Getting your Trinity Audio player ready... After much consternation, I’ve managed to pare down a long list of fine jazz-improv recordings from 2025 to a top 10. So, apologies to Marshall Allen, The ...

If you think about it a certain way, one of the defining qualities of jazz is earnestness. This is one of the reasons why jazz and metal have so much in common, and so often appeal to the same ...

For anyone in the habit of touting jazz as a living art form, it can feel both nourishing and a little perilous to stand in awe at the wonders of the past. It's especially tricky in a year when some ...

I always wanted to write how Miles Davis talked: abrupt, profane, contemptuous, in a stiletto rhythm that jabbed and stung and threw off unexpected sparks of enlightenment and tenderness. Of course, ...

A terrific year for new jazz releases, the breath and depth of the music from all corners of the world underlining the robust health of jazz a quarter of the way into the 21st century. Northbound ...

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Be sure to check out our full 2025 Summer Arts Guide to live music, movies, art, theater, festivals and more in the Bay Area. It’s an unpredictable summer, folks. Some find escape in music festivals ...

The sprawling festival blended local talent with international superstars at its latest staging. Get all the details.

It may be coincidence, or just a reflection of my own state of mind, that this dreadful year’s list of favorite jazz albums leans toward the meditative, the balladic, the Romantic, sometimes the Zen, ...

So... what kind of a year was 2025 for jazz? Well, it marked the centennial of saxophonist Gene Ammons, drummer Roy Haynes, critic Nat Hentoff, pianist Jutta Hipp ...