An Evening with Bobby Shew and the NM Philharmonic

Bobby Shew

Bobby Shew. Photo by Victoria Rogers.

Internationally renowned trumpeter, Albuquerque native, and Corrales resident Bobby Shew will be front and center Saturday evening, backed by the sterling rhythm section of pianist Jim Ahrend, bassist Colin Deuble, drummer Cal Haines—and the New Mexico Philharmonic Orchestra—in a concert that will reprise the material on Shew’s favorite album of his, Metropole Orchestra. The album features 10 tracks, including 8 standards, an original by Shew, and an original written for him by Lex Jasper, who arranged all the tunes on the album.

The Metropole Orchestra, founded in 1945 and based in the Netherlands, has held a lofty position in the European jazz world for over 70 years. The New Mexico Philharmonic will play the Metropole’s original arrangements.

I had the opportunity to chat with Bobby—no disrespect intended; he’s my neighbor, and everybody here calls him Bobby, and when I type “Shew,” I’m wondering who that is—about the album, the concert, and how he once jumped off a 35-foot windmill with a surplus parachute, and lived to tell about it. Continue reading →

Three Quickies: Reviews on Releases from Ralph Alessi, Tom McDermott and Aurora Nealand, and Herlin Riley

Ralph Alessi
Herlin Riley. Photo by Leonard Smith III.
Aurora Nealand and Tom McDermott. Thanks to You Tube’s jazzbo43 for the screen grab.

Short reviews of the latest releases from these masters. Continue reading →

Meredith Wilder Mesmerizes on ‘The Coming of the Night’

Meredith coverThe Coming of the Night, Meredith Wilder (indie)
A Review
Singer/songwriter Kristina Jacobsen calls singer/songwriter Meredith Wilder the
“Songbird of the Sandias.” It’s an appropriate moniker, given the appealing sweetness in Wilder’s voice, the transparency of her head tones, and her irresistible melodies. But there is also a dusky darkness and a wary
vulnerability in both voice and lyrics that
balance the sweetness and draw you deeper in to The Coming of the Night, a solo
album from the frontwoman of the popular band Wildewood. Continue reading →