Sebastian Scotney

5 days ago | theartsdesk.com | Sebastian Scotney

Carl Craig (b.1969) is a leading Detroit electronic music producer and DJ whose Planet E Communications label has existed for over three decades. This 90-minute documentary, which was directed by Jean-Cosme Delaloye and features over thirty interviews, tells Craig's life story and attempts to define his importance. It's accompanied by a soundtrack largely comprising music recorded by him, either under his own name or under his many aliases.

1 week ago | theartsdesk.com | Sebastian Scotney

Does it spark joy? Yes, definitely...and maybe we music critics should ask the Marie Kondo question more often. London-based vocalist/lyricist Georgia Mancio and New Zealand-born, US-based pianist, arranger and composer Alan Broadbent have been prospering as a songwriting and performing partnership for more than a decade and have so far produced three strong albums.

3 weeks ago | theartsdesk.com | Sebastian Scotney

In this new album, three top-flight musicians based in Berlin, guitarist Ronny Graupe, Lucia Cadotsch (voice) and Kit Downes (piano) work collaboratively, superbly, as a real team. The music, some well-known tunes which Cadotsch sings hauntingly, and some original tunes by Graupe – it’s hard to tell them apart – just flows superbly.

1 month ago | theartsdesk.com | Sebastian Scotney

Tenor titan Joe Lovano is thrilled by how Homage has turned out. He actually told me so himself in person a few weeks ago, and his new album has a very appealing, natural, free-flowing ease. Cincinatti-born saxophonist Lovano first met Polish pianist Marcin Wasilewski and his trio in 2009 through Tomasz Stanko. The first recording together for ECM was made in 2019, Arctic Riff. They have kept on working together since then, touring mainly in Europe.

1 month ago | theartsdesk.com | Sebastian Scotney

There was a telling remark in Wynton Marsalis’s recent interview with Katty Kay for the BBC show “Influential”. Talking about how jazz functions in real time as a democracy, he said: “Our music requires you to be in balance with other people”, contrasting it with unnamed but all-too-obvious examples in the US of the rise of cultures based on principles diametrically opposed to that, i.e. the search for victory and 'greatness' through bullying and subjugation.