Blog
Dec 23, 2013
Singer Kurt Elling at a crossroads
When singer Kurt Elling returns to Chicago next week, he will be dealing with two profound changes in his art and life: Pianist Laurence Hobgood, who has been Elling's primary accompanist and arranger since they joined forces two decades...
Oct 31, 2013
Kurt Elling: ‘You Can Feel When It Works’
Kurt Elling sat at the bar of a favored bistro near his Upper West Side apartment, sipping a beer, cool and relaxed in an untucked shirt, shorts and sandals He hadn't shaved Labor Day weekend was over, fall season looming, so, between...
Aug 10, 2013
Singer Kurt Elling voices his love for taking chances
Kurt Elling strikes an uncanny balance, enjoying widespread mainstream acceptance while retaining a sense of risk in the pursuit of his own idiosyncratic artistic impulse The highly decorated jazz singer shook things up in his own life a few...
Jul 03, 2013
CD Review: 1619 Broadway – The Brill Building Project
As with The Gate, Kurt Elling's previous release, the material presented on 1619 Broadway: The Brill Building Project is largely a departure from American Songbook and jazz standards and a movement toward music with Boomer appeal The song...
Jun 30, 2013
Review: Closing day splendor at Kilbourn
Leaning on the piano, listening to his band, glancing up into the full house at Kilbourn Hall, Kurt Elling was the picture of ease Day 9, final day of the Xerox Rochester International Jazz Festival, and that's the picture you want to hang...
Jun 28, 2013
Kurt Elling Lights Up Stage and Eyes at NJCU Concert
Kurt Elling is a prime number, divisible only by himself With a deep, rich baritone to match the depth and richness of his creative life, clear enunciation and inventive phrasing, the vocalist and lyricist/poet is without peer today Elling did...
Jun 12, 2013
Mr. Cool Heats Up
If you're going to make your bones in jazz and the blues, what better place to do it than in Chicago That's what Kurt Elling did, performing at the Green Mill Jazz Club inside the city limits – outside the limits of...
Jun 06, 2013
Kurt Elling: Question man
Though you might not guess it from his soul-patched jazzman persona, vocalist Kurt Elling grew up singing in church choirs He even spent a year in divinity school studying to be a professor of religion But when Elling, 45, talks about why he...
Jun 05, 2013
Kurt Elling at National Concert Hall Dublin
Kurt Elling didn't disappoint dedicated fans at the National Concert Hall in Dublin 21 May 2013 Hitting the ground running, he swung and scatted, schmoozed and soared his three octave range effortlessly The RTÉ concert orchestra led...
Jun 05, 2013
Kurt Elling inspired by jazz greats, Kerouac
The genesis of Kurt Elling's 1619 Broadway — The Brill Building Project, his Grammy-nominated 2012 CD, isn't complicated "I've been living in New York for a while, and I tend to pass that building on my way to my...
Jun 05, 2013
Kurt Elling Talks About the Art of Jazz Singing, and Influences — from Sinatra to Kerouac
The genesis of Kurt Elling's "1619 Broadway – The Brill Building Project," his Grammy-nominated 2012 CD, isn't complicated "I've been living in New York for a while, and I tend to pass that building on my way to my...
Jun 04, 2013
Pre-eminent jazz vocalist Kurt Elling closes South Florida series Saturday
Trying to define jazz singing is asking for trouble Go one way and you box yourself into an essentialist view riddled with exceptions; go another and you wander into pop territory Still, to paraphrase a famous dictum, you know great jazz...