Straight No Chaser - A Jazz Show

At its heart, Oneness is Israeli-born vocalist/songwriter/arranger Sivan Arbel’s musical response to the divisions she sees in society. Seamlessly blending Eastern and Western influences, she invites listeners to embrace their cultural and ideological differences and yet recognize the universal connections that bind us a...

On its own merits, the music on Seven Days, Mauricio Morales’ latest album, speaks with a strong, persuasive creative voice. The respected bassist-composer-ban...

With The Colors of My Life: A Cy Coleman Songbook, Manhattan Transfer founding member and Grammy Award-Winning vocalist Janis Siegel and acclaimed pianist/arranger/musical director Yaron Gershovsky, together have co-produced their first duo songbook album. And it comes from a classic “When a door closes, a window opens” ...

Long hailed for her style-blurring renditions of artists spanning Tom Waits and Jimi Hendrix to Marvin Gaye and Metallica, Elles sees Youn Sun Nah bringing her remarkable voice and unique perspective to a range of songs that have deeply fueled her own indescribable musical approach, all made famous by such iconic female ...

No Cowards in Our Band is a musical drama telling the story of renowned activist and abolitionist Frederick Douglass (1818-1895) through his own words. With the performance just days before the 2024 Presidential Election, th...

Tord Gustavsen has gone down many musical paths in his still-blossoming career. Classically trained and educated in musicology, Tord also has a deep knowledge of jazz, which he has seamlessly integrated with the folk and religious music of his upbringing in Oslo. In many ways a quintessential ECM artis (though in our con...

I’m always happy to preview jazz festivals across the US on Straight No Chaser. The big ones like Newport or Monterey are always great, and regional festivals like those held in Saratoga  or by NJPAC are a blast. But I have a special place in my heart for the cities and towns who present festivals, places like Northa...

Pianist and keyboardist Dan Siegel has covered a broad swath of the jazz spectrum over the course of his four-and-a-half decade career, from straight ahead swing to sleek contemporary sounds. While that’s a testament to Siegel’s multi-faceted talents and restless curiosity, it’s also the result of the diverse array of co...

‘Genre-fluid’ is a great word to describe the music of guitarist Ethan Margolis, aka “Emaginario.”  A life-long student of music, he has traveled the world from his native Cleveland to bring African diaspora-Caribbean sounds and flamenco stylings to his musical base of the blues a...

Norma Winstone has been a one of a kind musician in the jazz scene for more than fifty years. A unique artist as both jazz vocalist and lyricist, and ability to sing in ensembles from Big Bands to Avant-garde ensembles to intimate duets and trios have made each release in her distinctive career a “must hear.”

A reliably swinging presence and facile improviser on the New York scene since the late ‘80s, guitarist Greg Skaff has shared the bandstand with such jazz greats as Stanley Turrentine, Freddie Hubbard, David “Fathead” Newman and Ralph Peterson Jr., as well current notables like Mike LeDonne, David Hazeltine, Orrin Evans,...

The Latin Side of McCoy Tyner is Conrad Herwig’s latest reimagination of music from his musical heroes, and in this case, former boss on the bandstand. Backed by a band that includes his closest friends and long-time collaborators, including Craig Handy (tenor & baritone saxophone), Alex Norris (trumpet & flugelhorn), Bill O'Connell (piano), Rub...

The Latin Side of McCoy Tyner is the latest installment in a critically-acclaimed series that started in 1996 with The Latin Side of John Coltrane. It's the work of Conrad Herwig, a musically gifted, bilingual artist, a master trombonist who grew up admiring jazz's greatest practitioners but, at the same time, cutting his Latin Jazz teeth with l...

An early highlight of the summer for jazz fans in the US Northeast is always the Freihoer's Saratoga Jazz Festival, held on the grounds of the lovely Saratoga Performing Arts Center ("SPAC"). This year's lineup...

Those who cover music love to categorize the music and musicians we focus on. I put myself all too often into this group. What should I call it? Is it Acid Jazz? Post Bop? Downtown Loft? But far too often muscians fall in between the cracks of these often arbitrary categories, and we are left looking for new descriptive ...

""In a world where it's easy to be cynical and bitter, what strikes me m...

Zaccai Curtis continues to be one of the most engaging piano players of the past decade. Whether as a band leader (alone or with his brother Luques) or backing the likes of the late Ralph Peterson, Lakecia Benjamin and Cindy Blackman Santana, his strong sense of rhythm and deep knowledge of Latin and Afro-...

Podcast 975 continues my conversation with the great Charles McPherson. A giant of the saxophone, Charles is a product of the rich jazz city of Detroit, where he was mentored by the late Barry Harris. His closest childhood friend was the future trumpeter Lonnie Hillyer; the two later played together with the iconic Charl...

Reverence is Charles McPherson’s first release for Smoke Sessions Records, and a few listens reveal why he’s been held in such reverence for the last 64 years. The album captures a scintillating live performance from Smoke Jazz Club, where McPherson is joined by his remarkable current group featuring trumpeter Terell Stafford, pianist Jeb Patton, bassist David Wong, and drumm...