Music
Solid Sound is like a family picnic for stylistically open-minded musicians and fans alike within the brick-mill infrastructure of MASS MoCA.
Legendary percussionist Bill Bruford’s recorded output reveals him to be a restless innovator who went from one band to another so he could learn more about his instrument and about himself as a musician.
Crescent gives us the first five songs of the I Am The Moon suite and runs about 35 minutes. Let me rephrase that: it runs about 35 perfect minutes of music.
We’d returned to the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival. We’d ridden a paddle-wheeler on the Mississippi River. It was good to be back, and why we’ll go back every chance we get: to life.
This is the definitive recording of William Bolcom’s rags, complete or excerpted: a triumph for the pianist and the composer – as well as a grandly spirited, accessible, inventive journey for any who care to join them on it.
At his best — and there are indeed moments of that here — Keb’ Mo’ is a genre-bender who brings new listeners to blues, folk, and smooth soul music.
Two exquisite sopranos bring us refreshing songs, arias, and cantatas; and a noted Broadway composer and a remarkable Black librettist offer a searing opera about police brutality.
Dance Fever is one of the few pandemic-themed artworks that doesn’t feel contrived — it is specific about the value of music to the individual and by extension to the community.
The album serves up exceptional stuff, even if the program’s a touch macabre and pianist Orion Weiss’s well-written liner notes make uncomfortable connections between the world of pre-World War 1 Europe and our own pandemic-riddled age.
Trampling on the expectations of his fans, of course, is a big part of what makes Joe Jackson the singular talent he is — and most of his admirers wouldn’t have it any other way.
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