Album Reviews

One of the finest clarinetists of the past 30 years, Tim Laughlin long ago developed his own sound within the New Orleans jazz tradition, inspired

Cliff Jackson (1902-70) was one of the great stride pianists to emerge from the 1920s. Despite that, Jackson recorded exclusively during 1924-27 as an accompanist

I didn’t realize just how much I need dancing in my life, until I could no longer do it. I knew I loved it, but

Robert Bell’s Hot Swing Combo has spent the last fifteen years as regional favorites at Midwestern swing events. They are based in Minneapolis and have

I downloaded this album the moment I saw it. At the time it was only five tracks with maybe six or seven musicians on board

Veteran clarinetist and saxophonist Bob Fanelli pays tribute to Louis Armstrong on a CD with the Dixie Boys. The performances are not strict re-creations and

The recordings on this CD date from the last days of Louis Armstrong’s membership in the King Oliver Creole Jazz Band until the time when

Recently I picked up a used self-titled LP by a group called Wholly Cats since it had some potentially hot swing performances on it. Only

Rarely has one musician made such a difference. When Louis Armstrong moved from Chicago to New York in September 1924 to join Fletcher Henderson’s orchestra,

Turk Murphy (1915-1987) was one of the giants of jazz in the San Francisco area, beginning with his tenure in the Lu Watters Yerba Buena

When it comes to reviewing recordings by tenor-saxophonist Scott Hamilton, all one really has to say is that a particular release is “what you expect,”

Here is a group and a leader who I know nothing about and are not listed in jazz discographies. In 2012, Ted Shafer, who ran

The U.K. has always been fortunate, it seems, in the number of traditional jazz bands that have emerged over the years. One of them is

Fred Hunt was most notable for being the longtime pianist with trumpeter Alex Welsh’s Eddie Condon-influenced band in the 1950s and ’60s. An excellent stride

The story of the beginnings of Preservation Hall in New Orleans is one with a few twists and turns. While many people ascribed the founding

While trumpeter Sonny Morris gets the first billing on this collection from Upbeat (which is titled Sonny Morris & Friends In Germany with Lutz Eikelmann),

Ever since the advent of George Webb’s Dixielanders in the forties, the UK has been fortunate in its abundance of traditional jazz groups. Dozens have

Among the Jazz Oracle CDs that are now being made available by the Upbeat Company is Jack Teagarden’s 1930 Studio Sessions. In a parallel universe

While Lu Watters was the leader of the pioneering and highly influential Yerba Buena Jazz Band starting in 1941, he retired prematurely in 1950 to

The CD notes tell us that Dick Hyman made partial arrangements of these pieces, setting up a platform for improvisation. When clarinetist Ken Peplowski arrived

Jazz is powerful word, so powerful that the decade 1919/1929 was held in its grasp, known as the Jazz Age. Yet it has a strange

The mere announcement of a new Fat Babies album should inspire most readers of The Syncopated Times to run out and buy it. They are