John Alvey | Loft Glow

Drummer John Alvey announces his formidable presence to the jazz world with the release of Loft Glow on Jazz Music City Records. Alvey’s recording debut presents a remarkably assured, but also risk-taking set of straight-ahead postbop jazz, joined by a killer sextet of stalwarts from the increasingly hot Nashville jazz scene: trombonist Roland Barber, tenor saxophonist Joel Frahm, alto saxophonist Jovan Quallo, pianist Matt Endahl, and bassist Jacob Jezioro. 

Alvey is a native of Nashville, the son of pianist and former Opryland USA conductor Michael Alvey. He grew up, studied, apprenticed, listened, and honed his craft all in the environs of Music City. Loft Glow is a nod to that immersion. “A small studio apartment south of Nashville was my home for a few years about ten years ago,” Alvey recalls. “It was a peaceful period of practicing and listening, a relaxed, focused, and transitional time in my life. This album is a reflection on that time and place, with an emphasis on the solitary, undistracted listening experiences I had there every evening.” 

The album title refers directly to those experiences: “the many lamps I kept on late at night, aglow in the window as seen from the street below my apartment.” 

We can hear how that intensive work paid off on Loft Glow’s combination of band originals and covers of tunes by Alvey’s musical heroes Ron Carter, Benny Golson, and John Stubblefield. The drummer drives the stately suspenseful interpretation of Stubblefield’s “Baby Man” and adds depth, shading, and a Latin tinge to Golson’s “Terminal 1,” giving sharp-eared empathy to smart solos by Endahl, Barber, and Frahm and making his own thoughtful, curiously colored statement on Golson’s tune. Alvey takes a more subtle, but still defining role on Carter’s fun, gospel-inflected “Blues for D.P."

Alvey brings the same level of respect and sensitivity to the album’s original tunes. His deft treatments of Barber’s sweet “Winslow Nocturne” and Quallo’s introspective “June 23” beautifully maintain the balance—so often neglected on drummer-led albums—of firmly outlining the rhythmic shapes while also giving his bandmates maximal room to express themselves. Even on his own tune, the harder-driving “Azure,” Alvey proves himself a careful drummer, injecting the performance with the required energy but never getting carried away (as his dazzling but punctilious solo demonstrates). 

In short, it’s Alvey’s remarkable discipline behind the kit that helps elevate Loft Glow to the polished, eminently pleasurable record that it is. It augurs well for the leader’s, and the musics future.

John Alvey was born February 3, 1985, in Nashville, Tennessee, the son of noted jazz pianist, conductor, and educator Michael Alvey. While growing up in the suburbs of the country music capital of the world, Alvey the younger was nonetheless first drawn to rock music. It was the energy of those artists and songs that led him to the drums, forsaking his father’s piano for them at nine years old. 

But if country music surrounded him and rock inspired him, it was jazz—in the guise of his father’s influence—that guided him. He taught his son how to play drum rolls, encouraged him to check out the great jazz albums, and jammed with him at home. Eventually, they played a gig together, which led to seven years of John’s presence in Michael’s established piano trio at a Nashville restaurant. 

That, in turn, led Alvey to find work with fellow Nashvillians Barber (as well as his saxophonist twin brother Rahsaan), Joel Frahm, and Rod McGaha, and with musicians like Taj Mahal and Sherman Holmes. He’s also been an active freelancer on Nashville’s rich circuit of country, bluegrass, and Americana music, playing with Rob Ickes & Trey Hensley and Sierra Hull. Each was a valuable educational and artistic experience that worked along with those late-night practice and listening sessions to feed the creation of his debut album, Loft Glow.