Having stamped their authority on the 2012 Mercury Music Prize shortlist, not least with a blistering performance at the awards ceremony that left the mainly rock and pop audience in slack-jawed awe, Roller Trio arrived like a bolt from the blue.
Branford Marsalis has always tackled every musical challenge head on – be it playing arenas with Sting, freewheeling improvised rock with the Grateful Dead, primetime US television shows or leading one of the hottest quartets in contemporary jazz.
This article was first published in Jazzwise in December 2011 in The Player section of the magazine The fact that Jack Bruce is still with us is remarkable in itself.
Saxophonist and composer Trish Clowes is set to release her most ambitious work to date, with her third album Pocket Compass, and an expansive live performance with the BBC Concert Orchestra and Guy Barker at the EFG London Jazz Festival in November.
It’s 20 years since highly acclaimed tenorist Mark Turner emerged alongside his illustrious peers Brad Mehldau, Kurt Rosenwinkel and Joshua Redman, yet he’s often deferred solo star status for that of esteemed sideman.
Throughout Robert Wyatt’s prolific, often profound, musical life, a deep love of jazz has been the conduit between his own celebrated jazz-rock legacy with Soft Machine and Matching Mole, his individualistic, highly imaginative solo career and the deep world of jazz music and musicians he has become involved with along the way.
To say Malcolm John ‘Mac’ Rebennack Jr, aka Dr John, has lived a colourful life would be something of an understatement: from spells in jail, being shot in the hand, scoring drugs and his upbringing in deepest, darkest New Orleans, he is the very embodiment of the Crescent City’s rich gumbo soul.
Cloudmakers brings together three of the UK’s most dynamic young jazz musicians in acclaimed vibes virtuoso Jim Hart, bass demon Michael Janisch and powerhouse drummer Dave Smith, the latter also banging out beats with Led Zep singer Robert Plant on many globetrotting stadium dates.
Manu Katché’s music is much like the beaming smile that flashes across his face during a gig: full of bright melodies and a natural warmth.
Keyboardist and Jazzland label boss Bugge Wesseltoft has been at the heart of Europe’s forward-looking jazz scene since he first unleashed his New Conception of Jazz in 1996, uniting spontaneous improv with edgy beat music.
