TOP NEWS JAZZ

From drill’s high watermark to Tuareg rock, Colombian pop and London jazz, here are our music editors’ picks of the best LPs from the first half of the year Related: Nick Cave and Warren Ellis: Carnage review – the firebrand returns Related: ‘Nature is hurting’: Gojira, ... read more

(Temple Music)The musician breathes new life into familiar material in a captivating collaboration Barbara Thompson, saxophonist, flautist, composer and one of Europe’s finest and certainly most popular jazz musicians, led her band, Paraphernalia, between 1978 and 2015. Now aged 76, she has been forced to stop performing by Parkinson’s ... read more

The chatshow presenter and jazz DJ recalls crushes on screen icons, disappointment on the cricket field – and the first time he heard Louis Armstrong I was born in Cudworth, a mining village near Barnsley. My father worked down Grimethorpe colliery. There’s a great tradition in Yorkshire of brass ... read more

Discover all our four- and five-star album reviews from the last month, from pop to folk, classical and more Continue reading... ... read more

(AMF Records) Hip-hop, jazz and righteous reggae blend elegantly in the singer-songwriter’s message-driven debut album South Londoner Greentea Peng vibrates a little differently from the rest of us. Genuinely – her debut album was purposely recorded at 432Hz (and not the industry standard 440) because of the frequency’s much-discussed ... read more

St John at Hackney, LondonThe London rockers pack a punch with a thunderous recital of their new album. Shame about the sound… A sense of frustration hangs over this Black Midi gig, disguised as early evening light filtered through stained glass. In part, it’s down to the times. Rather ... read more

With theatre and dance scaled back, music dominates, including concerts from Simon Rattle, Damon Albarn, Nicola Benedetti and Laura Mvula After a year away because of Covid-19, the Edinburgh international festival is returning with a music-heavy lineup for 2021. Although the festival’s usual raft of live theatre and dance ... read more

The actor’s remarkable life fed into the character of Arlette in the Netflix hit, from growing up Jewish in occupied France, via Left Bank jazz and a relationship with Chet Baker, to global fame in her 80s If you’re an actor in the rare position of becoming internationally famous ... read more

(Savant)Snidero and band take comfort music to the next level in this hugely enjoyable, at times mind-boggling set recorded last year Believe it or not, this was recorded last October – live, before an audience (small and wearing masks) at a jazz club in rural Pennsylvania. Jim Snidero, an ... read more

The Ivor Novello award winner ponders love and possibilities on her enticing new EP There’s something indelibly rich about 25-year-old south Londoner Mysie’s vocals. Since the singer-songwriter’s emergence in 2019 with her stunning track Rocking Chair, she has consistently released songs in which that striking voice has taken centre ... read more

Owner of Chicago’s influential Jazz Record Mart and Delmark label, which recorded many of the city’s blues greatsIn the 1960s, musicians and music fans across the world began to be intrigued by the blues. Searching for it, they would inevitably be led to Chicago and, once there, to two Chicago ... read more

(Rough Trade)There’s a impressive maelstrom of moods on the Mercury nominees’ new album, building to a fantastical, absurdist whole Experimental rock group Black Midi’s origin story involves meeting at the Brit School, being championed by the industry and then thrust along the faultline between hype and scepticism: their explosive ... read more

Read all the Guardian and Observer’s four- and five-star album reviews from the last month, spanning pop, classical and more Continue reading... ... read more

Len Skeat, my friend and colleague of 35 years, who has died aged 84 of heart failure, was one of Britain’s great jazz double bassists. Affectionately known as “the Time Lord” for his mastery of the “three musical Ts” of time, tone and taste, he had a career spanning ... read more

(Unit)The alto saxophonist and his rhythm section are on top form in this collection of radically inventive remakes I can’t think of another alto saxophonist with a sound quite like Sam Braysher’s. Critics have compared him to Paul Desmond and other light-toned players, but they all have at least ... read more