Rick Hannah – reviews

Selection of CD and Concert Reviews

All About Jazz; by Budd Kopman ★★★★

"...Joe Pass...set the bar at seeming impossible height. However, guitarist Rick Hannah takes up the challenge, and with Handful Of Strings, shows us how it is done.... The mix of pure line playing, melody with accompaniment, walking bass and chordal melody playing always varies and what is going to happen next is many times surprising. What the tune is, and where Hannah is in the tune is never is question, although the harmonies can get quite altered....This is a master at work."
(Read the complete review: All About Jazz, 4-star review, by Budd Kopman)


Birdland59 concert (Ettlingen)

"Rick Hannah's guitar playing is impeccable, even the difficult parts. His improvisations on standards such as "Embraceable You" and "My Romance" were full of acoustic nuances. There were rich adaptations of Beatles songs. His original composition "My Musette" created a bridge between the French cafe and jazz. The public was conquered and greatly applauded. The overall atmosphere of the concert was excellent, and the trio was very engaged in its music.
(Review of Birdland59 concert (6 June 2014) translation - complete original German text at birdland59.de)


* "Guitarist Rick Hannah's lively trio speaks elegantly in the service of timeless jazz, drawing sharp arabesque lines, melodious interlacing, dressing immortal jazz standards with a shimmering jewel of which swing remains the essential feature... Playing tightly but uncluttered, in the way of a classical trio, the three musicians establish a peaceful dialogue where each instrument consults with and then moves back from the others. Rick Hannah reigns supreme in this consistently exemplar trio, while his talent for improvisation constantly surprises audiences spellbound by such elegant classy music, constantly reinvented and deeply humanist."
*Dernieres Nouvelles d’Alsace 27/07/2007 (translation)


"The very remarkable jazz performance by a six-string virtuoso, Rick Hannah, astonishingly rich in feeling...nothing less than marvelous....."
*Dernieres Nouvelles d’Alsace, 11/07/2007 (translation) 


"Rick Hannah is a Strasbourg-based American guitarist whose playing is precise and elegant...Combining chords and notes with clean attacks, he has developed his own way of playing jazz - it's mainstream, elegant, upscale, chic and elegiac, all without being sad. The type of jazz that for decades has known how to delight us while always sounding up to date. He played his own compositions along with standards by Benny Golson, Duke Ellington, Russell Lee, Rodgers and Hart, Shelton Brooks Billy Strayhorn, George Harrison. Remember this name: Rick Hannah, his fame will go far beyond Alsace. This man has something important to say."
www.agitato.net (translation)


"Hannah offers clarity and technique; rolled into a tight musical package. This CD is packed with original fragrance...like fine perfume, for those with discriminating taste"
(CADENCE).