New Jazz Releases..What Do You Like?

Once you get past all the Nora Jones and Diana Krall hype (they are good vocalists but enough already!) there are actually some great new jazz musicians with lots of recent releases. My current favorite is Joe Lovano who is one of the best jazz sax player to come along since Coltrane, Dex Gordon, Rollins etc. Check out his many CD's on Towerrecords.com

Jason Moran's "Modernistic"

If you like piano jazz and want to try out something fresh and new, try this. I love it. In fact, it's on right now.

Jazz pianist, Michel Camilo, is an unbelievably gifted musician-composer. Check out his recent release, Triangulo.

I'll second Moran; he's a facinating character. I tend to go for the classic stuff, however, so my favorite of the last year was Bill Charlap's take on Hoagy Carmichael, "Stardust." (Or maybe it was called "Skylark." I can never remember.) Includes such great "guests" as Tony Bennett, Frank Wess, and Jim Hall.

The Shorter Quartet got a lot of buzz (including a thread here). "Footprints Live" is a fine sample of their work.

Finally, I always look forward to something new from Jacky Terrasson. "Smile" just came out last week, so I haven't heard it yet.

"4 Generations of Miles" -- a Chesky high-resolution CD featuring the songs of Miles Davis performed by his former sidemen Jimmy Cobb, Ron Carter, George Coleman, and Mike Stern. Great songs & great sound.