Category Film Reviews
Rewind & Play: Thelonious Monk
It’s a great era for jazz documentaries. The latest exhibit is Alain Gomis’s ‘Rewind & Play: Thelonious Monk’, based around some long-lost footage of the jazz piano giant filming a French TV special at the end of his 1969 European tour. Some of the edited footage was shown on French TV as ‘Jazz Portraits: Thelonious […]
Sonny Rollins: Saxophone Colossus
Every serious jazz fan seems to have a favourite Sonny Rollins story. A good one is recited by musician Matt Glaser in Ken Burns’ ‘Jazz’ documentary. Sonny was playing a late-night Carnegie Hall gig on Easter Saturday during the 1990s. He embarked on a typically Herculean solo at around 11:30pm. This went on for quite […]
The New Miles Movie: First Impressions
So we finally get a sneak preview of the new Miles Davis movie ‘Miles Ahead’, which wrapped in August 2014 and gets a worldwide release in January. It has also just closed the New York Film Festival and the reviews are in. First, the positives – Don Cheadle, who also directed, co-wrote and co-produced, has […]
Ornette: Made In America
Ornette Coleman’s sad recent passing reminded me of an amazing, almost totally forgotten ‘documentary’ that is begging for a DVD re-release (though it may be available in the US). Shirley Clarke’s 1985 film ‘Ornette: Made In America‘ centres around Coleman’s 1983 return to his hometown of Fort Worth, Texas, to receive the keys to the city from […]
Sounds Of Surprise 