The season for end of year lists has already started, I see. I quite like them, but I’m not going to add to them. Still, as I post here so rarely, they do make me feel like pulling together the CDs I’ve reviewed (so far) this year as I see I’ve not done that for ages. These are all on the LondonJazzNews site, but it pleases me to have them all linked here. Date order, with no other implication… Paul Clarvis, Liam Noble, Cathy Jordan – Freight Train An unexpected trio (Irish folk singer meets first quality Brit jazz), which really works. Still regretful I was out of town for their Bristol gig ..read more

This blog being in a state of benign(?) neglect, I can’t see that I’ve posted any of the CD reviews I write for another site here this year. Since everyone else is doing end of year roundups, here’s mine. This is in no sense a “best of” – which, judging by at least one jazz magazine’s lists, seem nowadays to be mainly a way of reinforcing a pretty predictable critical consensus that centres on major label jazz that got heavily promoted (see also “reads of the year” in every newspaper). These are just some things I fancied reviewing and picked out of the torrent of new jazz releases before the ..read more

The London jamboree was back on full song this year, and we succumbed to temptation – in contrast to 2021 when we heard a single concert. A double dose took in five gigs, including Joshua Redman with Meldhau, Blade and McBride – first booked for July 2020, so the longest ever wait for a live show. That was just for listening and, as the final date on their European tour, was pretty special. Nice to be back in the Barbican again, too. The other four were all dates I got to review for LondonJazzNews. Here are the links for interest. Linda May Han Oh – Pizza Express. Dave Holland, Aziza – Cadog ..read more

after the show… Swanage had a few travails even before the pandemic so it was good to see the festival bounce back after a 2-year hiatus. Reason enough for the blog to stir briefly from stasis – mainly to note some things for my own benefit for next year: I’ll be going back! It’s a small festival, in an unbeatable location: a jazz festival where you can swim before breakfast (this year it was warm enough for there still to be swimmers after dinner). I like that. Easy to get to, as well. Bristolians may like to note that public transport is pretty easy – take the Weymouth train, change in Dorch ..read more

Posts here got sparse during the pandemic, then focussed on one idea – a track a week – through last year. The exploration that started after that – explaining music, I guess – is now suspended (temporarily?). I don’t suppose anyone has noticed, but thought I’d mention it. I have one or two ideas to pursue there, but not enough headspace just now. Nor do I seem to be making time for previewing/reviewing now live music in my city is back. It seems to be going along splendidly without my two pennyworth, which is great. And after a decade of moderately assiduous comment on the passing scene I’m r ..read more

I came to a stop last time with Roger Scruton’s declaration that there is nothing to be learned about music – or its meaning – by studying sounds animals make. He held to that because he interpreted a range of evidence, including the usual mix of evolution of various traits, ethology, neuroscience and psychology, to indicate that whatever the sound, music comes from the perceptual processing that we bring to the acoustic moment. So whatever animals may experience when they make sound, or hear it, it won’t be music. Some of the leading biomusicologists tend to agree nowadays. But they – Henkjan ..read more

Do gibbon duets work up a kind of proto-musical call and response? With the ear of faith, perhaps. But of course there are other species that do more than make noise. Birds are the ones we love best, and the sound-generating capacities of some species offer a mystery as profound in its way as human music. We humans even call their active noise-making song, in recognition of the qualities it shares with what we do. And the more it resembles song, the harder it seems to account for. I am beguiled by David Rothenberg’s Why Birds Sing* and not just because he is a jazz musician – he studied clarin ..read more

Almost certainly unnecessary continuity note: held this piece until I’d written some more, but I haven’t. So posting now, and more follows on some other creatures that sing (“sing”?) The last rambling posted here pointed toward what we can learn from the noises other creatures make that may resemble music. So let’s go into some biology a bit more. Hearing makes music possible. That highlights one of the special features of the senses that has developed in an astonishing way for this latecomer (evolutionarily speaking) to ways of gathering information about the world. Any sense, I suppose, can ..read more

Thought of missing a week, because of wars and stuff, but trying to keep this regular for now. Consequently, what’s below is (even) more in the nature of “notes to self” than usual. Anyway… When I began this episodic excursion I said I wasn’t sure where it was going to go. Meaning, really, what ideas to explore, and also in what order. That’s definitely the case now, as I’m weighing several directions to look in next. But I also have a residual niggle or two about the book I mentioned last week (Sweet Anticipation), so I’m going to note those first.  Any inquiry into music is an inquiry i ..read more

Can one get a bit deeper into how this bit of music produces its effects? Others think so, so I’ll look at a book I admire, even though it has limitations. David Huron’s Sweet Anticipation: Music and the Psychology of Expectation  (2006) is pretty ambitious. It’s more than fifteen years old now, so he wasn’t able to take in recent neuroscience However, as the subtitle says, his focus is psychology – in this case observable effects on perception and response – rather than underlying brain mechanisms so that doesn’t matter too much. He’s intent on accounting for pleasure in music. His take ..read more