Listen to this week’s playlist on YouTube and Spotify
Russ Anixter is an arranger, orchestrator, and bandleader whose music exists at the intersection of jazz, rock, free improvisation, and orchestral craft. A graduate of Manhattan School of Music, where he studied jazz composition with Manny Albam and Rich DeRosa, Anixter further developed his orchestral expertise through more than three decades as a Broadway music copyist. His Hippie Big Band is built around a close circle of long-time collaborators who emerged from the pandemic together. On the new CD, “What Next?”, they transform familiar rock, funk, fusion, and jam-band repertoire into music defined by orchestration, groove, humor, and improvisation.
“Legacy Dances” is the highly anticipated twelfth release from four-time Grammy-nominated vibraphonist and composer Stefon Harris. Marking the 20th anniversary of his groundbreaking Blackout ensemble, this fifth collaborative album delivers an unapologetically authentic mix of modern jazz rooted in African rhythms, R&B, and electronic soul. This landmark project also features some of the final studio recordings of the late Casey Benjamin who tragically passed away just two months after the recording sessions, the iconic saxophonist, vocalist, and vocoder specialist who co-founded Blackout and helped anchor the Robert Glasper Experiment.
Also this week, saxophonist and composer Ardeshir Pourkeramati makes his debut as a bandleader, “Introducing…,” a straight-ahead album rooted in the harp bop tradition; pianist and composer Miki Yamanaka’s stellar trio is joined by one of the leading voices on saxophone of her generation, Nicole Glover, on “Breathe”; and “Nostalgia” is the new album from bassist and composer Tony Grey, featuring legendary pianist Bob James.