Al Jarreau News

"Buenos Aires Report," the opening composition of Argentine pianist/composer Pablo Ziegler's collaboration with the Netherlands' Metropole Orkest, Amsterdam Meets New Tango, is a good indication of the emotional grit that characterizes the album's aesthetic. Ziegler, as Gustavo Conde's liner notes explain, is "a key exponent of contemporary Buenos Aires urban music, centered on pure tango" seasoned with "aspects of jazz improvisation." This is the new tango, a genre pioneered by Astor Piazzolla , and Ziegler had learned from the master.

It isn't often that a Grammy-winning professional soloist takes second billing to an amateur on the same orchestral program.

The jazz community around the globe participated in a big celebration a couple of weeks back when the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization , along with the Thelonious Monk Institute, hosted the second annual International Jazz Day in Istanbul, Turkey.

Professor and former Berklee College Voice Department Chair Jan Shapiro does make it into the studio occasionally.

Bobby McFerrin, Al Jarreau and Jon Hendricks are the most innovative jazz voices of the past 50 years.

Photo: A concert on the theme, "Jazz: A Language for Peace", featuring the Brubeck Institute Jazz Quintet, was held at UN Headquarters in connection with the International Jazz Day .

Today is UNESCO's International Jazz Day , a celebration of an American art form that has united people around the world.