Jazz
Dana Hall – Into the Light (Origin) – with Terrell Stafford, Tim Warfield, Jr.,  Bruce Barth, Rodney Whitaker
Steve Kuhn with Joe Lovano – Mostly Coltrane (ECM) – with Joe Lovano, David Finck, Joey Baron
Kurt Rosenwinkel Standards Trio – Reflections (Word of Mouth) – with Eric Revis, Eric Harland
Darcy James Argue’s Secret Society – Infernal Machines (New Amsterdam)
Henry Threadgill Zooid – This Brings Us To, Volume 1 (Pi Recordings)
Tom Harrell – Prana Dance (HighNote)
Gretchen Parlato – In a Dream (Obliqsound)
Martial Solal – Live at the Village Vanguard (Cam Jazz)

Other Genres
St. Vincent – Actor (4AD)
The Very Best – Warm Heart of Africa (Green Owl)
The Antlers – Hospice (Frenchkiss)
The xx – xx (XL)

1. John Hollenbeck Large Ensemble – Eternal Interlude (Sunnyside) – The most musically adventurous record I heard all year. Their live concerts (which I saw twice in 2009 were unbelievable studies in concentration, improvisation and group dynamics). John Hollenbeck is a master composer and arranger and conceptualist. His recent bonanza (three-fer) at (le) Poisson Rouge was one of my top three live concert experiences of 2009.

2. Andrew Bird – Noble Beast (Fat Possum) – The most beautifully crafted folk rock album of the year from songwriting to lyrics to production to packaging. Andrew Bird is no slouch. Props to Fat Possum too.

3. AlasNoAxis – Houseplant (Winter & Winter) – This band is the “jazz” equivalent of Tortoise or Orbital or (insert amazing instrumental rock band here). Just freaking amazing. Jim Black is a monster. But then so are multi-reedist Chris Speed (founder of Skirl Records), bassist Skuli Sverisson and guitarist Hilmar Jensson. Buy it. See all their albums in one place.  Their Philly Ars Nova Workshop show in June was probably my top live music experience of 2009.

4. Various Artists – Dark Was the Night (4AD) – An amazing indie rock meeting of the minds to benefit the Red Hot AIDS charity with all original material curated by the Aaron and Bryce Dessner (from The National) including David Byrne, Cat Power, The Books, Buck 65, Beirut, Beach House, Blonde Redhead, Arcae Fire, Dirty Projectors, Andrew Bird, Bon Iver, Kronos Quartet, Iron & Wine, Yo La Tengo, Spoon, My Morning Jacket, Grizzly Bear, Feist, The Decemberists, The New Pornographers and many more. A MUST HAVE!

5. Lucky 7s – Pluto Junkyard (Clean Feed) – A really strong free outing by a mixture of New Orleans and Chicago’s avant jazz players who were brought together by the aftermath of Katrina including vibraphonist Jason Adasiewicz (more on him below), trombonists Jeff Albert (NOLA) and Jeb Bishop (Chicago), cornetist Josh Berman (more about him below), NOLA bassist Matthew Golombisky, Chicago saxophonist Keefe Jackson and NOLA drummer Quin Kirchner. Here’s their website.

6. Peter Bernstein Trio – Monk (Xanadu/The Orchard) – One of the year’s most understated records, Bernstein handles the music of Monk beautifully on this trio outing with drummer Bill Stewart and bassist Doug Weiss. Bernstein is not suprisingly one of the most in-demand NY-based guitarists.  This is a real sleeper.

7. Q-Tip – Kamaal the Abstract (Jive) – the LONG-AWAITED “jazz” album from former A Tribe Called Quest emcee Q-Tip finally dropped for public consumption this year after the record label shelved it from release after advance copies had gone out to press for being too “avant-garde.” This album is so funky you cannot help but shake your ass. Serious. For hardcore jazz geeks, notable special guests include saxophonists Kenny Garrett and Gary Thomas, plus Q-Tip’s close musical associate, guitarist Kurt Rosenwinkel. Q-Tip’s actual new album from 2009, “The Renaissance” is also a very fine effort – also including Rosenwinkel, keyboardists Marc Cary and Robert Glasper, bassist Derrick Hodge, Norah Jones and soul crooner Raphael Saadiq.

8. Various Artists – Open Strings: 1920s Middle Eastern Recordings – New Responses (Honest Jons) – I took the following from the product description because I didn’t know how otherwise to put my feelings on this music to words. Just beautiful. “Delving for a fourth time into EMI’s Hayes Archive, Honest Jons trawl a treasure trove of old 78s from Egypt, Iran, Iraq and Turkey, all united by the theme of virtuoso string instrument performances. Originally recorded during the 1920s these revelatory selections have been all-but consigned to obscurity ever since, but now a whole new audience awaits the arresting talents of musicians like Abdul Hussein Khan Shahnazi, Kanoni Artaki and the incredible Nechat Bey – whose hypnotic bowing performance on ‘Husseini Taxim’ converges on the outright otherworldly.”

9. Kurt Elling – Dedicated to You: Kurt Elling Sings the Music of Coltrane and Hartman (Concord) – Some might be surprised to see Kurt Elling on my list but I am a firm believer that Elling is the best male vocalist currently singing jazz (a close second is Andy Bey, followed by the underrated old-school hipster Giacomo Gates. Jon Hendricks and Mark Murphy’s voices have really suffered with time, imo).  Elling’s accompanist and musical director Laurence Hobgood is just about as good a mainstream modern jazz pianist as you will find today.  Hobgood released his own record this year on NAIM Records that I failed to check out (just got 4 stars in Down Beat). His Grammy-nominated arrangement of the title track on Elling’s record featuring the ETHEL String Quartet is something I played at least 50 times alone this year.  A superbly executed album with notable contributions from saxophonist Ernie Watts in the “Coltrane chair.”

10. Josh Berman – Old Idea (Delmark) – Another excellent free-bop effort by one of Chicago’s leading avant-gardists, trumpeter/cornetist Josh Berman. Shockingly this is his recording debut as a leader after countless sessions as a sideman on some records that have defined Chicago’s “new thing” over the last 10 years.  This CD features a host of the hottest musicians on that scene: vibraphonist Jason Adasiewicz (consistently one of the most exciting and captivating new musicians on today’s jazz scene), Arkansas-born tenor saxophonist (and another Chicagoan to watch) Keefe Jackson, Anton Hatwich on bass and Nori Tanaka on drums.

Honorable Mentions (in no particular order)

Jason Adasiewicz’s Rolldown – Varmint (Cuneiform) – See above on Adasiewicz (pronounced ad-uh-she-vits) – if I had had spent a bit more time with this record it might have made my Top 10 list.

Ran Blake – Driftwoods (Tompkins Square) – This original faculty member of the New England Conservatory’s jazz program released a record of film noir tunes plus vocal standards (without words) which Ran Blake used to hear and love (especially music from The Spiral Staircase and Vertigo).  I kept meaning to spend more time with this record as the year wore on as I think Blake is a underrated master (thankfully NPR acknowledged his genius on Weekend Edition Saturday here). I lost the physical CD in one of my moves and thus had to listen digitally but really loved what I heard. Almost made the Top 10. Thanks to Gunther Schuller for “discovering” Blake when the pianist was a janitor at Atlantic Records after having just moved to New York City from Connecticut. Many of my peers and jazz musicians cite Blake as a major influence on their playing.

Fuck Buttons – Tarot Sport (ATP Recordings) – not as good as this UK duo’s debut, still an entrancing electronic wall of sound. Saw them live at Market Hotel in Bushwick, Brooklyn this November. Was a total dump but a decent noise show.


Blakroc – Blakroc (Blakroc Project) – A bizarre project of The Black Keys plus rappers/friends(?) the RZA, Raekwon, Q-Tip, Mos Def, Jim Jones, Pharoahe Monch, etc. Still surprisingly good. Saw them on Jimmy Fallon with RZA. That sealed the deal.


M. Ward – Hold Time (Merge) – One of the more thoughtful songwriters we have today. His involvement in Monsters of Folk kind of overshadowed this album, which I thought was pretty strong, and at the time seemed to be garnering quite a bit of attention. Will be interesting to see if it holds up towards the end of the year.


The Heartless Bastards – The Mountain (Fat Possum) – Just good rock music. I dunno what else to say. It’s not a coincidence that two records on this list come from Fat Possum, a label that consistently puts out great music in a great many genres from blues to punk rock.


Manuel Valera – Currents (MaxJazz) – A dangerously underrated Cuban pianist and composer who previously self-released a couple records with contributions from saxophonist Seamus Blake, among others plus a CD last year for Anat Cohen’s Anzic imprint. This fine piano trio session with James Genus on bass and Ernesto Simpson on drums is sublime music making including very special renditions of the late Kenny Kirkland’s “Dienda” and Irving Berlin’s “How Deep is the Ocean” plus several fine originals.


Edward Simon – Poesia (Sunnyside) – I liked this record, this trio’s second for the Italian Cam Jazz label.  His bandmates are the iconic Brian Blade on drums and John Patitucci on bass. Their 2006 session Unicity was stronger to my ears (perhaps because I had more time with it), but this one is nothing to shake a stick at.  And it’s from another grossly underrated Venezuelan pianist who did a long stint in Terence Blanchard’s band.


Ben Wendel – Simple Song (Sunnyside) – This saxophonist has had my ear since his LA-based band Kneebody released their self-titled debut on Dave Douglas’ Greenleaf Music label back in 2005. He further grabbed my ear as a sideman on Todd Sickafoose’s Tiny Resistors.


John Zorn – O’o (Tzadik) – Billed as an “exotica” record by Zorn, this is, to my ears, nothing more than a fairly straight-ahead, sometimes swinging version of Electric Masada. But man does Jamie Saft play his ass off on this. Wow. Also notable this year from Tzadik was Stolas (featuring Masada Quintet with Joe Lovano subbing for Zorn and adding Uri Caine on piano).


Dirty Projectors – Bitte Orca (Domino) – One of the best indie rock records of the year which I didn’t have enough time to really dig into – but what I’ve heard is very convincing.  This band has serious compositional and textural chops.  They are surely going to be a force to be reckoned with in years to come. Their collab on Dark Was the Night with David Byrne was stunning. Worth the hype.


Dan Auerbach – Keep it Hid (Nonesuch) – A strong debut by the electric blues guitarist and vocalist from The Black Keys.


The Wood Brothers – Up Above My Head (Indirecto) – Not nearly as good as their last Blue Note effort, Loaded, this record of folk covers was pleasant the few times I heard it.

Probably more to come on this subject.  I have a number of records I’ll probably be checking out in the days and weeks to come based on other people’s lists.  A good place to look for lists by critics in the jazz genre is Jazzhouse Diaries as well as the upcoming Village Voice Jazz Poll. Another place to look for genre lists is PopMatters’ The Best Music of 2009 (multiple lists for all genres) and NPR’s Best Music of 2009.

And of course I’m still working on my top records of the decade list, which is mostly a silly concept but allows me to look back on the decade and rediscover a lot of music that brought me and others enjoyment this past 10 years. What can I say? I like making lists – of records.

Details courtesy of Nate Chinen in the New York Times Jazz Listings:

★ THE THIRD MAN TRIO (Sunday) This improvising collective, which could be named either for the number of its parts or for the immortal 1949 film by Carol Reed, brings together an American accordionist (Will Holshouser) with an expatriate multireedist (Michael Moore) and a mischievous Dutch percussionist (Han Bennink). The level of musicianship will be extremely high, and the interplay, specially honed during a preceding East Coast tour, should border on the telepathic. At 7 p.m., Drom, 85 Avenue A, at Fifth Street, East Village , (212) 777-1157, dromnyc.com; $12. (Chinen)20091022

★ HENRY THREADGILL (Sunday) One of the most important living composers in and around the jazz idiom, Mr. Threadgill has a dazzling new album, “This Brings Us To, Vol. 1” (Pi), featuring his working group Zooid, with Liberty Ellman on guitar, Jose Davila on trombone and tuba, Stomu Takeishi on bass and Elliot Humberto Kavee on drums. Here the same ensemble introduces a full-length piece called “All the Way Light Touch,” commissioned by Roulette, which will also stream a live broadcast at roulette.org. At 8 p.m., Roulette, 20 Greene Street, at Grand Street, SoHo , (212) 219-8242, roulette.org; $15; $10 for students, those under 30 and 60+; free for members. (Chinen)

The first intense example of this was on Friday June 19th at Alwan for the Arts in Lower Manhattan for a concert by the Iraqi-American trumpeter Amir Elsaffar and the San Francisco-based Iranian-American saxophonist Hafez Modirzadeh.  These two horn players were being backed by what some might call an “all-star” West Coast rhythm section (Alex Cline on drums from Los Angeles, CA and Mark Dresser on bass from San Diego, CA; though a former and semi-frequent New Yorker).  Amir, Alex and Mark have all been clients of mine at one time or another in the past for different labels, so it was especially exhilarating to see them play all together in one room together.

I should note that there were a lot of musicians in the audience which usually means that you’ve come to right show.  I spotted saxophonist Fred Ho, multi-reedist JD Parran, saxophonists Rudresh Mahanthappa and Steve Lehman, pianist James Hurt, trumpeter Jonathan Finlayson, bassist Carlo de Rosa, multi-instrumentalist Raz Mesinai (also known as Badawi) and others. Word was apparently out that what Amir and Rez were doing with Alex and Mark was gonna be really f***ing hip.

Here are my live tweets in chronological order:

At Alwan seeing Amir Elsaffar/Hafez Modirzadeh 4tet w/ Alex Cline & Mark Dresser. Lots of cats in house. http://twitpic.com/7v0eg8:42 PM Jun 19th from Twitterrific

1. At Alwan seeing Amir Elsaffar/Hafez Modirzadeh 4tet w/ Alex Cline & Mark Dresser. Lots of cats in house. http://twitpic.com/7v0eg8:42 PM Jun 19th from Twitterrific

2. real sparse sax into rich sax-trumpet harmony #elsaffar/modirzadeh8:49 PM Jun 19th from Twitterrific

3. Mark Dresser has most distinctive bass sound since Mr. PC or C. Haden. All about the harmonics/vibrato… #elsaffar/modirzadeh #alwan8:53 PM Jun 19th from Twitterrific

4. amazing bass/drum duo improv – Alex Cline (twin brother of Nels) & Mark Dresser. Left Coast represent! #elsaffar/modirzadeh #alwan8:57 PM Jun 19th from Twitterrific

5. heavy two rivers vibe on sax/trumpet/bass improv section. real deep. cline slowly enters w/ mallet cymbal roll #elsaffar/modirzadeh #alwan9:00 PM Jun 19th from Twitterrific

6. loud African vibe now with backbeat. this music seems to focus in on transitions. #elsaffar/modirzadeh #alwan9:03 PM Jun 19th from Twitterrific
7. Mesmerizing Cline drum solo (LOUD!), enthusiastic applause, then really quiet. #elsaffar/modirzadeh #alwan9:05 PM Jun 19th from Twitterrific
8. Now swingin’ free-bop à la #ornette. Dresser walking insanely fast bass line. Philly Joe-like ride from Cline w/ flair of Elvin #alwan 9:13 PM Jun 19th from Twitterrific

9. 2nd set seems darker. More somber. Realized band has xtra polit. signif. now.

10. Modirzadeh is Iranian-American. #elsaffar/modirzadeh #alwan 10:04 PM Jun 19th from Twitterrific

11. Also seems jazzier, while maintaining microtonal feel. #elsaffar/modirzadeh #alwan 10:08 PM Jun 19th from Twitterrific

12. How bout a twit pic? #elsaffar/modirzadeh #alwan http://twitpic.com/7vacf 10:14 PM Jun 19th from Twitterrific

13. Different angle #elsaffar #modirzadeh #alwan #alexcline #markdresser http://twitpic.com/7vatl10:17 PM Jun 19th from Twitterrific

14. Amir solos. Hafez accompanies. #elsaffar #modirzadeh #alwan #alexcline #markdresser http://twitpic.com/7vbdv10:22 PM Jun 19th from Twitterrific

15. Crowd pleased. #elsaffar #modirzadeh #alwan #alexcline #markdresser http://twitpic.com/7vbng10:24 PM Jun 19th from Twitterrific

16. Post gig hang. #elsaffar #modirzadeh #alwan #alexcline #markdresser http://twitpic.com/7vbvl10:26 PM Jun 19th from Twitterrific

17. Hafez spreads the gospel of microtonal harmolodics. #elsaffar #modirzadeh #alwan http://twitpic.com/7vc3l10:29 PM Jun 19th from Twitterrific
    

More soon including Jeff Albert Quartet at Chris’ Jazz Cafe in Philly (6/18), Dave Douglas‘ Brass Ecstacy at Jazz Standard (6/20, 1st set),  and AlasNoAxis (featuring Jim Black, Chris Speed, Hilmar Jenssson and Skuli Sverisson) at Philadelphia Art Alliance (6/24), the closing concert of the 2009-2010 Ars Nova Workshop season.

You should listen to his stuff.  Tonight while my iTunes was on random I came across and M-Base sounding record which I would never ever have guessed was a David Binney record. I am speaking of “The Luxury of Guessing” on Audioquest from 1994. The band is Binney, Donny McCaslin, Ben Monder, Scott Colley, Uri Caine.

Maybe at some point I’ll get around to blogging something about my excellent trip to the Left Coast, but for now I’ll just leave you with a few pictures and let the pictures do the talking.

A specialty record store called Zion’s Gate Records on E. Pike St. in Seattle. My first day there before the EMP Pop Conference began. Strangely enough, in Zion’s Gate, I found a copy of Quartet Music’s Window on The Lake on Nine Winds (yes, that’s Nels and Alex Cline, Jeff Gauthier and the late Eric Von Essen, for whom Cryptogramophone records was founded). Nels and Jeff look like they are straight out of Ridgemont High. Alex looks like the wolf man. I kid you not. Of all places – a reggae specialty shop in the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Seattle!?!? Who knew?

a rad skateboard and urban chic clothing/hat/shoe shop also on E. Pike St.

me on Pike St. with my first vinyl purchase of the trip.

A human-sized bunny in a store window. Naturally.

Pike Place Market – with blue skies.

flowers at Pike Place Market

belt buckles at Pike Place Market

more to come soon…

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On another note, I’ve been wondering if there is a way to get my Twitter feed syndicated on my blog (but do I want you all to see what I’m tweeting?). I don’t know the answer to that question. And I also would like to set up mobile blogging once again which I had set up on my old iPhone but never set up for my new one.

I’m strongly considering migrating this blog to a WordPress format as I am beginning to get used to that system on my new business website. Let me tell you, its way better than anything Google has come up with yet (but you do have to pay for the hosting).

(Ending) Music as Torture

Enjoy!