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Jazz/Blues

Spike Wilner's 'Koan' Transcends Limiting Piano Trio Format on New Posi-Tone Release [REVIEW]

Man, those guys at Posi-Tone are on a roll! Spike Wilner's 'Koan' is as engaging a piano trio CD as you'll hope to hear. I thought I was done with basic piano trios but Wilner is so inventive, his originals so, uh, original, his covers so well-picked and performed, that if you have to hear yet another piano trio, let it be he.
By Mike Greenblatt

  • 'Good Days a Comin' for Ivas John Due to His Solid Fifth CD on Right Side Up Records [REVIEW]

    If you didn't know any better, you might think, after hearing 'Good Days a Comin' (Right Side Up), that you're digging some itinerant flat- and finger-picking folk singer who rides the rails 1940s hobo-style like Woody Guthrie. Then you'd realize it's a Southern Illinois University graduate named Ivas John whose mastery of both Appalachian mountain music and Mississippi Delta blues coalesces within the soul of this one mighty fine singer-songwriter.
    By Mike Greenblatt

  • Ilhan Ersahin's Istanbul Sessions Results in 'Istanbul Underground' on Nublu Records [REVIEW]

    East meets West in this delicious fusion of jazz, world, rock, prog, soundtrack (for a movie that doesn't exist) and engaging instrumental Euro-Pop. There's no telling where it will take you until you go there...and you find yourself wanting to return. 'Istanbul Underground' (Nublu Records), by Ilhan Ersahin's Istanbul Sessions, is like walking out of your hotel room onto the main thoroughfare of the Turkish metropolis, closing your eyes and breathing it all in.
    By Mike Greenblatt
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