You can approach guitarist Tim Sparks’ music from several directions. You can enter through Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker Suite, originally arranged for orchestra, rearranged by ...]]>
You can approach guitarist Tim Sparks’ music from several directions. You can enter through Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker Suite, originally arranged for orchestra, rearranged by ...]]>
Stuart Nicholson looks at the inner workings of one of the most successful jazz events in the world—the annual Molde Jazz Festival. Now in its 50th year, the festival draws 100,000 fans to a city with a population of only 25,000. Below is the first installment of Nicholson’s two-part article. T.G.
From the early 20th century until his death in 1961, conductor Sir Thomas Beecham transformed musical life in the United Kingdom. And while London still has two symphony orchestras that were founded by him, The London Philharmon...]]>
About twenty years ago, when he was writing the music for Spike Lee's Jungle Fever, his first film score, trumpeter Terence Blanchard took a hiatus from a successful...]]>
Five days per week, jazz.com highlights an oustanding recent track as part of its Song of the Day feature. The aim is to guide listeners through the confusing array of new CDs on the market, and direct them to superior music they might otherwise miss.
Some of the names below will be familiar, and a few—Hank Jones, Gerald Wilson—are famous veterans who were gigging back in the Swing Era. Yet many of the tracks highlighted come from new or little-known artists who have released self-produced disks or are working with small indie labels.
This week marks the publication of my new book, The Birth (and Death) of the Cool. With the permission of the publisher, I am sharing an extract below. Also, note that I will be making an appearance in the Los Angeles area this Friday, October 30, at Book Soup—on 8818 Sunset Boulevard—at 7 PM. T.G.
Tim Wilkins, a regular contributor here, recently attended the Brooklyn Big Band Bonanza, a blowout event with so many large jazz ensembles on hand that the musicians almost outnumbered the audience. His report is below. T.G.
Are big bands cool? Darcy James Argue doesn't think so. "It's a dorky way to make m...]]>
Bill Barnes concludes his three-part article on the role of guitar in jazz below. Click here for parts one and two. T.G.
The “audience factor” can no longer be ignored. We are fast approaching a period in which jazz musicians may outnumber the people who want to hear them play. When that happens, we will no longer have a living, breathing art; we will be left with a hobbyist-driven artifact, the musical equivalent of Latin, a dead language spoken only in lecture halls and courtrooms.
As unassumingly as Bill Frisell presents himself in his everyday life is as fiery and unabashedly bold he is with his musical choices. A stylistic chameleon once all-too-appropriately deemed the “Clark Kent of jazz,” his fascination with and dedication to collective improvisation and his early training with Dale Bruning and Jim Hall imparts a jazz approach to most everything Frisell does – regardless of whether it sounds like jazz, or country, or folk, or rock, or a fusion of all, or none of the above. But the truth of the matter is that stylistic categorization hardly mat...]]>
As unassumingly as Bill Frisell presents himself in his everyday life is as fiery and unabashedly bold he is with his musical choices. A stylistic chameleon once all-too-appropriately deemed the “Clark Kent of jazz,” his fascination with and dedication to collective improvisation and his early training with Dale Bruning and Jim Hall imparts a jazz approach to most everything Frisell does – regardless of whether it sounds like jazz, or country, or folk, or rock, or a fusion of all, or none of the above. But the truth of the matter is that stylistic categorization hardly mat...]]>
Sims thrived when providing a clean, swinging groove, but he was openly uncomfortable in the worlds of outright free jazz and fusion, and was absent from jazz hroughout much of the 1970s, 1980s, through the mid 1990s. His return to the jazz scene sparked a revival of interest in his work has ...]]>
Catlett was also one of the few pre-bop drummers who comfortably transitioned from big bands into the small combos of postwar jazz, which makes his discography a complete historical representation of one of the most significant evolutionary periods in jazz history.
Catlett, along with
Arthur Edward Pepper Jr. was born on September 1, 1926 in Gardena, California to Arthur Sr. and Mildred Bartold. Pepper’s father Arthur Sr. was a longshoreman and machinist. Both parents were alcoholics, which created ...]]>
Gene Harris was born Eugene Haire on September 1, 1933 in Benton Harbor, Michigan. As a child, Harris enjoyed the music of local bandleader Charles Metcalf and was inspired to teach himself the piano. At the age of nine, Gene would pick out songs on the piano by ear and slowly built his repertory of popular songs of the day. He further found inspiration in the boogie-woogie style of pianists Pete Johnson and Albert Ammons.
In 1951, Harris joined the United States Army and bega...]]>
George Mraz was born Jiri Mraz on September 9, 1944 in Pisek, Czechoslovakia. Growing up in Tabor, Czechoslovakia, Mraz began his musical education at the age of seven when he began to study the violin. During his high school years, George began to perform on the alto saxophone. Beginning in 1961, George studied at the Prague Conservatory where he concentrated his efforts on the upright bass. While a student at the conservatory, Mraz recorded his first sessions as a sideman with pianist/vibraphoni...]]>
George Sylvester Callender was born March 6th, 1916 in Haynesville, Virginia. Callender’s father was from Barbados, and while primarily of African descent, he also traced his ancestry back to Scotland. Red Callender attributed his “red hair, freckles and light-brown eyes” to this lineage.
Callender grew up with music in the house, as his mother was an amateur singer and guitarist. By...]]>
Melvin Sokoloff was born on May 10, 1929 in Buffalo, New York. Born to Russian immigrants, Mel’s father was a drummer who performed around the Buffalo area. At the age of three, Lewis began to play the drums after his father showed him how to properly hold the sticks. Lewis played drums through elementary school, then switched to the baritone horn in high school. He later credited his experience learning the bari...]]>
Wesley was born on July 4, 1943, to parents Fred Wesley, Sr. and Vetta S. Wesley in Columbus, Georgia. The family moved to Mobile, Alabama shortly thereafter. His first musical memories were of his grandmother, wh...]]>
Gonzalo Julio Gonzalez Fonseca was born on May 27th, 1963 in Havana, Cuba. Rubalcaba was born into an extremely rich musical family. He is the grandson of Cuban trombonist Jacobo Gonzalez Rubalcaba, who composed a number of famous danzones including El cadete constitucional and Linda Mercedes. His father was pianist Guillermo Rubalcaba and his two brothers were also musicians, Jesús a pianist and William a bassist.
Gonzalo grew up immersing himself in the m...]]>
What is true is that in the 1940s he became a key figure in the revival of New Orleans music, and made memorable recordings in his brief second career. Johnson's flexible, singing horn style was very much in contrast to the more familiar declamatory sound of his most famous student, Joe "King" Oliver, and this offers listeners a fascinating sonic glimpse into the vanished world of early jazz.
Whoever was responsible for bestowing the nickname “Bunk” on young William Gear...]]>
Robert Lrod Dorough was born on Dec. 12, 1923 in Cherry Hill, Arkansas. His family moved to Plainview, Texas, where he discovered jazz while playing clarinet in the high school band. As a freshman at Texas Tech in Lubbock, he studied arranging and conducting, but was drafted in 1942 and joined an Army band primarily as a saxophonist and pi...]]>
A fiery soloist, Sample is capable of playing multiple styles of music. His early piano solos were very rooted in the jazz traditions of swing and bebop. While primarily associated with the Crusaders, Sample has been active as a sideman with drummer Buddy Rich singers Ella Fitzgerald Lou Rawls, and the...]]>
Like many young trumpeters in the 1950s, Smith was deeply influenced by Clifford Brown and Fats Navarro. While as a young soloit he lacked a wholly distinctive voice, he showed great fluency in hard bop's idiom, and great potential.
Smith’s long-winded phrases are singable and melodic, gracefully rhythmic, and peppered with...]]>
Clarke's uncluttered approach to rhythm empowered fellow modernists Charlie Christian, Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie,
Robinson was born in Chicago on October 19, 1972. As a child he grew up hearing his parents listen to music of all sorts, including contemporary jazz, classical, blues, rhythm 'n' blues country & western, and pop. “Personally I was listening to whatever songs that were hit the radio in the 1970s and 80s,” Robinson has said. Robinson first played music on homemade instruments, accompanying his brother Marlando ...]]>
Jessica Jennifer Williams was born on March 17, 1948 in Baltimore, Maryland. She was four when she first played her grandmother's piano and began lessons at seven. At the age of nine she enrolled at the city's Peabody Conservatory of Music, and graduated at age sixteen.
At Peabody, she studied piano, music theory, ear training, and composition, but at 15 started playing with jazz groups around ...]]>
Like Louis Armstrong and Fats Waller, Smith ...]]>
Carney was Ellington's most enduring collaborator; he joined Ellington at seventeen, and stayed by the bandleader's side until his death in 1972. His baritone playing became a distinctive element of the Ellington sound, and his skills as a soloist were featured frequently on Ellington mainstays, such as
Alan as born in Newark, New Jersey on May 29, 1932, six years before his brother. He attended grammar school on Oliver Street, near the Shorter home. His inquisitive and rebellious personality, typical of his music, was evident even in his childhood . His early practice included playing along with pianist Lennie Tristano’s Crosscurrents. The ...]]>