Phil Lentz Presents... Vol. II Runs 11 Jazz Tunes in 29 Minutes, Cut to Pop Length
A Greenwich Village Club Pianist Rides the Jazz Wave Laufey Opened to Pop Fans
The hook on Phil Lentz Presents… Vol. II belongs to Richard Philbin’s saxophone, which leads the opener Bebopping Along with the piano close behind. Phil Lentz, the New York composer and jazz pianist behind the album, plays clubs such as the Bitter End in Greenwich Village, and the album keeps eleven tunes to 29 minutes.
Phil Lentz’s Bebopping Along is in the playlist below, and the Phil Lentz profile collects every feature our titles have written about the pianist. The album, Phil Lentz Presents… Vol. II, reached this desk through PopHits.Co Music Charts, which verifies independent artists and places their releases across its network of music news desks. Press play on the opener, then read on for the scene it came from.
Laufey and Samara Joy Put Jazz in Front of Pop Fans Before Phil Lentz Presents… Vol. II Arrived
The timing matters. In February 2023, Samara Joy won Best New Artist at the Grammys, a category open to every genre, as a jazz artist. Then, in September 2023, Laufey released Bewitched. It gave jazz its biggest album debut in Spotify’s history and sat second only to Olivia Rodrigo’s Guts that week. Bewitched also took a traditional pop Grammy in 2024.
Both wins came from inside jazz and landed in front of a pop audience. That is the wave this album arrived on. Phil Lentz Presents… Vol. II came out on 22 November 2024, nine months after that Grammy, as an independent release.
The Bitter End Has Hosted Folk, Rock and Comedy on Bleecker Street Since 1961
Lentz’s own scene is older. The Bitter End opened at 147 Bleecker Street in 1961 and holds about 230 people. It calls itself New York’s oldest rock club, and it built its name on young acts such as Joni Mitchell, while Bob Dylan played pool there in its early years. The city made it a landmark in 1992.
The club is still on Lentz’s calendar. On Friday 16 October 2026, the Phil Lentz Music Machine took the 7:30pm slot on a Music Makers NY night there, with Red Heller, Dennis Harte, Wolf Lugomarsini and Dave Young, all four of them players on this album.
That stage has hosted folk, rock and comedy since it opened, and the album mixes styles in the same spirit. A bebop opener is followed by titles that range from Honky-Tonk Blues and Blues À La Carte to Prairie March and Chimes, and a short Coda closes it. After careers in journalism, fiction and speechwriting, Lentz now writes music and plays jazz workshops at venues across New York.
Where Phil Lentz Presents… Vol. II Fits, With Eleven Jazz Tunes Kept to the Length of Pop Singles
Here is where the record meets the wave. Only two of the eleven tracks pass four minutes: Play Your Melody and One Little Drop of Justice. The shortest, Coda, lasts 105 seconds. Most of the rest land between two and three minutes, which is single length on any pop playlist.
Lentz shares the tunes with a rotating cast, so the colour keeps changing. Richard Philbin is the featured player on Bebopping Along, December Song and Coda, and Philbin’s saxophone leads the first of them. Bob Cohen’s violin runs through Play Your Melody, one of Cohen’s three appearances. Red Heller turns up on five tracks and Dennis Harte on three. Under the opener, Dave Young on drums and Wolfgang Lugomarsini on bass hold the rhythm.
Even the stores cannot settle where Lentz belongs. Apple Music files the first volume, Phil Lentz Presents… from 2022, under pop, and this second one under jazz. Meanwhile, the Indie Dock Music Blog has already featured the album.
Jamie Cullum, Laufey and Samara Joy Sit Next to It on a Jazz-Pop Playlist
Three acts sit closest for listeners who found jazz through the wave. Jamie Cullum is the obvious neighbour: an English jazz-pop pianist who has presented a weekly jazz show on BBC Radio 2 since April 2010. Lentz also leads from the piano and moves between the same two worlds.
Laufey began as a cello soloist with the Iceland Symphony Orchestra at 15 and now blends jazz pop with classical music. Similarly, Bob Cohen’s violin brings that classical colour into this album. Samara Joy’s Linger Awhile reached number one on the Billboard Jazz Albums chart, and Bebopping Along is Lentz’s own nod to the bebop tradition.
So this is a record for pop listeners who have started saving jazz to their playlists. It also suits anyone who likes jazz that gets to the point.
On PopHits.News, Bebopping Along now sits in our World, Roots, Jazz, Lounge and Ambient playlist.
From the PopHits.News curator team: “Bebopping Along is shorter than most of the 83 tracks in our World, Roots, Jazz, Lounge and Ambient playlist, and it sits a few places from SAULT. It gets to the tune quickly, and that is why we chose it to carry the album.”
Stream Phil Lentz Presents… Vol. II on Apple Music and Bandcamp, then follow Phil Lentz on Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, X, TikTok and Bluesky, and visit the official site.
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