Gabriele Coen’s “Awakening” is a dark, moody collection of pieces built around complex, syncopated rhythms and long, spinning melodies in minor modes. Coen and his band mates are clearly accomplished jazz musicians, and together they produce moments of understated elegance. But don’t think of playing this album at your next cocktail party — your guests…
Crossposted from Haaretz Here’s an idea for a wonderful festival of new Israeli jazz: Bring together under one roof all (or most) of the local musicians who have put out albums in recent years under the New York label Tzadik Records. In the past 10 years, Tzadik — the company owned by avant-garde composer/musician John…
Crossposted from Haaretz On Friday morning, the ninth-grade students in the jazz program at the Thelma Yellin High School for Arts were learning about the history of jazz with their beloved teacher, Amit Golan. That same day there was a test. The questions were about Duke Ellington, Art Tatum and other early jazz giants, whom…
Gaucho’s “Pearl,” released last month on Porto Franco Records and launched at the Jewish Music Festival of Berkeley, Calif., is the perfect accompaniment to a lazy autumn afternoon. Channeling the sounds of 1930s Paris, the San Francisco-based sextet plays the kind of gentle, sometimes-jubilant, sometimes-melancholy swing that doesn’t make you want to get up and…
Crossposted from Frontier Psychiatrist While many new indie bands are busy recycling the sounds of the 1980s, the Xylopholks look deeper into the past. With a blend of earnestness and irony, their zany music draws from ragtime and jazz from the Roaring ’20s and features the xylophone, an instrument now more prevalent in elementary school…
In the high-ceilinged atrium of the World Financial Center’s Winter Garden, Israeli bassist Avishai Cohen gave a free concert Saturday in a forest of palm trees. The show was part of Daniel Pearl World Music Days, an international network of concerts honoring the slain American journalist. For the project’s mission of reaffirming a commitment to…
Meet Avi Yitzhak, Israel’s first Ethiopian fashion designer. Jewish Fiction .net, “the first English-language journal devoted exclusively to the publishing of Jewish fiction,” has launched. Roberto Rodriguez and Abraham Inc. are among several Jewish-y acts included in the Village Voice’s Jazz Consumer Guide. The fourth annual Tel Aviv Dance festival opens today, bringing 12 international…
How a machinist named Martin Cohen became the pre-eminent photographer of New York’s Latin music scene. Montreal’s Schwartz’s Hebrew Delicatessen is set to be turned into a musical. Is it time to update the Hebrew alphabet for the Internet age? Read an interview with Allen Ginsberg collaborator and “Howl!” illustrator Eric Drooker. The trailer for…
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