Listen to this week’s playlist on YouTube and Spotify
The self-titled 2024 debut of Matt Wilson’s Good Trouble drew inspiration from the late civil rights icon John Lewis to craft an album that responded to our tumultuous times by encouraging positivity as a remedy for divisiveness. On the band’s heartfelt follow-up, “Love is the Whole Thing, We Are Only Pieces,” the band uses the words of the great Sufi poet Rumi from more than 750 years ago as the leaping-off point for a jubilant and moving new set of music that offers gentle protest in the form of deep communion.
“Leave That in There” is the sixth album by Grammy Award-winning pianist, composer, and bandleader Sullivan Fortner, presenting his most personal and self-referential statement to date. Across a dozen original compositions and one cover, the New Orleans native threads together musical references, memories pulled from family history, spiritual traditions, and sonic callbacks to earlier works throughout his catalog. It’s the first studio recording featuring his working trio comprising bassist Tyrone Allen II and drummer Kayvon Gordon.
Also this week, after four decades in music, veteran pianist, composer and producer Dan Siegel presents “Resolution,” a nine-song contemporary jazz album shaped by instinct, first takes, and trusted collaborators; the Greg Abate Quartet offers up a super-charged, diverse flow of energetic, original jazz with “In the Moment”; and Grammy-nominated singer/songwriter and two-time NAACP Image Award winner Somi presents her first collection original songs in six years, “What Does it Take to Bloom?”