I volunteer as a DJ for Charlottesville’s local independent radio station, WTJU Charlottesville, 91.1 FM, and am currently the every-other-week co-host of All That Jazz, which airs from 9:00–11:00am ET on Thursdays.
WTJU broadcasts locally and streams worldwide on the web, so you can tune in live no matter where you are, or you can catch the archived stream anytime!
All volunteers can sub for others, too. While I’ll mostly sub for Jazz shows, I may get to do the occasional Rock, Folk, or Classical one.
Whenever I host a show, I’ll drop its stream and a corresponding playlist on the blog, and I’ll write a little about what I’m spinning and why.
Hope you enjoy and hear something that inspires!
All That Jazz | Thursday, May 2, 2024
Public Spotify playlist:
The Opener
I came across alto saxophonist Kenny Garrett’s latest album, Who Killed AI?, by chance. It features Garrett teaming up with electronica producer Svoy, and the result is… jazz saxophone over electronica, ha. No surprises!
I have a bit of a soft spot for electronica through video games and Dance Dance Revolution (though in terms of the latter, I did listen to some of that music again recently and… may not again for another 20 years lol). So, this I dig this effort. In fact, some of the stuff would fit right into the Final Fantasy VII Remake/Rebirth titles. After this record and playing a concert featuring arrangements of the music of Elden Ring alongside trumpeter Takuya Kuroda, maybe Square should just hire Garrett for the next gig.
Anyhow, hearing this track and having no other ideas at the time, I thought I’d go ahead and do a set of electronic/fusion/adjacent music over the years, focusing on the modern stuff.
Set 1: Pre-aughts
For the first 4 tunes, I blew through some electric jazz history:
Had to start with Bitches Brew, and “John McLaughlin” is the only track on that pioneering record that’s not 25 minutes long.
I couldn’t not include Weather Report in the set, especially after having watched two of three parts of the Wayne Shorter documentary prior to the show. Early Weather Report is so different from the lineup known for “Birdland”—really incredible stuff.
Herbie had to be included in this set, too, and after some untamed musicianship, “Textures” was a perfect contrast to bring things down a bit.
Still on my Sun Ra kick, I concluded the 20th century with “El is the Sound of Joy,” which features some electronic elements but settles into hard swinging bop.
Where are the Yellow Jackets, Greg?? Sorryyyyyy~
Set 2: Aughts and teens
Chick Corea’s The Ultimate Adventure is not an album that I know got a lot of traction, but I picked it up in high school when it came out when I was listening to him nonstop. It features his flamenco band, Touchtone, which gives it a unique vibe amongst the other tracks in this playlist.
The band on Kenny Werner’s Lawn Chair Society is Chris Potter, Nick Payton, Scott Colley, and Brian Blade… so naturally it’s a favorite of mine, ha. That said, the electronic elements on the album aren’t particularly sophisticated in my opinion… They’re neat ornaments but, at best, represent some early experimentation that don’t amount to much. Regardless, the record features killing writing and playing.
Eric Harland’s “Vi” is the first track in my playlist that digs into a hip hop sound, which is prominent in modern jazz and jazz-adjacent music.
Bryan and the Aardvarks’s “Bright Shimmering Lights” brings the spacey vibes.
John Escreet is someone that first comes to mind for me when thinking about the sound of electric keys in jazz. I don’t know how legit that is, lol, but so be it. I plucked this one out of his discography.
Like Bryan and the Aardvarks, Nyeusi is a band on pianist Fabian Almazon’s Biophilia label, which tends to record a number of groups that have a more alternative jazz sound. “Lots for Nothin’” is a good example of what you can expect from a lot of their groups.
Set 3: Current decade
Had to start off with more of that hip hop sound for the modern set, and the music of Derrick Hodge and Nate Smith were two of the first sounds that came to mind
By the way, Robert Glasper was actually the first artist I thought of. But his releases, at least to my ear, have gone a little too far away from improvised music for me to include with the rest of these tracks.
My buddy (and top-notch drummer) Billy Williams turned me on to the music of Morgan Guerin. “Pryamid” is a release off of his latest.
I featured a track from Donny McCaslin’s I Want More not too long ago. It’s a record that I don’t know that I care for—too much back beat for me, even if McCaslin’s one of my favorite modern players—but its sound fits the bill.
Aaron Parks is another artist that came to mind when thinking about modern players that lean into the electronic. These two tracks have very different palettes, so you can hear a bit of the breadth of what he’s about.
James Francies is another keys wizard that had to included! That’s it.
The Closer
When I dropped James Francies in, I knew i had to feature him with Chris Potter’s Circuits band, too. Sunrise Reprise is an album that I haven’t spent enough time with to fully connect to its content (unlike its predecessor, Circuits, which I revisit constantly and was my first exposure to Francies’s work). This track felt, to me, like not only a great track to feature another face of electronic jazz, but also just a great vibe to end on.
I hope you find something new you love in these sets. Let me know in the comments!
Peace,
Greg