Big Joe Turner July 20, 2007

This Down Beat readers' poll winner belts out the blues, croons ballads and pours his soul into gospel. One of the freshest faces of jazz with a style deeply rooted in the African-American traditions of gospel and blues, pianist/composer Cyrus Chestnut belongs to the new evolution of jazz inspired by Wynton Marsalis and others. "Gritty, sweat-streaked, bluesy tenor sax is an essential ingredient in what's come to be known as soul jazz and tenor man James "Red" Holloway was seducing crowds with that sound well before soul was a term people applied to popular music." John Corbett, 'Chicago Reader'