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When they first took the stage at NYC’s Augie’s Jazz Bar (now Smoke Jazz Club), organist Larry Goldings, guitarist Peter Bernstein and drummer Bill Stewart would never have imagined that 35 years later they’d not only still be working together, but that they would be considered by many to be the gold standard for the modern jazz organ trio. Their new album, “Rhombus,” finds the trio drawing inspiration from some of the most revered composers in jazz history, including Keith Jarrett, Randy Weston, Abdullah Ibrahim, Wayne Shorter and Thelonious Monk.
Long before “Naptown” became a widely used moniker for Indianapolis, the term emerged from the city’s black musical community. Known for its rich jazz legacy, the Indiana Avenue scene produced internationally celebrated artists including J.J. Johnson, Wes Montgomery, Freddie Hubbard and Slide Hampton. Saxophonist and composer Rob Dixon, who has spent the majority of his adult life in the city, carries that lineage into the present, pushing the city’s musical tradition into the 21st century with his new CD, “Naptown Soul.”
Also this week, Grammy Award-winning multi-instrumentalist, producer and arranger Nicholas Payton teams up with Virginia-bred collective Butcher Brown for “A Supreme Blue,” a bold and deeply considered reimagining of two of the most revered albums in recorded music, Miles Davis’s “Kind of Blue” and John Coltrane’s “A Love Supreme”; drummer Mike Clark is joined by Eddie Henderson, Patrice Rushen, and Craig Handy for his new project, “Kuon Ganjo”; and drummer Jae Sinnett makes his swan song as a recording artist with “Parallel 49.”