Results: Little-Visited Vistas In Jazz

Gunhild Carling: In a previous poll of mine about musical weirdos, I asked about jazz bagpiper Rufus Harley. He's no longer living, but Swedish swing exponent Carling, most often a brass player, utilizes Harley's axe of choices for at least one number, as she does in this Dixieland-styled performance of a Rick Astley oldie. Do you think the timbre of her 'pipes fits well with this arrangement (she starts blowing them at the 2:00 mark)?

Theon Cross. If the tuba is considered in a jazz context at all, it's most often it's as a a substitute for a stand-up bass or bass guitar, keeping a combo's low end. This Caribbean-English musician is among the rare players who make it a lead instrument. Furthermore, like other mavericks in London's current jazz scene,. he suffuses his artistry with elements of non-jazz styles with which he was raised. Even if you don't think tuba is an appealing lead jazz instrument, can you at least admire Cross' athleticism for wielding such a bulky instrument through the entirety of any given concert (much less traveling with one)?

Gabriela Martina: She's a Swede who incorporates yodeling into her singing and sometimes has an accordionist in her band. I think both of those aspects of her work are pretty cool, but which do you think is cooler?

Brandee Younger: Harp isn't entirely novel in jazz, but it's taken Younger to give the instrument a higher profile than it has had in the music arguably since the living days of one of her main inspirations, the late Dorothy Ashby. While researching the number of jazz harpists currently, I discovered that, if the number of them represented on the website of a company offering sheet music for harp compositions, women appear to outnumber men when it comes to writing/transcribing for and performing on the instrument. Do you view the harp as n especially feminine instrument?

Of the jazz outliers of one type or another listed above, who's your favorite?