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A Brief Guide To Ukrainian Jazz: Part 4
by Ian Patterson
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 The fourth installment of A Brief Guide To Ukrainian Jazz--a series developed with the cooperation of the Ukrainian Institute--introduces four more highly talented jazz artists/groups from Ukraine. The vast range of personal musical identities attests to the strength, depth and originality of contemporary Ukranian jazz. Dima Bondarev Classically trained from an early age, trumpeter Dima Bondarev was a jazz convert by his late teens. By ...
Continue ReadingJohn Engels Just Turned 90, But Who’s Counting?
by Joan Gannij
What do you give a man for his 90th birthday, who has everything in terms of chops, contentment, experience, and energy? How about a special edition of an Edison Prize, combined with a birthday tribute concert. Amsterdam's Bimhuis was packed to standing room, filled with friends, family, musicians and music lovers. This was no ordinary birthday celebration, although there was a cake, flowers, balloons and some special gifts, including an invitation from Sonor to visit their factory in Germany. John ...
Continue ReadingA Brief Guide To Ukrainian Jazz: Part 3
by Ian Patterson
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 The third installment of A Brief Guide To Ukrainian Jazz--a series developed with the cooperation of the Ukrainian Institute--introduces five more highly talented jazz artists/groups from Ukraine. The vast range of personal musical identities attests to the strength, depth and originality of contemporary Ukranian jazz. Leléka Victoria Leléka is the voice and driving force of Leléka, a multi-national folk-jazz quartet founded in Berlin in 2016. ...
Continue ReadingA Brief Guide To Ukrainian Jazz: Part 2
by Ian Patterson
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 The second installment of A Brief Guide To Ukrainian Jazz--a series developed with the cooperation of the Ukrainian Institute--introduces five more highly talented jazz artists/groups from Ukraine. In addition, we profile the jazz festivals and jazz clubs that are keeping the Ukrainian jazz flame burning brightly in these most difficult of times. Pokaz Trio Pokaz Trio takes its name from pianist and composer Andrew Pokaz, ...
Continue ReadingVagif Mustafa-Zadeh: Azerbaijan's Jazz Pioneer
by Mehman N Mamedov
March 16, 2025, would mark the 85th birthday of one of the most outstanding jazz composers and performers, Vagif Mustafa-Zadeh. He can be considered a pioneer of ethno-jazz in the Soviet Union and, on a global scale, a unique and virtuoso jazz performer and composer who fused ancient Eastern musical traditions with Western music. First steps in music Vagif Mustafa-Zadeh was born on March 16, 1940 in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan. His father, a military doctor, originally ...
Continue ReadingMoving On Music: Literal Magic
by Ian Patterson
2025 marks the 30th anniversary of Moving On Music (MOM), one of Ireland's finest music promotion companies. There will probably be little hoopla, no big party and probably not even a cake. Instead, it will be business as usual for the small but industrious team of four, and that means bringing the best music of all stripes to the island. Jazz, traditional Irish, folk, electronic, contemporary classical, indie-rock, choral... and plenty that slips between the ever-widening genre ...
Continue ReadingA Brief Guide To Ukrainian Jazz: Part 1
by Ian Patterson
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 The history of jazz in Ukraine can be traced fairly precisely according to academic, literature teacher and jazz journalist Alexander Yudin. Writing in The History Of European Jazz: The Music, Musicians And Audience in Context (Equinox Publishing, 2018), Yudin credits Yuliy Meitus with leading the country's first jazz band. Meitus' band, which consisted of vibraphone, violin, drums and percussion, reportedly gave the first jazz concert in Ukraine ...
Continue ReadingSwingbooty: Reviving Gypsy Jazz with a Modern Twist
by Kris Smith
In the '70s Electric Light Orchestra (ELO) brought classical music to the foreground of the Woodstock generation releasing songs like “Roll Over Beethoven" and blending orchestral elements with rock. Today, Swingbooty, a seven-piece gypsy swing band, is taking a page from the ELO playbook. In their home base of East Tennessee, Swingbooty brings jazz manouche to a scene more familiar with rock and pop--and their shows are a visual feast of dance, live art, and poi or fire spinning. As ...
Continue ReadingKen Nordine: The Architect of Word Jazz
by Kristine England
"Let me tell you a funny story I made up about the guy who wanted to reach into in, and he couldn't. And it bothered him. It'd bother you, wouldn't it?" So begins the tale of a troubled man lost within his mind's abstractions. This tale is Word Jazz, a “somewhat new medium" conceived by Ken Nordine in the 1950s. A voiceover performer who was a uniquely creative wordsmith as well, Nordine wielded his rich, velvety baritone like ...
Continue ReadingYana Purim: Intimate Jazz, Deep Feelings And Raw Emotion
by Trevor Spiro
You're sitting in your happy chair at home, just mooching a magazine, when the phone rings. It's a good friend you haven't seen in a long time, and she would like to see you for old time's sake. She turns up and it's like the last few years never existed--you talk heart to heart about old times and things that matter, no idle chit-chat. Fact or fantasy?Yana Purim is that old friend even though I've never met her. ...
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