Listen to this week’s playlist on YouTube and Spotify
Revered drummer Jeff Hamilton reunites with his trio, featuring bassist Jon Hamar and pianist Tamir Hendelman, for “Merry & Bright,” a recording of Hamilton’s favorite Christmas songs. The tunes were selected from the drummer’s memories growing up in a family where everyone gathered around the piano and sang Christmas tunes in four-part harmony. Two of the pieces he learned from The Singers Unlimited, whose textured vocal harmonies were reminiscent of Hamilton’s evenings singing with the family.

     Singer Kat Edmonson was fresh off the heels of her critically acclaimed “Dreamers Do” album last year and in the midst of a 40-city tour across the country when COVID struck, forcing her back home. It was there where she created a weekly on-line variety show performed from her living room, taking live requests, performing skits, and hosted holiday specials. Her Christmas show saw over 12,000 viewers. For this holiday season, Kat has reinterpreted a batch of classics for a new Christmas album, “Holiday Swingin’! A Kat Edmonson Christmas Vol. 1.”

 Also this week, the Pete Ellman Big Band from the Chicagoland area swings the season with “The Twelve Grooves of Christmas,” proceeds from which are putting instruments in the hands of up-and-coming music students;

singer Norah Jones unveils her first holiday release, “I Dream of Christmas”;

and Gordon Goodwin’s Big Phat Band presents “The Reset,” a disc which serves as tribute to Gordon’s mentor, the great arranger Sammy Nestico, who passed in January.

    Listen to this week’s playlist on YouTube and Spotify
 Detroit-born drummer Louis Hayes arrived in New York when he was 19 to join the Horace Silver ensemble. Over the next 60 years, Hayes amassed a great body of work, playing and recording with Cannonball Adderly, Oscar Peterson, John Coltrane, Dexter Gordon, Grant Green, Sonny Rollins, Woody Shaw and many more of the giants of modern music. Hayes pays tribute to some of his jazz colleagues past and present on is new album, “Crisis,” with a set list featuring works by Freddie Hubbard, Bobby Hutcherson, Joe Farrell and others.

     Pianist Bill Charlap returns to the legendary Blue Note record label for “Street of Dreams,” a stunning new album featuring his revered longstanding trio with bassist Peter Washington and drummer Kenny Washington. The disc is a celebration of New York City as it emerges from an unprecedentedly challenging period, as reflected in the eight impeccably curated songs on the album, a delightful mix of jazz classics and Songbook favorites. It’s also a reflection of the literal and metaphorical road traveled together by Charlap and the Washingtons during nearly twenty-five years as a trio.

Also this week, jazz chanteuse extraordinaire Shawnn Monteiro, a veteran vocalist whose artistry is crafted in the mold of Sarah Vaughan, Carmen McRae and Nancy Wilson, unveils her sixth release, “You Are There”;

2020 Downbeat Rising Star trombonist Nick Finzer puts his compositional pen to the side to explore compositions that have informed his growth as an artist on “Out of Focus,” featuring the horn man in solo, quartet, and trombone ensemble settings;

       and saxophonist Will Boyd, a member of the Knoxville Jazz Orchestra, offers up his third release as a leader, “Soulful Noise.”