Sunday, April 28, 2024

Soesja Citroen - Shall We Dance Or Keep On Moping

Styles: Vocal
Year: 1989
File: MP3@320K/s
Time: 44:25
Size: 102,7 MB
Art: Front

(3:41)  1. Natural Step
(6:47)  2. Little Niles
(4:29)  3. Lonely House
(4:06)  4. Shall We Dance
(3:21)  5. Over The HIll
(6:35)  6. Baltimore Oriole
(5:18)  7. Hi-Fly
(6:11)  8. Spring Can Really Hang You Up the Most
(3:52)  9. Lonely Woman

Although not well known in the U.S., Soesja Citroen is among Holland's top jazz singers and has commanded a lot of respect in European jazz circles. Her influences include Abbey Lincoln, Sarah Vaughan, Billie Holiday and Ella Fitzgerald, among others, and she is an expressive interpreter of lyrics as well as a talented composer/lyricist. Though Dutch is her native language, Citroen's English is excellent--and she sings with only a slight trace of a Dutch accent. The vocalist was born and raised in the Hague, and as a young adult, she moved to Amsterdam to further her education and earned a masters degree in social psychology.

Citroen was 32 when, in 1980, she recorded her debut album, To Build and she went on to provide seven more albums in the 1980s, recording for Turning Point, Varagram and Timeless. It was in 1983 that she recorded the Turning Point release Soesja Citroen Sings Thelonious Monk, which received rave reviews from European jazz critics and is considered one of her best albums. Another conceptual offering that enjoyed high marks from European critics was 1987's Soesja Citroen sings Fred Astaire on Varagram. Citroen was equally busy in the 1990s, when she recorded for Varajazz and Challenge and often worked with the well respected British producer Chris Ellis. ~ Alex Henderson https://www.allmusic.com/artist/soesja-citroen-mn0000754593/biography

Shall We Dance Or Keep On Moping

Alyssa Allgood - Exactly Like You

Styles: Vocal
Year: 2018
File: MP3@320K/s
Time: 59:40
Size: 138,8 MB
Art: Front

(4:19)  1. Exactly Like You
(5:44)  2. Hocus Pocus
(4:52)  3. Rock With You
(5:57)  4. Ask Me Now
(5:44)  5. By My Side
(4:48)  6. The More I See You
(6:02)  7. If It's Magic
(5:09)  8. Alone Together
(4:43)  9. Waltzy
(5:41) 10. Darn That Dream
(6:37) 11. Yardbird Suite

Chicago-based jazz vocalist Alyssa Allgood has been described as an artist who “impressively sings, scats and writes original lyrics” (DownBeat Magazine). Her debut album, Out of the Blue, was released in Fall 2016 to wide critical acclaim. The album reimagines the classic Blue Note Records era with original arrangements and lyrics. It received a 4-star review from DownBeat Magazine and was named a “Best Release of 2016” by seven different publications including The Huffington Post and All About Jazz and a “Best Debut Release of 2016” by The New York City Jazz Record. Critics consistently praised Allgood’s instrumental approach and accomplished scat and vocalese singing. Allgood's sophomore album, Exactly Like You, was recently released in November 2018 on Cellar Live Records.

The album features her jazz organ quartet playing a mix of arrangements of jazz standards, pop classics and original songs. Allgood recently won the first Ella Fitzgerald Jazz Vocal Competition held in Washington D.C. in 2017. Other notable awards include being named a Top 15 Finalist in the 2016 and 2017 Sarah Vaughan International Jazz Vocal Competition, a 2016 Jazz Fellow through the Luminarts Cultural Foundation in Chicago and second place winner in the 2016 Mid-Atlantic Jazz Voice Competition. She also placed as a Top 10 Semifinalist in the 2015 Shure Montreux Jazz Voice Competition; where she competed live in Switzerland for a jury presided by jazz legend Al Jarreau. Allgood actively performs in and around Chicago and has appeared at the 2016 Chicago Jazz Festival, the Green Mill, the Jazz Showcase, Andy’s Jazz Club, Winter’s Jazz Club and the Jazz Estate. Allgood is also an active educator and recently served as a clinician at the 2018 Niles North Vocal Jazz Festival and the 2018 Illinois Wesleyan University Jazz Festival. She currently teaches directs vocal jazz ensembles at Neuqua Valley High School and Oak Park and River Forest High School. http://www.alyssaallgood.com/about.html

Exactly Like You

Barbara Dennerlein - Tribute To Charlie

Styles: Jazz
Year: 1986
File: MP3@320K/s
Time: 49:05
Size: 117,4 MB
Art: Front

(2:47)  1. A Tribute To Charlie P.
(5:02)  2. Donna Lee
(4:39)  3. Goodbye Pork Pie Hat
(3:47)  4. New Times
(3:07)  5. Ornithology
(3:57)  6. Billie's Bounce
(3:18)  7. Yardbird Suite
(4:54)  8. Solo For Winds
(5:10)  9. Four Years For T.
(4:16) 10. Scrapple From The Apple
(4:35) 11. Dewey Square
(3:33) 12. Last Friends

Her CDs have won numerous awards, including the German Record Critics Award. Her CD "Take Off" (Verve/Universal) even reached number 1 in the jazz charts and was the best-selling German jazz album of the year. Barbara Dennerlein belongs to the small circle of German artists of international repute. On her recordings and in her concerts, she stands out as a member of a new generation of jazz musicians, and is regarded by her peers and her audiences alike as one of the leading representatives of her instrument, the legendary Hammond B3.

It is an awe-inspiring experience to watch Barbara live on stage. As the most important and most successful German jazz export, she is familiar with large international festival stages and intimate clubs alike. A list of venues where she has wowed audiences is as varied as it is long: the "Blue Note" and the "Sweet Basil" in New York, "Ronnie Scott's Club" and the "Jazz Café" in London and the "Blue Note" in Tokyo; Philadelphia, Berkley, San Jose, San Diego; the Montreal, Vancouver, Toronto, Edmonton, and Victoria jazz festivals; European festivals in The Hague, the North Sea Jazz Festival in the Netherlands, the Pori Jazz Festival in Finland, the Molde Jazz in Norway, the Arhus Jazz Festival in Denmark, the Maastricht-Kortrijk Festival in Belgium, the Vitoria Festival de Jazz in Spain, and German festivals in Berlin, Frankfurt, Leverkusen, Nuremberg, Vilshofen, Burghausen, Freiburg, Hamburg, Hanover and many others. Besides her nearly endless live performances, Barbara has made numerous appearances on both domestic and international radio and TV.

Both with her own "Bebab" group and solo, Barbara is equally celebrated by critics and audiences alike on both sides of the Atlantic. The name "Bebab" is a play on "Bebop" and "Barbara" and indicates something unique for which there is no established term, no pigeonhole. She knows the value of tradition but is also at home in modern jazz, in the here and now. She is one of the few musicians who can make the connection between different styles and audiences, building bridges between the musical past and present. She is just as familiar with the grooves of youth culture as with the listening experiences of a generation that grew up with the Hammond organ boom of the fifties. Swing, bebop, blues, soul, latin and funk for Barbara there are no rigid boundaries, only fluid transitions. Audiences are captivated by her talent, her absolute mastery of the instrument, her taste, and not least, her warm personality. The B3, it would seem, is a seamless extension of herself. She understands better than anyone how to exploit her instrument to the full, creating a sound and a musical style that is unmistakably "Barbara Dennerlein". Her brilliant technique has breathed new life into the venerable Hammond organ, an instrument long neglected in modern jazz. She can rightfully claim to have paved the way for the organ's current renaissance in jazz. Born in Munich in 1964, she fell in love with one sound at an early age. While others were practicing "Für Elise" or strumming "All You Need Is Love" on the guitar, Barbara was fascinated by the sound of the Hammond organ. More Bio ~ http://www.barbaradennerlein.com/en/cds/index.php

Personnel: Bass – Jean Warland, Thomas Stabenow; Composed By – Barbara Dennerlein (tracks: A1, A4, B2, B3), Charles Mingus (tracks: A3), Charlie Parker (tracks: A2, A5, A6, B1, B4, B5), Heinz von Hermann (tracks: B6); Conductor – Peter Herbolzheimer; Drums – Bruno Castellucci; Guitar – Peter Tiehuis; Organ – Barbara Dennerlein; Saxophone – Bubi Aderhold, Heinz Von Hermann, James Towsey, John Ruocco, Karl Drewo; Trombone – Bart Van Lier, Eric Van Lier, Jiggs Whigham, Joe Gallardo, Sepp Romeis; Trumpet – Ack Van Rooyen, Allan Botschinsky, Andreas Haderer, Derek Watkins, Gregg Bowen, Jan Oosthof

Charlie Haden & Brad Mehldau - Long Ago And Far Away

Styles: Post Bop, Piano Jazz
Year: 2018
File: MP3@320K/s
Time: 71:52
Size: 165,7 MB
Art: Front

( 9:55)  1. Au Privave
( 9:13)  2. My Old Flame
(12:00)  3. What'll I Do
(15:05)  4. Long Ago And Far Away
(12:59)  5. My Love And I
(12:37)  6. Everything Happens To Me

It starts with a few irreverent tickles. Just three minutes into Bird’s “Au Privave,” Brad Mehldau gives his muse the green light, messes around with a spray of notes, and we’re off into a chatty conversation where blithe trills are grounded by buoyant thumps meaning informality has just as much bearing on this entertaining exchange as decorum does. Perhaps that’s predictable. Impulse!’s last three Haden duet discs (with Jim Hall and Gonzalo Rubalcaba, respectively) make hay with a parallel dynamic. One of the bassist’s strengths was splitting the diff between the formidable and the folksy, and as these six performances from a 2007 German show illustrate, Mehldau has little problem turning to his colloquial side when the mood strikes. The cozy context gives the pianist’s whimsy more wiggle room than usual. Though the book is ballad-heavy and the tempos measured, both participants skip through a handful of passages with a mischievous air. Mehldau’s right hand dodges opaque excursions and lets light-hearted flurries carry the day on “What’ll I Do.” Because the two decide on a bouncy gait for “Long Ago and Far Away,” it too is a romp that trusts mercurial solos to control its temperament. 

Both players love a moody digression, however, and “My Love and I” turns bluesy and brooding while still dropping a string of surprises. The pianist’s urbane essence is no longer on the back burner, and the duo’s pulsing interplay renders yet another bit of sage advice: Caprice is an ally, dismiss it at your peril. ~ Jim Macnie https://jazztimes.com/reviews/albums/charlie-haden-brad-mehldau-long-ago-far-away/

Personnel: Charlie Haden – bass; Brad Mehldau – piano

Long Ago And Far Away