Music 2023

2023 was the year that the covid induced listening wave tapered off a bit for me. I recorded listening to 7,347 tracks, compared to over 10 thousand in each of the previous 3 years. I listened to exceptionally little music in the last half of the year. That’s depressing!

GoGo Penguin

On the plus side, I took the whole crew to see GoGo Penguin open the Wellington Jazz Festival in October. I’ve seen them once before in Seattle and was even more impressed this time. Everything Is Going to Be OK was one of the favorite releases of 2023.

Greg Reitan

My favorite discovery of 2023 is L.A.-based pianist Greg Reitan, who plays thoughful jazz in a trio setting. Reitan is a graduate of USC Thornton School of Music as are bandmates bassist Jack Daro and drummer Dean Korba. Like Bill Evans, Reitan plays harmonically sophisticated music with melodic charm.

Reitan grew up in Seattle where he studied with former Cornish Professor Dave Peck and moved to L.A. in 1991. When Jen and I lived in Santa Monica, we’d see super-talented studio musicians playing on weekends at a Café called Anastasia’s Asylum in Santa Monica. I wonder if Reitan ever played there?

Reitan’s 5 albums span a decade, but they’re new to me.

• Some Other Time (2009)
• Antibes (2010)
• Daybreak (2011)
• Post No Bills (2014)
• West 60th (2019)

Snarky Puppy and Bill Laurance

Snarky Puppy’s Empire Central, released in late 2022, was near the top of my personal chart. Due to that album being so good, I got into Bill Laurance’s solo material which just keeps growing on me.

New Zealand musicians

For a small town at the far end of the Earth, Wellington has a pretty good music scene. At some point in 2023, I wondered through the Hub at Victoria University and had the good fortune to hear Daniel Hayles, Louisa Williamson, Seth Boy, and a drummer (?) playing a lunchtime set in Victoria University’s Hub. They played Poinciana in tribute to Ahmad Jamal’s passing. Of course, I stayed for the full set. Later, Henry and I heard Hayles play an eclectic set of solo piano at Classical on Cuba.

Louisa Williamson is a talented sax player, composer, and band leader. Her What Dreams May Come has joined my growing rotation of Big Band alongside albums by Miho Hazama and Jihye Lee.

Covet

I liked Covet’s 2023 release, catharsis nearly as much as the fantastic effloresce from 2018.

Staples

A great rainy Sunday, for me, consists of hanging out on the couch with the cats and a book listening to jazz from the late 50’s and early 60’s. Bill Evans, Miles Davis, Coltrane, Lee Konitz, Lennie Tristano, Paul Desmond. After decades, these have become my musical staples. In the past decade, classical piano has become a bigger part of my diet. András Schiff, Angela Hewitt, Alexandre Tharaud, and Pascal Rogé. The cats seem to be into it.