Sunday, April 25, 2010

Jazz Connexion 4/25

Here's the playlist from this evening's program:

1. Stanton Moore - Groove Alchemy - Keep on Gwine
2. The Nels Cline Singers - Initiate - Floored
3. Preservation Hall Jazz Band - Benefit Album - La vie en rose feat. Angelique Kidjo and Terence Blanchard
4. Darcy James Argue's Secret Society - Infernal Machines - Transit feat. Ingrid Jensen
5. Speak - Speak - Amalgam In The Middle
6. Wellstone Conspiracy - Motives - Turbulator
7. Anat Cohen - Clarinetworks: Live at the Village Vanguard - St. James Infirmary
8. Bobby Previte and Bump - Counterclockwise - And The Wind Cries... Mademoiselle Katherine

As always, thank you for tuning into the Jazz Connexion. The next two weeks will be relatively normal in their programming, building up to the final show on May 16th which will feature my top picks in jazz from the past 4 years (the span of time that I've been on the air on KWLC). See you next week.

Sunday, April 18, 2010

Jazz Connexion 4/18/2010 - Esperanza Spalding

Tonight's episode of the Jazz Connexion featured a profile on the prodigious, 25 year-old Esperanza Spalding. Her claim to fame is playing her bass and singing simultaneously. Since her debut at 15 with Portland group Noise for Pretend, she has created a spectacular, and still blossoming, solo career that shows why she is seen as her generation's most electrifying jazz star. This has resulted in pairings with legends Mike Stern, Francisco Mela, Lionel Loueke, Joe Lovano, and many others, right alongside fellow up-and-comers Christian Scott and Aaron Parks. Bass in hand, Esperanza infuses Afro-Caribbean grooves with Prince songs and manages to marry the driving sounds of Loud Rock with the lightest most delicate bass lines. Hers is a name to watch for, and certainly someone to be listening to whether you're an experienced connoisseur or you're trying to take your first steps into the world of jazz.

The following is tonight's playlist. All songs feature Esperanza Spalding on the vocals and/or bass.

1. Noise for Pretend - Happy You Near - Pants With His Halfway Down
2. Esperanza Spalding - Junjo - The Peacocks (this track was my first exposure to her sound as a freshman jazz DJ at KWLC)
3. Esperanza Spalding - Junjo - Loro
4. Lionel Loueke - Mwaliko - Twins
5. Lionel Loueke - Mwaliko - Flying
6. Mike Stern - Big Neighborhood - Bird Blue
7. Christian Scott - Anthem - Litany Against Fear
8. Esperanza Spalding - Esperanza - Mela
9. Esperanza Spalding - Esperanza - Espera

Sunday, April 11, 2010

Jazz Connexion 4/11/10

With Spring Break and Easter Break falling so close to each other, it has been over a month since the Jazz Connexion has been aired at its normal time. This was an exciting and progressive show. Thanks for listening.

1. Ilhan Ersahin - Ilhan Ersahin's Istanbul Sessions with Erik Truffaz - Freedom
2. Vijay Iyer Trio - Historicity - Smoke Stack (Andrew Hill)
3. Tigran Hamasyan - Red Hail (Aratta Rebirth) - Falling
4. Christian McBride - Kind of Brown - Used 'Ta Could
5. Christina Watson - A Flower Truly Blue - A Thousand Kisses Deep (Leonard Cohen)
6. Brad Mehldau - Highway Rider - Highway Rider
7. Matthew Shipp Quartet - Pastoral Composure - Frere Jacques
Notes from the album's Executive Producer Peter Gordon - "Regardless of genre, music trends are showing a growing complacency to challenge convention. Feeling frustrated by this stagnancy, I realized that by creating a series fo records marrying jazz's many languages, perhaps a new form could arise. The Blue Series (of which this album is a part) attempts to do this in a way that will, hopefully, challenge, probe, excite, and perhaps even anger listeners as we try to strip away conventions with a new convention."
8. Chris McGregor's Brotherhood of Breath - Eclipse at Dawn - Nick Tete

Alas, this evening we ran out of minutes. If only time were on my side. In the coming weeks expect to hear Bobby Previte & Bump from their album Counterclockwise.

Coming up next weekend (4/17-19), the KWLC Jazz Staff is going to provide you with 9 hours of edutainment via Artist Profiles. Each DJ will pick an artist and show their work in every context that it exists (i.e. solo works, composition, as a sideman). Tune in to hear profiles of pianist Matthew Shipp Saturday 8-9am, saxophonist John Coltrane right afterward from 9-10am. On Sunday, pianist Bill Anschell from 530-630p, drummer Stanton Moore from 630-730p, bassist/singer Esperanza Spalding on the Jazz Connexion from 730-830p, drummer/composer Dave King from 830-930p and then reed-master Anat Cohen 10p-11p on Monday night, followed by guitarist Lionel Loueke from 11p-12a, and Thelonious Monk from 12-1a.

Be sure to tune in for a weekend of wonderful music. Click here to view the entire KWLC Schedule.