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JON GARELICK

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John Malkovich freaks out at ArtsEmerson

You don't know Jack
In the flesh, the thing itself was about as odd and amusing as it had appeared on paper: John Malkovich delivering the "confessions" of convicted Austrian serial killer Jack Unterweger while accompanied onstage by a Baroque orchestra and a couple of sopranos singing arias.

By: JON GARELICK | September 30, 2011

Laurie Anderson is still really good

Mother lover
If I hesitate to offer a review of Laurie Anderson's Delusion (at ArtsEmerson's Paramount Center through October 2), it's because I fear the whole thing will be just one big spoiler.

By: JON GARELICK | September 30, 2011

Dead Cat Bounce's many meanings

Wordless stories
It's never easy to say what a piece of instrumental music "means." So composers give us titles and program notes and, when they get desperate, lyrics.

By: JON GARELICK | September 28, 2011

Is Boardwalk Empire about to enter its golden age?

Easy livin'
Dispel any remaining doubts. The new season (which begins this Sunday at 9 pm on HBO) unfolds with a new leisurely, cinematic grandeur.

By: JON GARELICK | September 21, 2011

Magos Herrera's cool moves

The Mexican jazz singer comes to Scullers
We like to say that live performance adds another dimension to music.

By: JON GARELICK | September 15, 2011

A new trio hits the Coolidge

Introducing
Soloff, now 67, has a long list of impressive credits that includes the Carla Bley Band, the Carnegie Hall Big Band, the Vanguard Jazz Orchestra, a passel of Latin jazz bands (including Machito's), seminal jazz-rock outfit Blood, Sweat, and Tears, and a long association with the man he considers his mentor, composer/arranger Gil Evans.

By: JON GARELICK | September 14, 2011

The top 10 jazz events in town this fall

Starting with the Beantown Jazz Festival, ensembles large and small mix it up
As usual, there's too much to choose from. Here are some highlights.

By: JON GARELICK | September 14, 2011

Gerry Beaudoin 'returns' with Harry Allen

History lessons
My first encounter with guitarist Gerry Beaudoin was as a fellow judge at a long-ago battle of the blues bands at Harpers Ferry. The night had been kind of a slog, and after three bands, Beaudoin — who'd been withholding comment all night looked at me and said, "I don't get it, don't these guys listen to any blues records?"

By: JON GARELICK | September 06, 2011

Paul Lieberman's Brazilian accent

Bilingual
How did a middle-class Jewish kid from New Jersey become a first-call session musician in Rio de Janeiro?

By: JON GARELICK | August 22, 2011

Newport Jazz Festival turns left

Now nonprofit, the event combines artistic and commercial viability
At this year's edition, there was very little you couldn't call jazz — maybe Afropop star Angelique Kidjo or, if you were being especially churlish, New Orleans trombonist and trumpeter Troy "Trombone Shorty" Andrews, with his funk-heavy set.

By: JON GARELICK | August 10, 2011

James Farm take jazz into songs

Plus: A Newport Jazz Fest sampler
Typical of the festival's — and jazz's — rich crosscurrents these days is the collective quartet James Farm. This is a band with unassailable jazz bona fides.

By: JON GARELICK | August 03, 2011

Amy Winehouse, 1983–2011

In Memoriam
While we all await the inevitable "Last Days of Amy Winehouse" report from Rolling Stone , let's take a breather and remember the voice. It was slow, smoky, insinuating, sweet-and-sour, and seemed to conjure a handful of jazz-and-soul divas in a syllable...

By: JON GARELICK | July 28, 2011

Dominick Farinacci's hometown arias

Hello Cleveland!
Farinacci releases the new, romantically-themed Dawn of Goodbye (E1) on July 26 and comes to the Regattabar on August 3.

By: JON GARELICK | July 20, 2011

Assaf Kehati - Flowers and Other Stories

Assaf Kehati Quartet | Flowers and Other Stories

AKJazz (2011)
The Boston-based Israeli guitarist Assaf Kehati and his quartet know how to straddle the great divide.

By: JON GARELICK | July 12, 2011

Mark McGrain takes Plunge, music ensues

Contrapuntally speaking
Trying to find continuities in the strains of jazz history can be a dizzying, foolish, irresistible head game. Original as it is, this stuff all comes from somewhere, right?

By: JON GARELICK | June 27, 2011

The Cookers' book

A "supergroup" maintains the standard
When does a one-off gimmick turn into a "real" band? On the face of it, the Cookers, who come to Scullers next Thursday, June 16, could easily have become a gimmick that outlived its usefulness — a handful of wily veterans egged on by a couple of younger cats as a way to trade on the collective power of their names and score some gigs.

By: JON GARELICK | June 09, 2011

Plainville, James Farm, and the Infrared Band

Old and new dreams
When Antoine Batiste is looking for a guitarist, the one thing he doesn't want to hear is "white boys with bad hair playin' them cowboy keys."

By: JON GARELICK | May 26, 2011

Photos: New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival

New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival | April 27–May 6, 2011
Big Freedia, Creole Wild West, Danny Barnes, Dr. John, Dave Bartholomew, Pine Leaf Boys, Tom Jones, Washboard Chaz and Zion Harmonizers perform live at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival from April 27–May 6, 2011.

By: JON GARELICK | May 18, 2011

Playing pretty at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival

Anthems and praise songs
An accordion blasted a few bars of a two-step and then stopped. "That's the only Cajun music you'll hear on this stage," said Colin Meloy. The Decemberists were making their New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival debut on the Fais Do-Do stage, which is typically reserved for Cajun, zydeco, and other indigenous Louisiana music.

By: JON GARELICK | May 12, 2011

JCA orchestra performs during Jazz week in Boston

Eric Jackson and Jazz Week

Good waves
When he headed for BU from his home town of Camden, New Jersey, in 1968, Eric Jackson thought his ultimate destination was medical school and a career in psychiatry. But as a jazz fan from an early age — and the son of a fairly renowned jazz DJ — he found himself on the closed-circuit BU student station, WTBU.

By: JON GARELICK | April 26, 2011

Review: Cure For Pain: The Mark Sandman Story

Documentary about the late Morphine frontman
It's difficult to say whether anyone besides fans will be drawn to Robert G. Bralver & David Ferino's at times hagiographic documentary about the late Morphine frontman, who died on a concert stage in Palestrina, Italy, in 1999, at the age of 46.

By: JON GARELICK | April 27, 2011

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