MISCELLANEOUS POSTINGS

This folder includes miscellaneous articles on jazz subjects, including performance and album reviews, written by Eric Myers, which may or may not have been published elsewhere. Readers can click on the INDEX button to peruse a list of contents in this folder.

SUSAN GAI DOWLING & CARL DEWHURST

Album review by Eric Myers

AJAZZ 94, August, 2022

This brief album, entitled Susan Gai Dowling & Carl Dewhurst, and totalling 18 minutes of music, contains four original compositions. Dewhurst has provided music and lyrics for three of them - Bernie, Wrap Me Up Inside, and Be At Peace – while Dowling does the same for the composition Hush. Of major interest is Bernie, a moving tribute to the enigmatic alto saxophonist Bernie McGann, who died in 2013. It’s a gentle, lilting waltz with sparing lyrics…

JEREMY SAWKINS’ SOMNAMBIENCE

Album review by Eric Myers

AJAZZ 94, August, 2022

A musician of expertise and virtuosity, Jeremy Sawkins is comfortably at home in the company of Australia’s leading jazz musicians, where he effortlessly shines. On this album, entitled Somnambience - a term he’s coined, but which he says literally means “sleep ambience” - he’s created an unusual context for himself, playing unaccompanied the nylon string acoustic guitar. It’s a quiet album of eight tracks only, running to about half-an-hour of music, but it’s not without depth, and not without variety…

DALE BARLOW AT FOUNDRY 616 WITH WARWICK ALDER & JOHN HARKINS TRIO

by Eric Myers

January 13, 2023

This was another great night at what most people regard as Sydney’s premier jazz club. Foundry 616 was sold out, with the restaurant area full, and standing room near the bar filled with an enthusiastic listening audience. Foundry owner Peter Rechniewski could thank his lucky stars that Dale Barlow survived relatively unscathed what has been described as a mugging a few days earlier. According to his own testimony Dale was “attacked in the street by some crazy drunk young people”, near the hotel in Newtown where he was staying.  He received injuries to his hip and knee, and in a post on Facebook foreshadowed a possible early return to Thailand, where it would be easier than in Sydney to get a remedial massage and see a doctor. In a nutshell his absence would have been disastrous for the venue. But, all’s well that ends well…