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Karen Mantler

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Radio & Podcasts

Can Jazz Have a Sense of Humor?

Read "Can Jazz Have a Sense of Humor?" reviewed by Patrick Burnette


Jazz--mysterious, challenging, expressive... funny? Rarely, one might think, but some artists display a sense of humor, even if it's subtle. In this episode, the boys listen to five albums with at least some humorous aspects. Things rarely get “funny ha ha" but hey, this isn't a Zappa podcast, now is it? Playlist Discussion of George Benson's album White Rabbit (CTI!) 2:37 Discussion of Ray Anderson's album Blues Bred in the Bone (Enja) 17:55 Discussion of Horace Silver's album ...

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Album Review

Karen Mantler: Business is Bad

Read "Business is Bad" reviewed by Hrayr Attarian


Composer/singer/multi-instrumentalist Karen Mantler's fifth release as a leader, Business is Bad, is a set of nine intimate sketches of everyday life. Delivered in Mantler's unique musical style, the pieces range from the whimsical “My Magic Pencil" to the elegiac “Surviving You" and everything in-between. Mantler does not so much sing these engaging soliloquies as she does hum them to herself. On “Catch as Catch Can," she laments the plight of the homeless and the hungry with plenty of ...

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Album Review

Karen Mantler: Business is Bad

Read "Business is Bad" reviewed by John Kelman


It's been nearly two decades since Karen Mantler last released an album under her own name on the XtraWATT label belonging to her similarly coifed mother, pianist/composer Carla Bley, but she's been anything but idle. Work on Bley albums like Appearing Nightly (Watt, 2008), recordings by father Michael Mantler like Folly Seeing All This (ECM, 1993), and sessions with fellow singer/songwriter Robert Wyatt have dovetailed with the singer/pianist/harmonicist's collaborations with the Golden Palominos and Hal Wilner, as well as her ...

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Extended Analysis

Cuckooland

Read "Cuckooland" reviewed by Joshua Weiner


The marriage of jazz and rock musical styles has had a checkered history. The late '60s records of Cannonball Adderley, Gary Burton, Tony Williams, and Miles Davis stretched the boundaries of jazz music while successfully bringing it to a broad young audience. The later development of Fusion with a capital “F" by Mahavishnu Orchestra, Return To Forever, and Weather Report led to platinum sales by jazz artists and some great records.It also, unfortunately, prompted the release of many ...

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