These are videos that I like: Nicole Mitchell at Teatro Manzoni, Marta Sanchez and Tomoko Omura at the Jazz Gallery

 

Our first featured video is from the Marta Sánchez Quintet.  The pianist’s 2015 release Partenika was one of the very best things to get released that year.  It’s an album I still find myself returning to with some frequency.  That album got a warm reception on this site (go read it), and this performance of the title-track at a 2015 performance at NYC’s Jazz Gallery is a good indication why.

Your video personnel:  Marta Sánchez (piano), Jerome Sabbagh (tenor sax), Román Filiú (alto sax), Matt Brewer (bass) and Jason Burger (drums).

You can listen to music from the album by checking out this site’s write-up or go straight to the artist’s Bandcamp page.

Our next video is from Nicole Mitchell and her Black Earth Ensemble.  The flautist has consistently put out some of the most compelling music over the last decade, and the music with her Black Earth Ensemble is my personal favorite.  I saw them play at the 2013 Chicago Jazz Festival, and to this day, I still struggle to adequately describe the effect it had on me.  The best I can come up with is illuminating, but even that descriptor falls short.  To give you a sense of things, here’s this 2012 performance of “Meadow Sunlight In the Swinging Fields” at the Teatro Manzoni in Milano, Italy.

Of relevance, I will have some exciting news to report about this ensemble before much longer.

And we’ll return to the Jazz Gallery for our final video, a March 2016 performance from Tomoko Omura.  The violinist’s 2015 release Roots received a strong recommendation from this site (go read it) and subsequently earned the #6 slot on this site’s Best of 2015 list.  The song “Hometown” is one of the album’s tracks.

Your video personnel:  Tomoko Omura (violin), Jeff Miles (guitar), Glenn Zaleski (piano, keyboards), Noah Garabedian (double bass) and Jay Sawyer (drums).

You can listen to music from the album by checking out this site’s write-up or go straight to the artist’s Bandcamp page.

And you get a bonus Omura video.  I’m immediately establishing a new Bird is the Worm These Are Videos That I Like rule:  I will feature any cat video that’s accompanied by the artist’s music.  Here is Tomoko Omura’s cat, who, like so many other cats out there, have an odd fascination with plastic grocery bags.

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