JazzMatters: The Best New Jazz of January 2023
Will Layman rounds up the best new jazz albums and cocoons with jazz documentaries, Louis Armstrong’s Black & Blues and Ron Carter: Finding the Right Notes.
matthew shipp
JazzMatters: The Best New Jazz of June 2022
PopMatters jazz critic Will Layman rounds up the best new jazz albums of recent vintage, including some thoughts on Paul McCartney and Ron Carter.
As East Axis, Shipp, Lowe, Cleaver, and Ray Play Free Jazz Together
Matthew Shipp, Allen Lowe, Gerald Cleaver, and Kevin Ray are East Axis, a free improvising jazz band that never sound harsh or lost on Cool with That.
Pianist Matthew Shipp Accidentally Makes an Introspective Album with ‘Codebreaker’
Codebreaker is the sound of jazz pianist Matthew Shipp gliding on autopilot, letting his subconscious do the talking.
Whit Dickey Reunites Old Trio to Create Dizzyingly Modern Sounds
Whit Dickey, William Parker, and Matthew Shipp push, pull, and roll their weight around in equal measure, making Village Mothership as unique as it is difficult.
Unbounded Saxophone That Sings: The Ivo Perelman Trio
Free improvising saxophonist Ivo Perelman, pianist Matthew Shipp, and drummer Whit Dickey spin listenable joy out of thin air. Jazz originality doesn’t have to be forbidding.
20 Jazz Albums You Might Have Missed in 2020
During the new-year season of best-of-the-year lists, I find myself looking backward—even at a year as difficult as 2020. Time was dilated—I thought I had too much of it but, as usual, there was too little for all the great music.
The 20 Best Jazz Albums of 2020
Here are six of the key jazz trends of the last 20 years, defined by 20 of the best 2020 recordings that made us see, again, why this music is in midst of such a thrilling patch of creativity.
The 60 Best Albums of 2020
Despite a global pandemic, an economic crash, and the shut-down of international touring, 2020 bestowed an embarrassment of musical riches upon us.
The 50 Best Albums of 2020 So Far
Even in the coronavirus-shortened record release schedule of 2020, the year has offered a mountainous feast of sublime music. The 50 best albums of 2020 so far are an eclectic and increasingly "woke" bunch.
Matthew Shipp’s ‘The Piano Equation’ Will Stand the Test of Time
Matthew Shipp's The Piano Equation is a fully improvised solo piano recital to stand the test of time, sitting in the realm where mathematics and magic collide.
The Best Jazz Albums of 2010
Jazz was working all the angles in 2010. Is there any other genre that has as much range -- from solo instruments to big bands, from instrumental to vocal, from European musicians to both North and South Americans, from truly pretty music to raucously avant-garde "noise"?