Jow Lovano

Joe Lovano can always be relied upon to switch gears from one project to another, constantly exploring new music and fresh variations of older pieces. On Streams of Expression, he contributes the five-part "Streams of Expression Suite," a three-part "Birth of the Cool Suite" (conducted by Gunther Schuller) that uses themes from Miles Davis' 1948-1950 Nonet, and three briefer works. Lovano utilizes several groups along the way, and there are spots for the other horn players (including tenors George Garzone and Ralph Lalama, baritonist Gary Smulyan, and especially trumpeter Tim Hagans) to be heard. Lovano is in prime form, the Miles Davis melodies are expertly updated, and although none of the new individual themes were destined to be future standards, the playing by Lovano and his sidemen is consistently creative.

Joe Lovano - Quartets: Live At The Village Vanguard (1995) {2CD Set Blue Note CDP 7243 8 29125 2 1 rec 1994-95}
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© 1995 Blue Note / Capitol | CDP 7243 8 29125 2 1
Jazz / Post Bop / Saxophone

Named Jazz Album of the Year by readers of Downbeat Magazine, this double CD features tenor saxophonist Joe Lovano during two appearances at the Village Vanguard recorded ten months apart. Other than the leader, the pair of quartets are completely different and they bring out two sides of Lovano. The earlier session features the leader in a stimulating piano-less quartet, matching wits and creativity with flügelhornist Tom Harrell. While the music is closer to Ornette Coleman than to Gerry Mulligan (to name two famous pianoless groups), Harrell's tone more closely resembles Chuck Mangione than Don Cherry although fortunately he is much more inventive.

Calm, cool and collected, this is swinging modern jazz bolstered by congenial interplay and an exotic, Yiddish patina. Devoid of the histrionic fervor of Zorn's original Quartet recordings, Stolas: Book of Angels, Volume 12 is the Masada Songbook's most mainstream offering to date.

Joe Lovano / Us Five - Bird Songs (2011) {Blue Note}
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© 2011 EMI / Blue Note | 509999 05861 2 5
Jazz / Post Bop / Hard Bop / Saxophone

There is a very good reason why tenor and soprano, as well as sometime alto, saxophonist Joe Lovano is one of the greatest jazz musicians of all time. It’s because he has devoted his life to finding new ways to express improvised melodic conceptualizations, because his harmonic language continues to evolve and develop, and because he has found new means for elaborating on and breaking through rhythmic patterns. But mostly, because Lovano continues to practice and develop his instrumental technique, as well as develop his art in a ceaseless drive to find musical meaning in an ever evolving musical world. His inexhaustible drive for unattainable perfection is not only seen in a lifetime catalog of incredible recordings, but also, is well on display in Bird Songs.

Viva Caruso is easily one of tenor saxophonist Joe Lovano's most ambitious and enjoyable recordings. Much like Terence Blanchard's Jazz in Film or Uri Caine's Urlicht/Primal Light, Viva Caruso finds the reedman adapting orchestral melodies and harmonies to a jazz format. Inspired after reading a biography about Italian tenor and opera legend Enrico Caruso, Lovano spent most of 2000 through 2001 researching Caruso's music and developing this project. There is a progressive, third stream appeal to Viva Caruso, with the various instruments laying down intricate counter-melodies and liquid, pulsating rhythms. For example, "Vesto La Giubba" from Pagliacci is slowed down here into a kind of folk-jazz meditation, not unlike something Dave Douglas' Tiny Bell Trio might do. Likewise, "Campane a Sera" features a pretty flute introduction to a very mid-'50s, Stan Kenton-style arrangement, and Gerald Wilson could very easily have scored "Soltano a Te" with its characteristically West Coast, neo-phonic horn sounds.

The third album from Joe Lovano’s Trio Tapestry finds the group continuing to extend its spacious and lyrical approach, with deep listening and intense focus. “Our Daily Bread is fueled by the rhythm spirit of expression that projects the mysterious world of music that lies ahead,” says master saxophonist Lovano in his liner note and these elegantly fluid pieces and free-floating ballads indeed feel like songs of the soul. “The intensity comes not from ferocity but from depth of feeling,” wrote the BBC Music Magazine of the group’s debut. “ Lovano’s themes and harmonies provide rich potential which the trio realises beautifully, exploring texture and mood as fruitfully as it develops melody and harmony.”

Tenor saxophonist Joe Lovano and Polish pianist Marcin Wasilewski reunite for their second collaboration, 2025's harmonically unfettered, free-leaning Homage. The album, which follows their 2022 duet Arctic Riff, builds nicely upon their intuitive sense of group interplay, moving between deftly composed works and wholly improvised ones. Joining them once again is Wasilewski's trio featuring bassist Sławomir Kurkiewicz and drummer Michał Miśkiewicz. This is the same group that earned acclaim for their work with the late trumpeter Tomasz Stanko and who bring an equally empathetic approach to playing with Lovano. Cuts like the opening "Love in the Garden" and "Golden Horn" have a tender, sun-dappled quality that conjures a striking blend of John Coltrane and Duke Ellington's later career small group work…