Where jazz is concerned, the 2010s could be divided almost precisely
in half: BK (Before Kamasi) and AK (After Kamasi). The burly LA
saxophonist’s triple album, The Epic, was released on May 5,
2015, almost exactly at the decade’s midpoint, and it changed
everything. Not because he inspired a slew of imitators, but because all
of a sudden people were paying attention to the genre in a way they
hadn’t before. In the years that followed, his audience grew like a
tumor — his August 2015 New York debut was at the Blue Note, a club that
holds fewer than 200 people, and less than three years later, in June
2018, I saw him open for alt-j at Forest Hills Stadium in Queens.
His popularity came along with an overall shift toward
populism. Musicians in their 20s and 30s like Robert Glasper, Esperanza
Spalding (who won the Best New Artist Grammy in 2011, shocking Justin
Bieber fans), Christian Scott, Keyon Harrold, Marcus Strickland, and
others, who’d never known a world without hip-hop, began making records
that reflected their own lives and experiences. They were the products
of music schools, whether in New York and Boston or in North Texas, but
they were also children of the internet, and they arrived in groups,
preferring to work with their peers rather than serve as the young
apprentices to elder statesmen. They were joined by a slew of equally
young, equally exciting London players intent on bringing the music back
to life by incorporating rhythms and hooks from across the
Afro-Caribbean diaspora and blending them with the dancefloor sounds and
looping structures of London nightclubs, though they could assemble
classic post-bop arrangements, too.
Jazz’s veterans continued to impress and inspire, in performance and
on record, and some seemed to catch a creative wave, like trumpeter
Wadada Leo Smith, who released several multi-disc sets, one of which, Ten Freedom Summers, was a finalist for the 2013 Pulitzer Prize for Music. Henry Threadgill actually won a Pulitzer in 2015, for his album In For A Penny, In For A Pound.
And the music’s high-art side was strong in general, with labels like
Pi and Firehouse 12 putting out critically acclaimed and genuinely
impressive albums by a slew of talented player-composers, many of whom
popped up again and again in each other’s ensembles.
The list that follows isn’t a strict “best-of,” although every album
on it is genuinely great. It’s also (and maybe more) a list of 20 albums
that moved jazz forward, recontextualizing its past and suggesting new
possibilities for its future. With only a couple of exceptions, it’s a
list of music by Americans, because jazz is a global music, but it’s
from this country. And while there are a few players who’ve been active
since the late ’60s or early ’70s, it’s a list mostly made by people who
came on the scene in the 21st century, because they’re the generation
of players and composers who will be leading the charge in the years to
come.
20 Nicole Mitchell – Mandorla Awakening II: Emerging Worlds (FPE, 2017)
Flutist Nicole Mitchell is an avowed sci-fi fan, and cites the late
Octavia Butler as an influence on her work. The music on this record
combines ancient and modern instrumentation: shakuhachi (a Japanese wood
flute), violin, cello, banjo, electric guitar, oud, bass, shamisen,
Western percussion, and taiko drums. That blend of sounds — deployed
here in patient, meditative compositions that shimmer and radiate —
posits a future that’s culturally omnivorous and philosophically
egalitarian, putting no one above anyone else and all in service to the
whole. It’s extraordinarily beautiful and thoughtful music, a verdant
rain forest of sound that inspires while it entertains.
19 Darcy James Argue’s Secret Society – Real Enemies (New Amsterdam, 2016)
Composer and arranger Darcy James Argue is just one of a small school
of musicians who are revitalizing big band orchestration for the modern
era. Each of the Secret Society’s three albums to date has been a
conceptually unified large-scale work, and this is the ensemble’s
darkest music to date. It tackles themes of Cold War paranoia, creating
an alternate soundtrack to a spy thriller that plays out only in your
mind. The rhythms are stealthy, the horns creep up like a tail you can’t
quite shake; heard on headphones, this is music that’ll have you
looking over your shoulder.
18 Branford Marsalis Quartet – Four MFs Playin’ Tunes (Marsalis Music, 2012)
Saxophonist Branford Marsalis keeps his long-running quartet —
currently featuring pianist Joey Calderazzo, bassist Eric Revis, and
drummer Justin Faulkner — busy on the road, and occasionally they stop
into a recording studio. This album was Faulkner’s first with the group,
after joining in 2009, and it lives up to its title. These are tuneful
compositions, and they swing hard, because Revis is an absolutely
masterful bassist who journeys back and forth between conventional
post-bop and avant-garde experimentation without blinking, and Faulkner
is one of the most thunderous drummers since Elvin Jones. These guys are
monster players, and this album kicks ass.
17 Orrin Evans – Flip The Script (Posi-Tone, 2012)
Pianist Orrin Evans draws from the entirety of black music to turn
his compositions and interpretations into music that blends the
high-level improvisation and fierce swing of the purest jazz with the
melody and richness of soul. On this trio disc, he, bassist Ben Wolfe,
and drummer Donald Edwards work their way through six hard-driving
originals and some surprising covers. Their sunset version of “Someday
My Prince Will Come” is lonelier and more subdued than Miles Davis’s
1961 version, while their take on Luther Vandross’s “A Brand New Day”
comes charging out of the gate and never pauses for breath.
16 Cécile McLorin Salvant – Dreams And Daggers (Mack Avenue, 2017)
On this Grammy-winning double disc, vocalist Salvant and her trio
(pianist Aaron Diehl, bassist Paul Sikivie, and drummer Lawrence
Leathers, who was murdered in June 2019) journeyed through nearly two
dozen tracks exploring romance and heartbreak from multiple angles. The
music was mostly recorded live at the Village Vanguard, with six studio
tracks adding a string quartet. Salvant’s voice is light, with a Billie
Holiday-ish ragged edge, but she delivers the lyrics with clarity and
focus; these words mean something to her, and she wants them to mean
something to you. This was the essential jazz vocal album of the decade.
15 Donny McCaslin – Beyond Now (Motéma, 2016)
The band on this release — McCaslin on saxophone, Jason Lindner on
keyboards, Tim Lefebvre on bass, and Mark Guiliana on drums — had been
together for four years before they were recruited by David Bowie for
his final studio album, Blackstar. This was their follow-up,
which blended hard-charging, synth-rock originals with versions of two
Bowie pieces, “A Small Plot Of Land” and “Warszawa,” Deadmau5’s
“Coelacanth1,” and Mutemath’s “Remain.” McCaslin’s playing was less
about virtuoso technique and more about raw, emotive sound, Lindner and
Lefebvre were a perfect team, and Guiliana’s precisely chopped-up beats
kept things twitchy and exciting at all times.
14 Linda May Han Oh – Aventurine (Biophilia, 2019)
Recorded in 2017, this album combines a jazz quartet (saxophone,
piano, Oh’s bass, drums, and occasional vibes) with a string quartet and
five vocalists singing wordless melodies. The resulting music is a
stunning vision of chamber jazz, something like a tornado striking a
flowerbed — a mosaic of colors rises into the air and spins wildly,
swirling around and around in a way that’s both mildly disorienting and
utterly captivating. It’s a culmination for Oh, whose music has been
getting more intricate with each release. Her blending of traditions is
much more than a dry technical exercise, though; it’s almost swooningly
romantic.
13 Esperanza Spalding – Radio Music Society (Heads Up, 2012)
This disc — jammed with high-profile guests and slinky, arty
post-R&B songs — won bassist/vocalist Esperanza Spalding a Grammy
for Best Jazz Vocal Album, two years after she beat both Justin Bieber
and Drake to take Best New Artist. Her voice is soft and clear, never
devolving into mannered breathiness, and her lyrics are sharp and
perceptive. The music blends jazz, funk, soul, and a few pieces have a
Brazilian lilt; “Hold On Me” is a lushly orchestrated big band ballad.
This was the album that marked Spalding as a composer and performer
whose talent could smash all arbitrary walls between genres.
12 Ambrose Akinmusire – The Imagined Savior Is Far Easier To Paint (Blue Note, 2014)
Trumpeter Ambrose Akinmusire’s third album featured longtime
collaborators — Walter Smith III on sax, Sam Harris on piano, Harish
Raghavan on bass, Justin Brown on drums — plus guitarist Charles Altura,
the OSSO String Quartet, and vocalists Becca Stevens, Theo Bleckmann,
and Cold Specks. He’s not a fire-breathing trumpeter; he often seems to
be murmuring to himself. And the lyrics seem like internal monologues
even as they demand sympathy for suffering people, from homeless men to
victims of gun violence to convicted murderers. This album may require
several listens to fully sink in and reveal itself, but when it does
it’s astonishingly powerful.
11 William Parker – Wood Flute Songs (AUM Fidelity, 2013)
In 1998, bassist William Parker premiered a new quartet featuring
trumpeter Lewis “Flip” Barnes, alto saxophonist Rob Brown, and drummer
Hamid Drake. That group has made multiple studio and live albums, all of
them excellent, but this eight-CD box, which includes concerts by the
quartet as well as expanded ensembles with those four musicians as the
core, is just mind-blowing. Parker and Drake are one of the greatest
rhythm teams in jazz, and the trance-like grooves they set up allow
Barnes and Brown (and a stunning array of guests) to journey as far out
as they like, the ground secure beneath them.
10 Matana Roberts – Coin Coin Chapter Two: Mississippi Moonchile (Constellation, 2013)
Alto saxophonist, composer, and multimedia artist Matana Roberts’
continuing series — projected to run 12 parts — tells the story of her
family, but it’s the story of America as well. In this second volume,
she assembles a fantastic group with trumpeter Jason Palmer, pianist
Shoko Nagai, bassist Thomson Kneeland, and drummer Tomas Fujiwara to
work through 18 linked pieces that blend jazz, gospel, and complex
compositional gambits. Oh, and there’s an operatic tenor, Jeremiah
Abiah, serving as a counterpoint to Roberts’ own singing and recitations
of poems, Bible verses, and memories of her grandmother, who’s the
primary subject of this album.
9 Sons Of Kemet – Your Queen Is A Reptile (Impulse!, 2018)
The rise of London’s insurgent jazz scene was one of the most
exciting stories of the 2010s’ second half. Dozens of musicians, many
the children of immigrants, worked together to create a vibrant music
that blended hard bop and avant-garde rigor with the driving beats of
the city’s dance clubs and street parties. This album by towering reeds
player Shabaka Hutchings’ sax/tuba/two-drummers quartet featured
multiple guests, including fellow saxophonists Nubya Garcia and Pete
Wareham, vocalist Congo Natty, and poet Joshua Idehen. Together, they
created a stomping, conscious party album laying raw skronk over deep,
dubby grooves, with every track a tribute to an under-celebrated woman.
8 Irreversible Entanglements – Irreversible Entanglements (International Anthem, 2017)
Irreversible Entanglements is a quintet featuring saxophonist Keir
Neuringer, bassist Luke Stewart, trumpeter Aquiles Navarro, and drummer
Tcheser Holmes, joined by poet Camae Ayewa, better known as Moor Mother.
It’s improvised free jazz in the 1960s tradition; Ayewa’s words are
furious, but delivered with exquisite control. And behind her, the music
surges up and down, the horns attacking and receding like she’s
conducting them, as the bass and drums drive it all forward with a kind
of marching swing. Albert Ayler’s music often sounded like a parade —
Irreversible Entanglements pull a similar trick, but it’s a protest
march.
7 Tyshawn Sorey – The Inner Spectrum Of Variables (Pi, 2016)
Tyshawn Sorey is much, much more than a jazz drummer. His own music
frequently has a meditative quality that combines sounds in genuinely
unexpected ways, drawing the listener in, demanding and rewarding
focused listening. This two-CD set, composed for piano trio and string
trio (violin, viola, and cello), is breathtakingly beautiful. The first
disc begins with solo piano from Cory Smythe, moves through solo cello,
piano-and-strings, and ends with an ominous, mournful ensemble
soundscape. The second disc is just as dark and harsh, though light
breaks through sometimes. Two hours long, this is a genuine masterwork,
defiantly uncategorizable and as beautiful as anything by Cecil Taylor
or Morton Feldman.
6 Nduduzo Makhathini – Ikhambi (Universal Music, 2017)
South African pianist/composer Nduduzo Makhathini released eight
albums in the 2010s. He’s a spiritual jazz player in the vein of McCoy
Tyner, Pharoah Sanders, and both John and Alice Coltrane; his
compositions pulse and shimmer, trumpet and saxophone bolstered by harp,
choirs and additional percussion. Ikhambi is a truly epic
work, a 75-minute album that includes two different three-part suites,
blues and gospel songs, and sprawling pieces that lay fierce free jazz
solos atop meditative orchestration. Ikhambi, the album title,
is a Zulu word for a blend of healing herbs. Makhathini clearly intends
his music to offer healing to the listener.
5 Kamasi Washington – The Epic (Brainfeeder, 2015)
This three-disc, three-hour statement brought jazz to more new ears —
fans and critics alike — than any record of the past decade. Washington
is the best kind of populist; he makes big, sweeping musical gestures
intended to reach as many people as possible. His solos have a
high-energy, R&B feel that’s as indebted to King Curtis or Stanley
Turrentine as to Pharoah Sanders or John Coltrane, and his band sets up
grooves that funk as hard as they swing. Meanwhile, the string and
choral arrangements launch the whole thing into the stratosphere. The Epic lives up to both the hype and its title.
4 Mary Halvorson Octet – Away With You (Firehouse 12, 2016)
Guitarist Mary Halvorson has reshaped jazz guitar in her own image.
Her pinging, scraping, zinging lines and sudden squiggly warps (courtesy
of her delay pedal) are instantly recognizable, and her slowly
expanding band — a trio, then a quintet, a septet, and finally an octet —
has allowed her to develop a compositional voice as unique as her
playing style. On this album, four horns (trumpet, trombone, alto and
tenor saxes) squabble and squall as Halvorson, bassist John Hébert,
drummer Ches Smith, and pedal steel guitarist Susan Alcorn lurch,
clatter, and sometimes soar. It’s avant-garde jazz with a strange
prairie edge, and it’s stunning.
3 Henry Threadgill 14 Or 15 Kestra: Agg – Dirt… And More Dirt (Pi, 2018)
In 2015, Henry Threadgill won a Pulitzer Prize for his double CD In For A Penny, In For A Pound.
Three years later, he gave the world this, two linked compositions
played by a 15-member ensemble that included two pianists and two
drummers alongside guitar, bass, cello, and eight horns. Some of the odd
instrumental combinations Threadgill favors (like guitar/bass/tuba) get
strong showcases, and there’s a great two-piano interlude before he
takes his own solo. It’s the kind of album only a man who’s spent
decades refining a very particular language, and years assembling a pool
of trusted collaborators/acolytes, would even attempt. It’s a
masterpiece.
2 Jaimie Branch – Fly Or Die (International Anthem, 2017)
Trumpeter Jaimie Branch comes out of Chicago, a city with a very
different attitude toward creative music than the pool-of-sharks
atmosphere of New York. She’s a DIY-ist and a collaborator, someone for
whom the group sound is every bit as important as the sound of her own
horn. The music on this album, scored for trumpet, cello, bass, and
drums with a guitar or a three-horn chorale popping up as needed, has
the organic blues feel of Julius Hemphill or William Parker, with a West
African edge. The pieces are built from deceptively simple vamps that
rise gradually to breathtaking crescendos, as the chugging rhythms keep
your head nodding.
1 Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah – The Centennial Trilogy (Ropeadope, 2017)
Spreading two and a half hours of music across three albums — Ruler Rebel, Diaspora, and The Emancipation Procrastination
— allowed trumpeter Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah to celebrate jazz’s
centennial by radically expanding the music’s definition. His
high-powered horn was surrounded by oceans of live and programmed
rhythm, from thundering New Orleans polyrhythms to ice-cold trap beats,
but he was never just soloing over loops; these were fully arranged
compositions, creating and sustaining a range of moods, from seething to
romantic to heart-crushingly bleak. He’s an absolute monster on the
horn, capable of screaming high notes and incredible sustain, and he
places his ferocious technique into a sonic landscape like nothing else
out there. Whatever jazz’s future may be, Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah
is going to be at the front of the pack.
from www.stereogum.com
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