On The Sunday Jazz Show – Dec. 27: New Album From Nat Birchall

On The Sunday Jazz Show – Dec. 27: New Album From Nat Birchall

Yesterday on the Sunday Jazz Show we spun a KTRU premier. Hailed by critics as one of the best jazz albums to come along in years, yet still flying under the radar stateside, Nat Birchall’s spiritual-jazz opus Invocations would likely sweep the awards for jazz album of the year if not for that Kamasi Washington fella and his triple-LP debut. Birchall is a veteran of the British Jazz scene where he’s been known for years and his playing, clearly inspired by the likes of Coltrane, Clifford Jordan and Pharoah Sanders, is truly evocative on the new album from Jazzman Records.

“Hailed by Gilles Peterson as “one of the best musicians in the UK”, saxophonist Nat Birchall remains one of the UK’s hidden jazz treasures.  Playing tenor and soprano saxophones,  he is a band leader, composer and arranger (and occasional DJ) who has grabbed listeners attention with his soulful sound and inspirational spiritual music.”

We played the opening cut, “Song To The Divine Mother,” and you can listen to it here.

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On The Sunday Jazz Show – Dec. 20th (First Set): Ella Wishes You a Swinging Christmas

On The Sunday Jazz Show – Dec. 20th (First Set): Ella Wishes You a Swinging Christmas

There’s only one time a year when the Jazz Show can pull out Christmas music. And while many listeners, by late December, are completely sick of Rudolph and Jinglin’ Bells, it’s short-sighted to dismiss the genre entirely because frankly, there is some absolutely soulful, swinging and satisfying Christmas records out there. Tops on our list would be Vince Guaraldi’s A Charlie Brown Christmas album on Fantasy (which we played – you can’t NOT play this one), Nat King Cole’s The Christmas Song album on Capitol (while less of a jazz album by definition, it is indeed an album that approaches perfection in execution, and Nat was a jazz pianist before he was the voice of Christmas), and last but certainly not least, Ella Fitzgerald’s Ella Wishes You a Swinging Christmas, on Verve Records. We spun the lilting, spectacularly funky blues jam, “Good Morning Blues,” which you can check out here. It’s easy to see why this 1960 album remains timeless.

In 2011, Jeff Balke of the Houston Press wrote: “This is pure swing awesomeness with only a very gentle offering of traditional instruments like strings, favoring instead classic big band horn sections, piano and vibes…Unlike some of the other [Christmas] records…Fitzgerald opted almost entirely for wartime songs and popular American Christmas tunes instead of traditional carols, which is well suited for her brand of swing. This is one of those records that, if you had a big fancy cocktail party at an apartment in the middle of the big city with attractive people dressed to the nines, this is the record that would be playing in the background.”

So pour the drinks, grab your date and get near some mistletoe. ‘Tis the season, after all.

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On The Sunday Jazz Show – Dec. 13: All Sorts Of Good Stuff

On The Sunday Jazz Show – Dec. 13: All Sorts Of Good Stuff

If we may be so bold, yesterday’s Sunday Jazz Show was an absolute killer. Three glorious hours of heavy stacks of wax. As usual, we brought in a mountain of vinyl and played everything from Benny Carter to Ornette Coleman. And while we could write about everything we played, here’s a couple highlights with links:

  • Sonny Rollins – “Decision” – Volume One (Blue Note Records, 1956) – with Donald Byrd, Wynton Kelly, Gene Ramey & Max Roach
  • Charles Mingus – “Devil Woman” – Oh Yeah (Atlantic Records, 1962) – with Booker Ervin, Roland Kirk, Jimmy Knepper, Doug Watkins & Dannie Richmond
  • Carsten Meinart Kvartet – “Blues To Someone” & “To You (Susanne)” – To You (Fredricksberg Records, 1968//RE 2015)
  • Charlie Parker – “Ah-Leu-Cha” – Memorial (Savoy Records, 1947) – with Miles Davis, John Lewis, Curly Russell & Max Roach.

Other recommended listening can be found here, here and here.

If you missed the show (why are you even missing the show at this point?) you can see the full playlist here.

We’ll be back next Sunday: 2pm to 7pm CST.

Until then, be excellent to each other.

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On The Sunday Jazz Show – Dec. 6th (Second Set): Charlie Haden’s Liberation Music Orchestra

On The Sunday Jazz Show – Dec. 6th (Second Set): Charlie Haden’s Liberation Music Orchestra

On the second set of the Sunday Jazz Show, DJ Achim reached deep into the archives and pulled out a legendary, if under-appreciated, classic jazz album from bassist Charlie Haden, Liberation Music Orchestra (Impulse! Records, 1969). Here’s a typically apt description from AMG:

“A fascinating [album] that comfortably straddles the lines of jazz, folk, and world music, working up a storm by way of a jazz protest album that points toward the Spanish Civil War in particular and the Vietnam War in passing. Haden leads the charge and contributes material, but the real star here may in fact be Carla Bley, who arranged numbers, wrote several, and contributed typically brilliant piano work.”

Other artists included on Haden’s auspicious debut as a leader include Don Cherry, Gato Barbieri, Andrew Cyrille, Howard Johnson, Dewey Redman, Paul Motian, Roswell Rudd and more. One of the most successfully ambitious albums in the storied history of the Impulse! Records label, Liberation Music Orchestra is an undisputed classic of the era. You can listen to the cut Achim played here.

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On The Sunday Jazz Show – Dec. 6th (First Set): Special Guest FAT TONY

On The Sunday Jazz Show – Dec. 6th (First Set): Special Guest FAT TONY

Yesterday we broke new ground on the Jazz Show, with a very special in-studio guest, Houston indie-rapper Fat Tony. It was an fantastic twist for the show as we connected the dots between Jazz and Rap, talked influences and even got a live on-air performance! Between talking with Tony and playing some of his brand new music, we spun jazz classics sampled for rap hits by artists like Bob James, Donald Byrd, Issac Hayes, Bobbi Humphrey, Dorothy Ashby, The Young-Holt Unlimited and much, much more. All in, it was an awesome show. If you missed it, you can hear Fat Tony’s newest single “MacGregor Park,” and watch the video here. Also, you can listen to some of the unknown classics we played here, here and here.

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On The Sunday Jazz Show – Nov. 29th (Second Set): In-Studio Interview with Tatsuya Nakatani and Michel Doneda

On The Sunday Jazz Show – Nov. 29th (Second Set): In-Studio Interview with Tatsuya Nakatani and Michel Doneda

For the second set, DJ Achim interviewed the improvisational artistic duo of Tatsuya Nakatani and Michel Doneda, live in the KTRU studio. The Houston Press’ Steve Jansen describes the duo as such:

“In the hit-and-miss realm of improvised music, the unusual pairing of Japanese percussionist Tatsuya Nakatani and French soprano saxophone and sopranino player Michel Doneda is a winner (though on paper it shouldn’t be).The collaboration goes back 15 years, when Nakatani and Doneda crossed paths in the latter’s hometown of Toulouse. Since then, the two have sculpted inexplicable ideas that morph into resplendent forms via Nakatani’s gongs and bowed cymbals and Doneda’s long tones and upper-register workings.”

Later on Sunday evening the duo performed at Houston’s The Match at 3400 Main Street, presented by Nameless Sound.

If you missed the interview or the show, you can check out the duo here.

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On The Sunday Jazz Show – Nov. 29th (First Set): Chico Freeman

On The Sunday Jazz Show – Nov. 29th (First Set): Chico Freeman

In the first set of the Sunday Jazz Show, we played an underrated gem of the post-Coltrane, post-bop era: Chico Freeman’s 1977 LP Beyond The Rain. The son of Chicago jazz saxophonist Von Freeman, Beyond The Rain finds the then young tenorman playing in a quartet setting with another wildly underrated player in pianist Hilton Ruiz, bassist Juni Booth and Coltrane’s longtime drummer, the legendary Elvin Jones. We played the cut “Two Over One.” If you missed it, you can check it out here. Be sure to listen to the interplay of Ruiz and Elvin Jones. Fantastic stuff.

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On The Sunday Jazz Show – Nov. 22nd (Second Set): Wayne Shorter

On The Sunday Jazz Show – Nov. 22nd (Second Set): Wayne Shorter

Towards the end of a phenomenal evening set on Sunday, Achim pulled out a monster. One of the legendary Blue Note Records’ most critically acclaimed albums, Wayne Shorter’s 1966 LP, Speak No Evil. Clearly influenced by his concurrent work with the Miles Davis Quintet, Shorter enlisted a couple of his band-mates from that group, with Herbie Hancock on piano and Ron Carter on bass; while enlisting John Coltrane’s drummer, the mighty Elvin Jones, to be the backbone of the session. Standing up front with Shorter was probably the second best trumpeter on the scene at that time, none other than Freddie Hubbard.

The Penguin Guide to Jazz selected this album as part of its suggested “Core Collection” calling it “by far Shorter’s most satisfying record”. Allmusic.com assigns the album five stars. Murray Horwitz stated in 2001 that “Speak No Evil is sort of a consolidation of Wayne Shorter’s compositional excellence. It’s so thorough and consistent and wide-ranging. It’s almost a manifesto for his ideas. Those ideas were new 40 years ago, but they’re still fresh today.”[

Achim played the album’s opener “Witch Hunt,” and if you missed it, you can check it out here. A high-energy start is a bold-faced lie, as the group checks to see if you’re paying attention before laying back into an infectious modal groove. Enjoy.

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On The Sunday Jazz Show – Nov. 22nd (First Set): Alice Coltrane

On The Sunday Jazz Show – Nov. 22nd (First Set): Alice Coltrane

About an hour into the first set of the show on Sunday we spun an epic string of spiritual jazz; Houston’s Billy Harper, Marion Brown, Lonnie Liston Smith & The Cosmic Echoes, and it all started with this one. The second track from Alice Coltrane’s stunning 1970 LP Ptah, The El Daoud; a song entitled “Turyia & Ramakrishna.” On the title of the song, Wikipedia states: “…according to the liner notes, “Turyia” was defined by Alice as ‘a state of consciousness — the high state of Nirvana, the goal of human life”, while “Ramakrishna” is named after the 19th-century Bengali religious figure.”

The track is an 8-minute-plus cut with just the trio of Coltrane on piano, Ron Carter on bass and Ben Riley on percussion. Modal, bluesy and hauntingly beautiful, the song may just steal the show on an album that is likely her most underrated and arguably her masterpiece (we like it even more than the often lauded “Journey Into Satchidananda” album). If you missed it, you can check it out here. Fair warning, you will listen to it multiple times. Be sure to check out the rest of the album too. While it’ll be tough (and expensive) to find an original copy of the Impulse! album, it is fairly available on CD.

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On The Sunday Jazz Show – Nov. 15th (Second Set): Kamasi Washington

On The Sunday Jazz Show – Nov. 15th (Second Set): Kamasi Washington

On the second set, Achim spun the cut “Isabelle” from saxophonist Kamasi Washington’s stunning debut album, aptly titled, “The Epic;” a three-LP/double CD effort that can almost certainly be considered not only the jazz album of the year, but perhaps the album of the year period. There’s a lot of hype building around Washington, but it seems hard to argue if it’s not due. Working in a smaller big-band setting of trombones, trumpets, keys, percussion, vocals and electric bass by the virtuoso player Thundercat; Washington has created nothing short of a masterpiece on his lengthy debut and one can only wonder what he’ll do next. If you missed it, you can listen to the song here.

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