Sunday, April 22, 2007

Saskia Laroo on tour in Brazil


A sensacional trompetista holandesa Saskia Laroo (acima em foto de Brenton Geach) estará indo ao Brasil para uma pequena turnê, entre 24 e 29 de Abril. Com o perdão do conteúdo machista desta definição, Saskia poderia ser chamada de "Randy Brecker de saias". Dono de uma técnica impecável e musicalidade à flor da pele, Saskia, assim como Randy, é de uma versatilidade absurda que irrita os puristas. Uma hora está tocando straight-ahead jazz, exclusivamente acústico (vide os excelentes CDs"Jazzkia" e "Sunset Eyes 2000"), e em outro momento aventura-se, com igual categoria, pelo dancefloor-jazz e pelo fusion ("It's Like Jazz" e "Body Music"), inclusive usando pedais e efeitos eletrônicos acoplados ao trompete, como fazia Miles e ainda faz Randy.

*April 2007
Tu 24, 22.00 Bleecker Street Music Pub, Rua Inácio Pereira da Rocha, 367 - Vila Mariana Sao Paolo, Brazil www.bleeckerstr.com.br Saskia Laroo + Warren Byrd duo with hip grooves


We 25, 20.30 / 22.00 Cais do Oriente, Rua Visconde de Itaborai 8, Centro, Rio de Janeiro, BR Fone: 48 - 32322298 www.caisdooriente.com.br Saskia Laroo + Warren Byrd duo with hip grooves


Th 26, 24.00 Confraria das Artes, Rua Major Carlos Pinto (canalete), Florianopolis, BR s/nº Fone: 53 - 3233.4339 Saskia Laroo + Warren Byrd duo with hip grooves


Sa 28 20.30 Teatro Municipal, Rua Major Carlos Pinto (canalete), Rio Grande, BR s/nº Fone 53 - 3233.4339 Saskia Laroo Jazz Quartet


Su 29 17.00 Santander Cultural, Rua Sete de Setembro, 1028, Porto Alegre, BR Fone 51 - 3287.5500 www.santandercultural.com.br Saskia Laroo Jazz Quartet


*May 2007
Su 6 9.30p-2a Cafe Alto, Korte Leidsedwarsstraat 115, Amsterdam, Netherlands Jazzkia
Tu 8 9.30p-0.30a Jazzcafe Casablanca, Zeedijk 26, Amsterdam NL Jazzkia
Fr 11 Rotterdam, NL tba Saskia 's Solo Act
Sa 12 Amersfoort Jazzfestival NL Saskia Laroo Band
Su 13 9.30p-2a Cafe Alto, Korte Leidsedwarsstraat 115, Amsterdam, NL Jazzkia
Su 20 afternoon Netherlands w Harry Emmery
Su 20 9.30p-2a Cafe Alto, Korte Leidsedwarsstraat 115, Amsterdam, NL Jazzkia
Su 27 9.30p-2a Cafe Alto, Korte Leidsedwarsstraat 115, Amsterdam, NL Jazzkia
Th 31 Ukraine tba Saskia 's Solo Act wi dj & mc



*June 2007
Fr 1 Ukraine tba Saskia 's Solo Act wi dj & mc
Sa 2 Ukraine tba Saskia 's Solo Act wi dj & mc
Su 3 9.30p-2a Cafe Alto, Korte Leidsedwarsstraat 115, Amsterdam, NL Jazzkia

Su 10 Jazzfest NY, USA Saskia Laroo Band featuring Byrd/Long/Carter
Fr 15 Parkville Jazzfest, Jacksonville, Missouri, USA Saskia Laroo Band featuring Byrd/Long/Carter
Fr 29 142 Throckmorton, San Francisco, CA, USA guest with Max Perkoff Band
*July 2007
Fr 6 Linz, Austria Saskia Laroo Jazzband
Sa 7 Festival Oisijk, Croatia Saskia Laroo Band
Su 8 Montreux Jazzfest , Swiss Saskia Laroo Band
19-29 TIJEPA, 4th Taipei International Summer Jazz Academy, Taiwan teaching & performing
*Aug 2007
31 NL tba
*Sept 2007
19-30 China Saskia Laroo Band
*Oct 2007
Bangkok tba
*Nov 2007
India, Indonesia tba



Past Performances
in 2007: ao India, Italy (Lucca Donna Jazz Fest), Netherlands, Poland(Bielska Zadymka Jazzowa), Ukraine, Russia, South Africa (Capetown Jazzfest), USA
in 2006: ao Belgium, Croatia (Jazzfestivals Zadar & Losinj), France, Italy (Women Jazz series), Germany, Nepal (Garden of Dreams Jazz Affair), the Netherlands, Poland, Russia, Slovenia (Festival Lent), Swiss (Montreux Jazzfestival), Ukraine (Koktebel Jazzfestival), the USA.
in 2005: ao Austria, Croatia (Split Jazz Festival), Czech Republic (Prague Jazz Festival), France, Indonesia (Java Jazz Festival), Japan, Lebanon (Grand Hills Jazz Festival), the Netherlands, Nicaragua (Tolerancia Festival), Poland (Ladies Festival), Russia, Surinam (Surinam Jazz Festival), the USA.
in 2004: ao China, Croatia, Czech Republic (Prague Jazz Festival), France, India (Jazz Yatra Festival), Indonesia (Bali Jazz Festival), Kuwait Jazz Festival, Lithuania (Gaida Contemporary Music Festival), the Netherlands, Poland, the USA (Hartford Jazz Festival, CT; Sunset Boulevard Festival, CA).
In 2003: ao Croatia (several international festivals), the Netherlands, Poland (several international festivals), Russia, the USA (Atlanta Hawks Festival).
In 2002: ao Baltic States (Mama Jazz Festival), Croatia, Curacao (Curacao Jazz Festival), France, Germany, the Netherlands, the USA.
In 2001: ao Germany (Burghause Jazzwoche), the Netherlands, Switzerland, the USA (Atlanta & Savannah Jazz Festivals).
In 2000: ao Belgium, Colombia, Dutch Antilles tour (5 islands), Germany, Japan (Sunset Jazz Festival), the Netherlands (North Sea Jazz Festival), Spain, the USA.
In 1999: ao Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria (Sofia Jazz Festival), France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands (North Sea Jazz Festival), Spain, Switzerland, Russia, the USA.
In 1998: ao France, the Netherlands (North Sea Jazz Festival), Switzerland, the USA.
In 1997: ao Bulgaria (Sofia Jazz Festival), Lebanon (Hamra Jazz Festival), Lithuania, the Netherlands, Russia.
In 1996: ao Hungary, the Netherlands, Spain, the USA.
In 1995: ao Czech Republic, the Netherlands (North Sea Jazz Festival), the Philippines, Poland, Slovakia, South Africa, South Korea.

Artigo de Nat Hentoff no Village Voice


Excelente artigo do veterano historiador Nat Hentoff (chama-lo de "crítico" seria uma ofensa) publicado na última edição do Village Voice, ainda o melhor guia semanal da vida cultural em NY.

In New Orleans, the Saints Are Marching In Again
Just as Hitler and Stalin couldn't ban jazz, Hurricane Katrina can't keep it and New Orleans down
by Nat Hentoff



"The Jazz Foundation has been a lifesaver to so many musicians from New Orleans, giving them the opportunity to work and earn money with dignity. They've done more to help the New Orleans musicians than any other group that I know of."Dr. Michael White, New Orleans classic jazz clarinetist, bandleader, and educator
"It's hard for people to imagine what it's like to go through something like [Hurricane Katrina], and to then start over with nothing. The Jazz Foundation was there for us every time . . . The light is coming back after so much darkness I thought would never end."Rodney Rollins, New Orleans musician and Hurricane Katrina survivor
Years ago in New Orleans, as I was going to Preservation Hall—with music swinging into the street from every nightclub on the way—I heard, coming from the hall, that joyous high-stepping jazz anthem, "When the Saints Go Marching In."
Now, the devastation of Hurricane Katrina continues to lie heavily on the city—unstable levees, broken neighborhoods, broken families, and 250,000 residents still gone. But the spirit of the city—embodied in its music, long reverberating around the world—is rising. Many of the musicians, including brass bands, are back.
Much of the credit for their determined presence, so vital to the life force of New Orleans, is due to the continuing work of the New York–based nonprofit Jazz Foundation of America. This past January 10, the International Association of Jazz Educators, the largest jazz organization in the world, for the first time included a special award in its annual conference: to the Jazz Foundation "in recognition of its incalculable efforts in support of the New Orleans and Gulf Coast musician communities following the Hurricane Katrina disaster."
Until Katrina, the Jazz Foundation, formed in 1989 by musicians—and by lay listeners for whom jazz is an essential, regenerating part of their lives—had been known primarily for its emergency help to the sick, elderly, or out-of- fashion jazz musicians. Among them were once-active players about to be evicted from their apartments and others in acute need of medical attention, including operations—which, through the foundation, they get free from New Jersey's Englewood Hospital and Medical Center.
Jazz makers, except for a very few, have no medical insurance or pensions; some, cited prominently in jazz histories and discographies, have died penniless and alone. The Jazz Foundation came into being to fill a crucial need. Its dauntless executive director, Wendy Oxenhorn, is always on call, and if a musician needs a meal, she's often the person to feed him. Recently, she rushed to a hospital in the middle of the night to look after a newly admitted 84-year-old percussionist.
Since Katrina hit, Oxenhorn says, "we've assisted more than 1,700 New Orleans emergency cases while still being there for some 1,300 new cases of our regular elderly musicians around the country."
For the displaced New Orleans musicians, she distributed more than $25,000 worth of new musical instruments. And among the foundation's key financial supporters, its president, Jarrett Lilien (his day job is head of E*Trade Financial), has, Oxenhorn adds, "made it possible for the JFA to house and relocate hundreds of New Orleans musicians and their families—saving them from homelessness and eviction in 20 states."
Another special award from the jazz educators was given to another mainstay of the Jazz Foundation: Dr. Agnes Varis, president of Agvar Chemicals, "for providing funds for the Foundation to employ more than 700 displaced musicians in eight states."
"Saint Agnes," as Oxenhorn calls her, paid for free performances post-Katrina by New Orleans musicians for thousands of children as part of her customary Jazz in the Schools program around the country. (The gigs for the New Orleans players included the elderly in nursing homes as well as the kids in schools.)
To enable the foundation to bring jazz musicians back to life in this tri-state area, New Orleans, and throughout the nation, the proceeds from its annual "A Great Night in Harlem" concert at the fabled Apollo Theater are absolutely vital.
The sixth annual Harlem fest takes place on Thursday, May 17. "A Great Night in Harlem" begins at 8 p.m.; the Apollo is on 125th Street between Adam Clayton Powell and Frederick Douglass boulevards (Seventh and Eighth avenues). Tickets can be purchased through the Jazz Foundation office by calling 212-245-3999, extension 28.
As Oxenhorn says, "It will be a night of living history." Among those onstage: Dr. Michael White and the Original Liberty Jazz Band from New Orleans, Big Chief Donald Harrison and the Mardi Gras Indian Chiefs, Jimmy Heath, Frank Wess, Paul Shaffer (of The Late Show With David Letterman), Candido, Junior Mance, Ben Riley, Gary Bartz, Arturo O'Farrill, Henry Butler, Jimmy Norman—and, as happens every year, many surprises. If no one plays "When the Saints Go Marching In," they'll all embody the song.
The hosts are Bill Cosby, Gil Noble (of WABC-TV's invaluable Like It Is), and Danny Glover. At a previous "Great Night in Harlem," I asked Cosby—and I was serious—to think about running for president. As Cosby keeps proving in the public square on such essential issues as education, he is a wise and fearless leader. Rejecting my invitation, he said, "What do you want me to do—bankrupt my wife?" I wished he'd reconsider.
At this May 17 concert, Dave Brubeck will receive a lifetime achievement award. And Roy Haynes, the continually evolving master drummer who has played with most of the major entries in the Encyclopedia of Jazz, will solo. You'll be telling your grandchildren about Haynes's performance—and about the rest of the night of living history.
In the interest of full disclosure, I'm on the board of directors of the Jazz Foundation; but because of my day job, making sense of the news, I never have time to go to any meetings. All I do for the foundation is write about it—because were it not for the creators of this music, my life would have been enormously diminished.
As Oxenhorn says of what the foundation does, "These are not handouts. It's a privilege to be of use to people who spent a lifetime giving us all they had."
When I was in my early twenties, Duke Ellington tenor saxophonist Ben Webster gave me a lifetime credo: "If the rhythm section isn't making it, go for yourself!" But sometimes, you need a rhythm.

Gladys Knight receives the ELLA Award


Gladys Knight will receive the 16th ELLA Award this year, presented by the Society of Singer ( San Francisco Chronicle , Society of Singers ). The award honors musical achievements just as well as musicians' commitment to charitable and humanitarian causes. Among the past winners were Frank Sinatra, Elton John and Celine Dion. The 62 year old Gladys Knight started performing at the age of 4. She recorded many popular hits, got seven Grammy Awards and just recently released a controversial jazz album ("Before Me") for the Verve label.



"Before Me" is a heartfelt homage to the great legends of song who paved the way for her to become a legendary performer in her own right. Many of these artists, including the likes of Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington, Billie Holiday, and Lena Horne, were friends, mentors, colleagues, of Knight's since the beginning of her career, and all gave her immeasurable inspiration, courage, and strength. When a woman like Gladys Knight turns her attention to the classics that inspired her, the listener is in for a once-in-a-lifetime experience. Recorded in New York and Los Angeles and helmed by Grammy® winning master producers Tommy LiPuma (Diana Krall, Natalie Cole, Al Jarreau, George Benson) and Phil Ramone (Frank Sinatra, Ray Charles, Barbra Streisand, Tony Bennett), "Before Me" finds Knight interpreting timeless material.



From the righteous blues of “God Bless the Child” and a bossa nova-kissed “The Man I Love” to the spirit-sending “Come Sunday” and brassy “I've Got It Bad (And That Ain't Good),” it's clear that Knight's voice is as clear, strong, and expressive as ever. It's also clear how near and dear to her heart this project has been. “As I was getting this music together,” Ms. Knight reflects, “the title, Before Me, just rang in my head. I was impressed to make a reference to those glorious performers that set the pace for me to be a part of this industry- from the great ladies of song Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday, Sarah Vaughan, Lena Horne, Dinah Washington, Nina Simone and Mahalia Jackson to supremely talented gentlemen such as Duke Ellington, Count Basie and Sammy Davis, Jr. These people made great strides not just with their music, but because of who they were as people. I salute these wonderful artists that set it up for me to do the extraordinary music that makes up Before Me.”



LiPuma and Ramone surrounded Knight with the cream of the jazz universe, including the renowned Clayton/Hamilton Jazz Orchestra for this special Gladys Knight recording, plus musicians such as saxophonist David “Fathead” Newman, peerless keyboardist Joe Sample, trumpeters Roy Hargrove and Chris Botti, and guitarists Russell Malone and Anthony Wilson. The impeccable production and masterful arrangements by John Clayton and Billy Childs help craft a record that can truly be called a revelation. Knight comes out swinging on a grand version of “Do Nothing Till You Hear From Me” and then softens the mood with a tender rendition of “The Man I Love,” an intimate “Good Morning Heartache,” and a gentle “Since I Fell for You.” One of the album's highlights is a powerful, bluesy interpretation of Billie Holiday's “God Bless the Child.” Other standout tracks on the album include a cinematic telling of “Someone To Watch Over Me” and an unforgettable “Stormy Weather” punctuated by incredible horn arrangements. Some of the other classic tunes treated to Knight's golden voice include “This Bitter Earth", a lesser known song by Dinah Washington, “I'll Be Seeing You,” and “But Not For Me". The record closes with the Duke Ellington-penned “Come Sunday,” a poignant and inspirational song of faith. Gladys Knight is a true living legend of modern music. She is a six-time GRAMMY® winner who has had number one hits in a wide variety of musical genres including pop, R&B, and adult contemporary, performed on Broadway, appeared in films, and is a member of the Rock N' Roll Hall of Fame. While this is not her first foray into the world of the classic American song repertoire (she studied and performed in a jazz band in Atlanta as a youngster), she is taking a strong new step with Before Me, as she pays her respects to those who inspired, challenged, and supported her along the way.

Michelle Nicolle: Australia's first lady of jazz


Michelle Nicolle has been called "Australia's first lady of jazz", reports Ermine Kart ( Today's Zaman ). She sung in a jazz choir while she studied to be a teacher. When the conductor asked her to sing a solo, she improvised for the first time. These days she performs in Istanbul for two concerts organized by the Australian embassy to Turkey. Jazz improvisation is like a language speaking to the people, and the same time it is very personal, says Nicholle. The people are not so much used to singers improvising, not playing with words but with sounds. She always tries to imagine a story and thus continuing the poetry of the songs.

A lucidez de Klaus Doldinger


Klaus Doldinger sees himself as a musician and composer and doesn't like to be limited to a specific musical genre, as he tells Stefan Wyss ( persönlich.com ). All of his music was born from the improvisational possibilities of jazz, though, even if the music itself is not jazz. He doesn't approve of casting shows as long as the young talents there only cover other artists and don't present something of their own. He warns against the effect of illegal copying of music. He does not know how much longer musicians will be able to live on their art "if copyright is undermined more and more".

RIP, Peter Muller

Peter Müller


The clarinetist and saxophonist Peter Müller died April 18th in Berlin at the age of 60. In his youth Müller lived in New Orleans for a while and there played with the likes of George Lewis and Capt'n. John Handy. Since 1968 he was the musical director for the White Eagle Jazz Band Berlin which played in the classic New Orleans style. Obituary: Frankfurter Rundschau .

Filme sobre o homem que teria inventado o jazz...


In Search of the Man Who May Have Created Jazz
Deu no NY Times:


Pictured:
Anthony Mackie, center, as the cornetist Charles (Buddy) Bolden during the filming of “Bolden.” In the background, Ellis Marsalis plays a clarinetist; the film’s director, Dan Pritzker, is at right.
photo by Peter Sorel, SMSP


MICHAEL CIEPLY
Published: April 22, 2007


NO one is really sure what this city’s first “cornet king,” Charles (Buddy) Bolden, sounded like 100 years ago, much less what made him tick. The lore says a single wax recording of Bolden’s namesake ensemble was demolished with the old shed in which it was stored in the early 1960s. What is probably the most reliable rendering of his trademark tune, “Buddy Bolden’s Blues,” came from Jelly Roll Morton, who had heard it performed and put it on a record years after the master’s death. But even the song’s own lyrics warn against trusting too much. “I thought I heard Buddy Bolden say,” runs the remarkably tentative opening line.

Yet this elusive character, who some aficionados say invented jazz before lapsing into ultimately fatal insanity before the age of 30, has been coming into focus in recent weeks as a troupe of seasoned filmmakers and impassioned amateurs struggle to capture Bolden and his world in not one but two, related, movies.

Eccentric in concept, ambitious in scope and not cheap — backers put the cost at more than $10 million — the twin pictures will probably stretch the limit of what independent film can do by the time they are seen on festival or commercial screens next year.

Dan Pritzker — a billionaire’s son best known as founder of and guitarist for the off-center soul-rock band Sonia Dada, and an important investor in the project as well as its director — has never made a movie. Yet that neophyte status has not kept him from attracting an impressive group of actors and behind-the- camera talent, including members of the Marsalis clan, to tell the story of a man Pritzker likens to “a shaman who flipped on the lights.”

The first picture, currently titled “Bolden,” is a musical biography with Anthony Mackie (“We Are Marshall”) in the lead role and Wendell Pierce (“The Wire”) and Jackie Earle Haley (an Oscar nominee this year for “Little Children”) among the supporting cast. The second is an hourlong silent film called “The Great Observer,” in which a young boy named Louis, recalling Bolden’s more celebrated successor Louis Armstrong, dreams of playing the horn while becoming entangled with the denizens of New Orleans’s red-light district, played by a company of ballerinas.

The films, which have no distributor yet, are meant to make their debuts in tandem. If all goes according to Mr. Pritzker’s plan, the second will play over a live performance by Wynton Marsalis, who is executive producer of the movies and has written original music that is meant to evoke the man Armstrong, Morton, Kid Ory, Sidney Bechet and other early jazzmen described as both influence and shadowy myth.

“There’s a fine line between guts and stupidity,” Mr. Pritzker said of his project last month. At the time, he was simmering in the spring heat with 100 mostly local players on a shoot that will end on locations and sets in Wilmington, N.C. The day’s work took the group to the Carrollton cemetery in an Uptown neighborhood, where a row of small frame houses had been painted blue-gray and modestly changed to stand in for the city of Bolden’s late-19th-century youth.

“This is a city that lives its history but doesn’t always know it,” explained Mr. Mackie, 28, who grew up here before leaving to attend arts school in North Carolina and then the Juilliard School. In character as Buddy Bolden, the actor wore a heavy blue band uniform with red piping and spent much of the day sweating through a scene in which notes from his horn jump the expected musical tracks at the end of a funeral, triggering a boisterous exit parade.

In and out of the clouds, the sun has only slightly annoyed the director of photography, Vilmos Zsigmond, a film veteran (“The Black Dahlia,” “The Witches of Eastwick”) who suggested that weathermen should be as competent to predict cloudy and bright as cinematographers are to deal with uncertain light. As things settled on the bright side, Mr. Pritzker mulled a replay of the funeral parade on the video monitor, then set up another take, this time with Mr. Marsalis’s music blaring from a loudspeaker. Arms started swinging. Handkerchiefs waved. Sun umbrellas pumped in time as locals picked up the Bolden spirit.

“If this music doesn’t make you move around, something’s wrong,” said Mr. Pritzker, 47, speaking later over lunch in his cramped trailer. With long, dark, gray-flecked hair, he wore jeans and green clogs and showed obvious discomfort only when the subject turned to the settling of a family dispute over the Pritzker financial empire, himself among the contentious heirs. “We’re all done with that; relationships are all back together,” Mr. Pritzker said of the wrangle, which had been simmering even before his father, Jay, died in 1999. Among other things, its resolution left Dan free (and with enough money) to pursue a notion that had dogged him since 1995, when a radio executive in Boulder, Colo., happened to ask if he had ever heard about Buddy Bolden and the birth of jazz.

“That he impacted my life so deeply and I didn’t know who he was, that was unbelievable to me,” said Mr. Pritzker, a professional musician who considers himself a connoisseur of American music.

He was to find that hard facts about Bolden are in short supply. That he was born to a working-class family in 1877 is firmly established. By the testimony of others who played with or around him, Bolden was among the first to break through accepted musical forms, pushing his group into the raucous improvisational style that would become known as jazz. In the first decade of the 20th century, he ruled the musical roost in New Orleans. By 1907, however, dementia, probably induced or assisted by alcohol, left him unable to function. That year he was committed to an insane asylum in Jackson, La., where he played his cornet only rarely with ensembles made up of patients, and where he remained until his death in 1931.

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Peter Sorel, SMPSP
Shanti Lowry and Anthony Coleman in “The Great Observer,” a silent film intended to be shown as a companion piece to “Bolden.”

Lacking the factual base for conventional biography on the order of “Ray,” about Ray Charles, or “Walk the Line,” about Johnny Cash, Mr. Pritzker and his collaborators — including the writers Derick and Steven Martini (who have written for the television series “South Beach”) — have chosen to develop the myth. Their telling imagines Bolden, in the last year of his life, hearing a radio broadcast in which Armstrong, who became the public face of New Orleans jazz, paid tribute to the music’s supposed birth with Bolden.

That vision, in fact, may be only slightly exaggerated. “If you look at oral histories from the musicians, they all basically talk about Bolden when they talk about where jazz came from,” said Bruce Raeburn, curator of the Hogan Jazz Archive at Tulane University. According to Mr. Raeburn, those who heard Bolden agreed, first, that he was loud, and, second, that his music opened the door to improvisation. “His combination of charisma and playing style is what put it over,” he said.

(Donald M. Marquis, whose “In Search of Buddy Bolden: First Man of Jazz” was first published in 1978, remained cautious enough about claims that Bolden invented jazz to include in a 2005 edition an epilogue noting that his text made no such assertion, and that the book’s title had not been his preferred choice.)

More surprising than Mr. Pritzker’s quest is its contagious quality. The New Orleans-born Mr. Marsalis became involved after a query from Mr. Pritzker’s producer, Jonathan Cornick, a production veteran whose credits range from studio films like “Super Mario Brothers” to independent features like David Mamet’s “State and Main.” Both Ellis Marsalis, the family patriarch, and Delfeayo, Wynton’s brother, have also contributed to the film.

The Marsalis presence may eventually bestow event status on the relatively small films if, as Mr. Pritzker envisions, they play at a major festival or at Lincoln Center, with Wynton Marsalis, artistic director of the center’s jazz program, leading a live musical performance in time with the silent picture. Mr. Marsalis said that such a performance was possible but that he had no firm plan at this point.

Mr. Pritzker said that idea was inspired about seven years ago by a similar show, during which a symphony in Chicago performed behind Charlie Chaplin’s “City Lights.” The experience, he said, was “jaw-dropping.” Mr. Pierce, who plays an important role as a music and events promoter in the movie, has a more than professional connection to the project, as a longtime friend of the Marsalis family and an alumnus of the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts, which has been the spawning ground for local performers, including Mr. Mackie.

“We live culture,” said Mr. Pierce, one of several Louisiana natives who talked of the attempt to recapture Bolden with near missionary fervor. Speaking by phone from Baltimore, where he is in production on the HBO series “The Wire,” he said he found it exhilarating to plumb his hometown’s musical heritage “at a time when we’re kind of questioning American aesthetic values.”

Extending that enthusiasm to a film audience that has never really warmed to jazz biography (movies like Clint Eastwood’s “Bird” haven’t performed that well at the box office) will be tough. Yet Wynton Marsalis is hopeful. “The world is always ready for everything,” he said. “All you have to do is play music with passion and feeling, and people will connect.”

For Mr. Pritzker, perhaps the greater risk lies in going public with a figure many aficionados may have preferred as a more private image. Mr. Marsalis, for instance, has expressed reservations, the director said, about his tendency to lift the street player Bolden to the realm of the mythic, ballerinas and all.

“I don’t want to demystify him,” Mr. Pritzker said. “I think it’s where it should be.”

Friday, April 20, 2007

RIP: Andrew Hill / O falecimento do grande pianista e compositor


Acaba de chegar a notícia do falecimento de Andrew Hill, que vivia uma fase de ressurreição artística após um longo período de ostracismo. Por conta de seu disco "Time Lines" voltou a merecer a atenção da imprensa. Na edição de Agosto de 2006 da DownBeat, que trouxe os resultados do 54th Annual Critics Poll, o CD foi eleito "álbum do ano", com Hill sendo apontado segundo melhor compositor e quarto melhor pianista. Na opinião dos leitores da mesma DownBeat, conforme o resultado do 71st Annual DB Readers Poll publicado em Dezembro último, "Time Lines" ficou em terceiro lugar na lista de melhores álbuns (atrás apenas do campeão "Without A Song", de Sonny Rollins, e de "Sangam" de Charles Lloyd), levando a Hill a aparecer em segundo lugar como compositor (perdeu para Maria Schneider) e em oitavo como pianista.


Na edição de Fevereiro de 2007 da DownBeat, Hill voltou a ser destaque por conta da primeira apresentação mundial, realizado no Merkin Hall de NY, do repertório do álbum "Passing Ships", gravado em 1969 mas lançado somente em 2003 após as fitas terem sido descobertas pelo incansável produtor Michael Cuscuna. Como dizem aqui, "Rest in Peace".


Composer and pianist Andrew Hill's died at 4 a.m. today, April 20, 2007,
several years after being diagnosed with lung cancer. He was 75 years
old and lived in Jersey City, NJ.

Hill, born June 30, 1931 in Chicago, Illinois (contrary to some
previously published places and dates), had a lengthy
international career as performer and recording artist, and educator
(at Portland State University; he also gave master classes at New
York University, and elsewhere; he leaves a voluminous and highly
varied recorded legacy, dating from the 1950s (So In Love) to his
2006 trio album Time Lines (Blue Note), named to many critics' top
ten lists. Hill is survived by his wife Joanne Robinson Hill, and a
neice, nephew and cousin, besides a devoted coterie of friends,
typically creative artists and perceptive fans.

As announced on April 11, Andrew Hill will receive an honorary
doctorate of music degree from Berklee College of Music at
commencement May 12; other honorees "for their achievements in the
world of music, and for their enduring contributions to American and
international culture" this year are Gloria and Emilio Estefan, and
The Edge; this distinction has perviously been extended to Duke
Ellington, Dizzy Gillespie, Tito Puente, Quincy Jones and Ahmet
Ertegun, among a few others. A press release from Berklee can be
obtained from Allen Bush, Office of Public Information, 617-747-2658
or at the school's website.

On April 3, 2007 Boosey & Hawkes music publishers announced the
addition of Andrew Hill "to its distinguished roster of composers"
whose works will be promulgated through its auspices. For information
on that agreement, contact Adina Williams, via the B&H jazz page at
www.boosey.com.jazz .

Andrew was voted Jazz Composer of the Year by the Jazz Journalists
Association four times, most recently in 2006; he received the 2003
JazzPar Award, and was one of the first to receive a Doris Duke
Foundation Award for jazz composers. His recordings have been on Blue
Note, Mosaic, Palmetto and Black Saint/Soul Note, among other labels.


In the 71st Annual DownBeat Readers Poll (December 2006 issue), "Time Lines" placed third in the "Jazz Album" category with Hill appearing as # 2 Composer and # 8 Pianist. Some months, in the DB August issue, "Time Lines" had already been voted "Jazz Album of the Year" in the 54th Annual DownBeat Critics Poll, with Hill placing # 2 as Composer and # 4 as Pianist.

Mais sobre Russ Kassoff / More abour Russ Kassoff


Estava ouvindo o novo CD de Russ Kassoff, "Somewhere", quando me ligaram para dar a notícia da morte de Andrew Hill. Então vou me limitar, por enquanto, a postar mais detalhes sobre a carreira de Russ. Quanto ao disco, embora tenha ouvido somente seis faixas (me deliciando com "It Only Happens When I Dance with You" e "The Best Thing for You", ambas de Irving Berlin,), posso garantir que é belíssimo. Classudo, chique, com formação de trio e um repertório impecável; um mix perfeito de standards ("Look For The Silver Lining", "It Never Entered My Mind", "Oh, Lady Be Good") com ótimos originals. O título "Somewhere" vem do tema de Leonard Bernstein para o célebre musical "West Side Story". (Lembrei da gravação de Victor Assis Brasil, daquele LP ao vivo no MAM do Rio de Janeiro, que eu tanto ouvia quando era criança...)

Bom, agora preciso me dedicar ao post sobre Hill. Falarei mais sobre Russ e seu "Somewhere" (que pode ser adquirido via www.cdbaby.com/kassoff) na Tribuna. E quem estiver em New York não pode perder a rara chance de assisti-lo em ação com sua big band na próxima terça, dia 24. Para ir aprendendo mais sobre o mestre:


Russ Kassoff is an accomplished jazz pianist, conductor, composer, orchestrator, and arranger, whose varied talents are much valued and on display in the music world. Russ Kassoff is one of the most highly regarded musicians in New York and was praised by the New York Times in 2004 as possessing a "precision and enthusiasm that is riveting." In the words of the Chairman of the Board, "You are the best." -Frank Sinatra, '87

Russ toured as pianist to Frank Sinatra from '80-'91, served as pianist/accompanist for Liza Minnelli from '82-'01 and Minnelli's music director and conductor for the acclaimed Minnelli on Minnelli national tour ('00). Russ was pianist for The Ultimate Event Tour ('88-'89), televised nationally on PBS and featuring Sinatra, Sammy Davis, Jr., Dean Martin, and Minnelli.

Currently, he performs as conductor/pianist to Rita Moreno (2005 sold-out 4 week + 3 week run at San Franciso's Plush Room), Debbie Gravitte (Big Band Broadway with the Russ Kassoff Big Band and many "in concert" appearances), Catherine Dupuis (State College PA Jazz Festival, Sackets Harbor Jazz Festival and many varied club appearances), and many others. His eclectic and varied recording career includes albums with Bucky Pizzarelli, John Pizzarelli, Red Norvo, Chris Connor, Sylvia Syms, Rod Stewart, Carly Simon, Mimi Hines, Catherine Dupuis, Martha Lorin, Jasper Kump and many others. In addition to Sinatra and Minnelli, as a pianist, music director and/or conductor Russ has accompanied a varied list of performers including: Steve Allen, Paul Anka, Tony Bennett, Sammy Cahn, Liz Callaway, Claiborne Cary, Vic Damone, Catherine Dupuis, Debbie Gravitte, Buddy Greco, Gregory Hines, Mimi Hines, Carol Lawrence, Ute Lemper, Monica Mancini, Barry Manilow, Amanda McBroom, Susannah McCorkle, Maureen McGovern, Patrice Munsel, Toby Parker, John Pizzarelli, Faith Prince, Trudy Richards, Ginger Rogers, Annie Ross, Carly Simon, Carol Sloane, Sylvia Syms, and Luciano Pavarotti (duet with Liza for Pavarotti & Friends in 1996).

Russ has appeared at the Sackets Harbor Jazz Festival, the State College Jazz Festival, the Pensacola Jazz Festival, and the Toronto Jazz Festival. In New York, he has performed countless times at Carnegie Hall, Radio City Music Hall, Avery Fisher Hall, Alice Tully Hall, the New York State Theatre, The Kaplan Penthouse and Town Hall. At the National Arts Club, Russ has led numerous trios and small groups over 25 years, including their four most recent Command Performances for the membership. In the 1980's, he performed regularly at Bradley's and One Fifth Avenue. Russ has been a regular performer at the acclaimed Knickerbocker jazz club since 1984.

Russ's arrangements and orchestrations have appeared in many different settings. From full orchestra for Liza Minnelli, Debbie Gravitte, Charles Aznavour and Billy Stritch to smaller intimate groups for Catherine Dupuis, Sylvia Syms, Mimi Hines, Chris Connor, John Pizzarelli, Bucky Pizzarelli, Trudi Richards, Martha Lorin and June Valli. Russ is also the sole writer and arranger for the concert book of the Russ Kassoff Big Band, which was featured in the world premiere concert of Big Band Broadway starring Tony award winner Debbie Gravitte at the Ridgefield Playhouse in November 2005.

In July 2002, Russ arranged and led two big band concerts in Norwood and Potsdam NY (Crane Youth Music). These arrangements have become the backbone of the new Russ Kassoff Big Band comprised of top studio recording and Broadway musicians, featured at the 2nd Milford, PA Music Festival in June 2004. The RKBB can be heard on the Local 802 Musician's Union radio spot promoting live music in the NY Metropolitan Area.

As an associate producer, 2004-6 has been a busy time for Russ. He wrote all of the arrangements, conducted, contracted and recorded CD's for Catherine Dupuis (The Rules Of The Road), Martha Lorin (Blues Over Broadway), Jasper Kump (Sunday In New York) and Toby Parker (brother of Sara Jessica Parker!). His first solo/trio CD "SOMEWHERE" was released on 9/12/2006 at "STEINWAY HALL" in NYC.

As a composer, Russ works regularly with magnificent lyricist, Deirdre Broderick, the perfect wordsmith for the stories evolving from his tunes. Together they have written over 30 songs and most recently "I Remember" qualified for the penultimate round towards a 2005-6 Grammy Nomination. Russ also writes with lyricist Dan Regan, creating a pop and folk groove for the catalog.

Russ has performed as a member of many jazz groups, most notably with the Bucky Pizzarelli Trio in the 1980's at the Cafe Pierre and New York’s Plaza Hotel, and their continued musical relationship finds them performing together at various jazz clubs, concerts, and jazz festivals. Russ was also a regular member of Peter Appleyard's Benny Goodman Alumni, touring Canada extensively in the mid-1980's and featuring jazz greats Ed Bickert, Slam Stewart, Billy Butterfield, Ed Polcer, Urbie Green, Abe Most, Butch Miles, Don Lamond, Peanuts Hucko, George Masso and Major Holley, among others.

As a concert jazz pianist, 2006 found Russ as a featured performer at the JVC Jazz Festival in NYC (80th Birthday Tribute honoring Bucky Pizzarelli), the Pensicola Jazz Festival (with Gene Bertoncini, Harry Allen and Jay Leonhart), the 2nd annual State College PA Jazz Festival (with Bucky Pizzarelli, Ken Peplowski, Martin Wind, Tim Horner and Catherine Dupuis) and the 7th annual Sackets Harbor Jazz Festival (with Marvin Stamm, Ted Nash, Martin Wind, Dennis Mackrel and Catherine Dupuis). 2004 found Russ as featured performer at the Pensacola Jazz Festival, The Toronto Jazz Festival (with Carol Sloane), and the 5th annual Sackets Harbor Jazz Festival (with Harry Allen, Joe Cohn and Catherine Dupuis).

Since it's inception in 2000, Russ has been the musical director/coordinator and pianist for the Sackets Harbor Jazz Festival. Over the first 7 years he has brought to the SHJF performers such as Catherine Dupuis, Linc Milliman, Terry Clarke, Ron Vincent, Martin Wind, Rob McConnell, Kickie Britt, Glenn Drewes, Gary Keller, Rick Cutler, Harry Allen, Joe Cohn, Bucky Pizzarelli, Ken Peplowski, Marvin Stamm, and Dennis Mackrel.

In 2005 Russ performed with his trio (Brian Torff and Rick Cutler) at the 1st annual State College Jazz Festival and his 2nd appearance in 2006 with his recording trio from "SOMEWHERE" was part of a spectacular day along with special guests Bucky Pizzarelli and Ken Peplowski.

In 2004, as a music director/conductor, in addition to all the fine vocalists he’s performed with, Russ conducted the Modesto Symphony with Rita Moreno, the annual Ridgefield (CT) Holiday Spectacular (starring Debbie Gravitte) and the annual Glaxo-Smithkline industrial show (as big band arranger and pianist).

In the summer of 2001, Russ toured Europe as pianist/accompanist to Internationally-acclaimed Ute Lemper.

On Broadway, Russ served as musical director/pianist for Charles Aznavour at the Marquis Theater in 1998 and as pianist/arranger/contractor to Minnelli on Minnelli at the Palace Theater in 1999-2000. Russ has also played hundreds of shows on Broadway, including Miss Saigon, Cats, Will Rogers Follies, Buttons On Broadway, Jane Eyre, The Life, Seussical, Victor Victoria, Sunset Boulevard, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Kiss Me Kate.

Russ holds a B.M. in performance from the Crane School of Music, SUNY-Potsdam, 1974.

Thursday, April 19, 2007

The Russ Kassoff Big Band with Catherine Dupuis at Gillespie Auditorium


The Russ Kassoff Big Band, led by renowned jazz pianist, composer and arranger Russ Kassoff, will perform at the John Birks Gillespie Auditorium, NYC Baha'i Center in New York City, located at 53 East 11th Street (between Broadway and University), on Tuesday, April 24th, sets at 8:00pm and 9:30pm. Guest vocalist Catherine Dupuis will be featured on the evening's concert.


Dedicated to the late great Dizzy Gillespie, this magnificent, yet cozy theater with its glorious acoustics is fast becoming the favorite venue of the world class musicians who play there, as well as jazz fans who return week after week to enjoy this comfortable and exhilarating experience, soaking up great sounds in the warm and welcoming environment of this beautiful theater.


The Russ Kassoff Big Band was formed in 2003 after a successful run of concerts featuring Russ as featured composer, arranger/orchestrator, and piano soloist. The band is comprised of top NY recording and Broadway musicians who all contribute to the new fresh sound of these hard-swinging original charts. Russ's repertoire is eclectic and diverse, including such classics as Ellington's Perdido, Fats Waller's The Joint Is Jumpin', Tori Amos' Winter in addition to many new and innovative arrangements of his original compositions. As a writer, Russ counts among his major influences Rob McConnell, Thad Jones, Nelson Riddle, Don Costa and Don Sebesky to name a few. As a pianist - his influences include Art Tatum, Oscar Peterson, Bill Evans, Herbie Hancock, Chick Corea and Keith Jarrett.

All members of the band, including Russ, are among a small group of the best free lance musicians in the world. Together, they form a vast bio of many worlds of performing experience. Russ - with Frank Sinatra, Liza Minnelli, Rita Moreno, Rod Stewart, Carly Simon, Chris Connor, Bucky Pizzarelli, and countless others - is joined by his band members who also bring their experience - with Count Basie, Woody Herman, Buddy Rich, Lionel Hampton, Thad Jones & Mel Lewis, Gerry Mulligan, Sting, Natalie Cole - just about everyone in the traditions of American Jazz and show business. Not to mention the broadway shows that are currently being played by these magnificent players.


Kassoff can be heard on NPR with Marion McPartland on Piano Jazz in early May celebrating his critically acclaimed solo/trio CD, "Somewhere."

Vocalist Catherine Dupuis has been the regular featured vocalist with the RKBB since its inception. Her style is soulful, innovative, and fresh and she is a consummate artist. She will be performing several RK original charts comprised of a repertoire that she and Russ have worked on as musical partners for many years. Her "Rules of the Road" CD was also written and co-produced by Russ and has been most critically acclaimed. Check out www.catherinedupuis.com

Copies of Russ's newly released trio/solo CD "Somewhere" will be available at this concert. "Somewhere" is also available at www.cdbaby.com/kassoff.

Admission is 15.00, $10.00 for students.
Tickets will be sold at the door, or call 212-222-5159 for reservations and information.

Jazz Tuesdays
in the John Birks Gillespie Auditorium
The New York Baha'i Center
53 East 11th Street (between University Place & Broadway)
Two shows: 8:00 and 9:30 p.m.

The Heath Brothers on DVD


Twenty-five years ago, I had the privilege to attend a superb concert by The Heath Brothers at Sala Cecilia Meirelles (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) on May 10, 1982. It was produced by Gaby Leib and sponsored by IBEU. The pianist was the great Stanley Cowell. After the concert, I had the pleasure to talk with Cowell and the three brothers (Jimmy, Tootie, Percy). The program comprised mostly songs they would record the following year in the "Brothers & Others" album, produced by Orrin Keepnews for the Antilles label. Now comes this "Brotherly Jazz" DVD. Enjoy!

New Heath Brothers Documentary Released on DVD
Includes Interviews, Archival Photos, 2004 Concert Footage of the Brothers


The brilliant careers of Philadelphia’s Heath Brothers—bassist Percy, saxophonist/composer/arranger Jimmy, and drummer Albert “Tootie”—are traced in Brotherly Jazz, an absorbing new documentary being released on DVD. Produced by Danny Scher and directed by Jesse Block, the film features extensive concert footage of the Heaths as well as new interviews with an array of friends and fellow musicians; fascinating archival material about the Heaths’ family life and early professional activities; and rarely seen footage of Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, and other bebop figures.

“It’s a great honor to have something documented on the family, especially now that Percy is gone,” says Jimmy of the film. “Coming from the same source is a unique happening. Whenever we performed, we always showed the audience that we were a family. All of us played with everybody over the years, but when we played together, it was a happy feeling. The audience could feel it.”

The Evolution of "Brotherly Jazz"
The 70-minute film’s centerpiece is a July 2004 concert held at Coventry Grove, a 300-seat amphitheater at producer Scher’s Kensington, California home. The occasion was a fund-raiser for Berkeley’s Jazzschool, but Scher immediately saw the musical and historical significance of the evening, which turned out to be one of the last times the brothers shared a stage before Percy’s death in April 2005, two days shy of his 82nd birthday.

“The original intent was just to film the performance,” says Scher, “but it was Jesse’s role as video director of the Monterey Jazz Festival that helped turn the Heaths’ performance into a full-fledged documentary. As we interviewed some of the artists performing at Monterey, we realized that there was a bigger story to tell about the Heath Brothers than just their wonderful music. We ended up with a film that not only documents their individual and collective careers, but explores the problems, such as drugs and racism, that they and many of their musician contemporaries faced.”
San Francisco–based Jesse Block, with extensive experience as a music video and film director, found the project especially rewarding because “it allowed me the freedom to help develop a story and present it in a way that is both entertaining and educational. With most films I direct, it is usually the performance that is most memorable. With this project, it was three equal parts—memorable performance, a loving family, and a rich history—that made it worth all the work we put into it before releasing it to the public.”

Interviewees
In a series of revealing interviews in the film, the Heath brothers tell their stories. Percy talks about his stint as a Tuskegee Airman, his bass lessons from Ray Brown, and his lengthy tenure with the Modern Jazz Quartet. Jimmy discusses the painful years he spent in prison and how he definitively turned his life around. And youngest brother “Tootie” admits that “had it not been for my older brothers, I might have gone astray and become a doctor or lawyer.”
Among the musicians interviewed in Brotherly Jazz are Sonny Rollins, Herbie Hancock, Taj Mahal, Jack DeJohnette, Christian McBride, and Marian McPartland. Impresario George Wein, producer Orrin Keepnews, and newsman Peter Jennings—a close friend of Percy’s—also offer reminiscences and observations.

Jimmy & Tootie Heath Today
As he celebrates his 80th birthday, Jimmy Heath is enjoying a much-deserved wave of recognition, with a new big band CD (Turn Up the Heath, on Planet Arts) and a busy performance schedule. He held forth last week at the Blue Note in New York, and will spend his birthday headlining a concert at the San Francisco Jazz Festival. The following day, he’ll present a master class for musicians at the Jazzschool in Berkeley.

Brotherly Jazz premiered at the Monterey Jazz Festival in Sept. 2005, and has also been seen at the Mill Valley Film Festival (Oct. 2005), the Miami Jazz Film Festival (Aug. 2006), and the In-Edit Music Documentary Festival in Barcelona, Spain (Oct. 2006).

In addition to continuing his work with the family business, Tootie Heath is involved with an all-percussion ensemble called The Whole Drum Truth, which features master drummers such as Ben Riley, Billy Hart, and Ed Thigpen. “As the proverb says, ‘Those of us who stand on the shoulders of our ancestors stand tall,’” observes Tootie. “I am a person who believes in what occurred before me, the ancestors of my profession, so to speak. I am always getting permission from them before I do any performing. I was fortunate enough to know some of my brothers’ mentors, so I could draw on all of that.”

As his big brother Jimmy puts it most succinctly, “Happiness is the Heath Brothers.”

Producer Danny Scher
In 2006, after producing concerts for almost 40 years, including 24 years as an executive at Bill Graham Presents, Danny Scher produced Brotherly Jazz, his first film, which brings him back to his original love of jazz history and music. Danny began promoting concerts while attending high school in Palo Alto, CA in the late 1960s, with artists such as Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk, Cal Tjader, Jon Hendricks, and Vince Guaraldi. He went to work for Bill Graham in 1975 after earning an MBA at Stanford, and booked concerts ranging from rock and jazz to stadium events, Broadway shows, and closed-circuit boxing. Since leaving BGP in 1999, he has run his own concert promotion and consulting company, DanSun Productions.

Director Jesse Block
San Francisco–based Jesse Block has been Video Director of the Monterey Jazz Festival since 2003. Prior to that he worked for ten years as a director for Black Entertainment Television/BET on Jazz programs featuring John Lee Hooker, Betty Carter, Abbey Lincoln, Milt Jackson, Diana Krall, and many others. In addition to Brotherly Jazz, three of his films have been shown at the Mill Valley Film Festival (Electric Guitarslinger, John Cipollina; 25 Years & Runnin’ Live at Sweetwater, Hot Tuna; Strings & Frets Play Great Guitarists). Some of his other credits include Dan Hicks’s 60th Birthday Concert Tribute, Todd Rundgren Live from San Francisco, Panasonic Jazz Festival, and the San Francisco Jazz Festival.
Ordering Info

Brotherly Jazz
DanSun Productions ~ $25.00
(Available at www.brotherlyjazz.com & www.cdbaby.com)

Ed Reed Sings Love Stories


"Ed Reed Sings Love Stories":
A Major New Jazz Vocalist Debuts
First Recording for Bay Area Singer, 78,
on His Own Blue Shorts Label


Jazz history is full of prodigies whose early promise was cut short by drugs, prison, or premature death. Much rarer is the late bloomer, the artist who, after years or even decades of being derailed by personal problems and the pitfalls of the jazz life, fulfills his talent. Enter Ed Reed.

Critic Andrew Gilbert has written that the Richmond, California resident is a "jazz singer in the truest sense." Drummer Tootie Heath called Reed "a great new voice." And singer Sheila Jordan told him, "The entire world needs to hear you because you're wonderful."

Reed's remarkable new CD, Ed Reed Sings Love Stories, on his own Blue Shorts label, is testament not only to his musical gifts but his grit and good fortune in having survived and overcome long-term heroin addiction as well as four stints in San Quentin and Folsom prisons. "This is a dream," Reed says of the ecstatic reception the CD is receiving.

Ed Reed Sings Love Stories was produced by Bud Spangler, a veteran of the San Francisco/Oakland Bay Area music scene (as disc jockey, drummer, and record producer), and co-produced by multi-instrumentalist Peck Allmond, who'd first heard Reed sing at Jazz Camp West in 2005 and convinced him that he needed to record. Spangler and Allmond convened a simpatico band for the session -- pianist Gary Fisher, bassist John Wiitala, drummer Eddie Marshall -- and worked with Reed in selecting the CD's sophisticated and challenging repertoire.

"They're beautiful, and they tell a great story," says Reed of the album's songs, which include "Daydream," "A Flower Is a Lovesome Thing," Thelonious Monk's "Ask Me Now," "If the Moon Turns Green," and "Goodbye." The CD's opening track, "A Sleepin' Bee" (by Harold Arlen, with lyrics by Truman Capote), has special resonance for Reed; he learned the song, in fragments and over a six-month period, while in prison, "and I've loved it ever since."

"His time, phrasing and intonation are so beautiful," Peck Allmond told writer Andrew Gilbert in the Contra Costa Times. "When you think of the great jazz singers, Billie, Ella, Andy Bey, they're not out front. They're right there in the music, and Ed is like that. He wasn't approaching music as 'I'm a singer.' He was a musician. And there's a time-capsule element, because of his incarceration. It took a long time for his music to get out to the world, and when it did, it was fully formed."

Mingus, Bird, Dizzy

Ed Reed was born in Cleveland, Ohio in 1929 and grew up in Los Angeles, where his father worked as a waiter on the Southern Pacific Railroad. Ed's first music lessons, at 11, came from teenage bassist Charles Mingus, whose sister lived across the street from the Reeds. "He taught me how to hear music, how to sing chord changes," says Reed.

Ed was introduced to Charlie Parker on record in 1944, and later heard Parker and Dizzy Gillespie at a Hollywood club. He started singing around town on amateur nights at the Lincoln Theater ("I never won; Ernie Andrews was always winning"), and later in talent nights hosted by pianist Hampton Hawes at the Club Alabam and other venues.

At 17, Reed joined the army and, while stationed at Oakland Army Base, began using heroin. After leaving the service, he sang briefly with a band led by his neighbor, trumpeter Dupree Bolton, but "We were always squabbling over heroin. None of us could keep it together." It would be another 40 years or so before Reed earned another dime from singing.

Between 1951 and 1966, Reed did three stints in San Quentin Prison and one in Folsom. During his last incarceration at San Quentin (1964-1966), he sang in the Warden's Band, with Art Pepper in the saxophone section. "Art soloed on all the things that I sang," Reed recalls. "We were friends."

Reed was released from prison for the final time in 1966, though it would be another 20 years before he finally quit using heroin. He now works as a health educator, trainer, and program planner at a major medical Bay Area HMO and other health agencies.

Singing, At Last

Ed Reed began singing in public again in the late 1980s at Bay Area venues with guitarist Alex Markels. He took singing performance classes at Berkeley's Jazzschool; later, he landed a weekly gig at the Cheese Board Pizza Collective, also in Berkeley. In summer 2005, at his wife Diane's suggestion, Reed attended Jazz Camp West, where he met Peck Allmond.

"Peck told me I needed to record," says Reed. "He brought in Bud Spangler, and together they helped Diane and me put the pieces together."

Among the bookings Ed is looking forward to this year: an appearance at the Sonoma Jazz Festival 5/27; Anna's Jazz Island in Berkeley, 6/16; and a benefit for the Monterey Jazz Festival and the National Steinbeck Center, 9/19.

"I was so scared," he says of his early attempts at being a jazz singer more than half a century ago, "but I ain't scared now."

Ed Reed Sings Love Stories
Available on CD Baby

(with sound samples, and a listener review by composer Richard Rodney Bennett, who calls Reed "one of the great undiscovered jazz singers. . . A lovely fresh, imaginative singer with great taste and jazz chops.")
www.edreedsings.com

Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Destaques da DownBeat de Maio de 2007


Vejam os destaques da DownBeat de Maio. Está sensacional!!! Zawinul era para ter sido matéria de capa na edição de Abril, mas, com a morte de Michael Brecker, que se tornou o destaque maior no número anterior, as peripécias do turbulento tecladista ficaram para Maio.
A revista traz também um superguia dos principais festivais de jazz em todo o mundo, citando as atrações de 2007. Há uma comovente cobertura do "memorial" de Michael Brecker, muitas novidades sobre projetos em andamento (na coluna "Things To Come" de Richard Seidel) e uma penca de reviews.
Os discos mais elogiados são os de Grady Tate (atacando exclusivamente como cantor em "From The Heart", convidando Dennis Mackrel para a bateria), do trombonista Wycliffe Gordon ("Standards Only") e do pianista Sten Sandell ("Oval"), os únicos que ganharam 4 estrelas, mesma cotação concedida ao DVD "The Oslo Concerts" de Bill Evans. Ah, "Nightnoves", de Kurt Elling, faturou 4 estrelas e meia.
Na porção brasileira: "Softly", de Romero Lubambo, e "Carioca", de Chico Buarque, receberam 3 estrelas. "Our Moments" (título americano para "Todas As Coisas e Eu"), de Gal Costa, não passou de 2 estrelas e meia...O desempenho vocal da diva foi elogiado, mas os arranjos...Segundo o crítico Peter Margasak, "the orchestrated strings are gloppy and glib...the instrumental component isn't far from old-fashioned muzak."
By the way, este disco já havia sido detonado pelo New York Times há alguns meses, mais precisamente no dia 8 de Janeiro. O crítico Ben Ratliff, embora elogiando a voz da cantora ("clara e leve, com afinação perfeita e pouco vibrato"), disse que ela foi mal gravada com excesso de compressão, chamou o álbum de "rush project", e taxou o som como "raso e sintético, com arranjos óbvios e açucarados". Pegou pesado.

COVER
Joe Zawinul -- (Previously scheduled as April Cover ... now May.) Not one to rest on his laurels, the legendary keyboardist/composer has broken new ground with the release of Brown Street, as he’s arranged his Weather Report classics for a big band for the first time. The result is a thrilling live ride through one of the best songbooks in jazz. We talk about this process, how he views the compositional arc of his career and songwriting legacy, and much more in this entertaining feature.

Ornette Coleman -- At the IAJE Conference in January, Coleman sat before a live audience for an interview conducted by fellow musical adventurer Greg Osby. They talked about music, racism, family, sex and much more in what was perhaps the most thought-provoking hour of the conference.

Robert Glasper & Mos Def -- The pianist has released his second album on Blue Note, a further exploration of how to incorporate hip-hop elements into acoustic jazz. Mos Def is one of the most innovative hip-hop artists on the planet, and he even dabbles in jazz, including leading a big band. We got them together to discuss intersections of jazz and hip-hop.

Los Angeles Big Band Scene -- From the Gordon Goodwin Big Phat Band and the Chris Walden Big Band to the Clayton–Hamilton Jazz Orchestra and Gerald Wilson Orchestra, L.A. currently boasts an active and innovative big band scene.

Toumani Diabaté -- Last year, the kora player released Boulevard De L’Independance, one of just a handful of albums that received 5 stars. Now, he’s in the States, on a rare tour.

SPECIAL SECTION: International Summer Jazz Festival Guide -- Includes listings of more than 100 festivals, as well as a feature on the 50th anniversary of the Monterey Jazz Festival. Other stories include a piece on the art of the festival commission and jazz being booked at non-jazz festivals.

BLINDFOLD TEST -- Ron Carter (Live from IAJE)

PLAYERS
Anat Fort (piano)
Tony Malaby (saxophone)
Chocolate Armenteros (trumpet)
Gary Lucas (guitar)

THE BEAT
• Riffs—Jazz News From Around The Globe
• Vinyl Freak; The Question; The Archives; Things To Come
• Caught: Chick Corea/Gary Burton begin tour in Princeton, N.J.; Creative Music Festival at Redcat in L.A.; Freddie Redd re-creates The Connection at Merkin Hall in New York.
• Backstage With: Eric Reed
• Lionel Hampton Jazz Festival Turns 40; Orbert Davis goes commercial
• “Regrowing Pains” in New Orleans

WOODSHED
• Master Class: By Antonio Garcia
• Jazz on Campus: Asper Foundation in Winnepeg
• Transcription: Pat Metheny guitar solo from the new CD Metheny Mehldau

GEAR BOX
• Vater Safe N’ Sound ear plugs
• Beyerdynamic Headzone portable surround mixing system
• Gator Pedal Tote for guitarists
• Two books from Sher Music: The Jazz Musician’s Guide To Creative Practicing and Jazz Piano Masterclass With Mark Levine
• Line 6 TonePort KB37

REVIEWS
Anat Cohen and the Anzic Orchestra, Noir (Anzic)
Uri Caine, Plays Mozart (Winter & Winter)
Mavis Staples, We’ll Never Turn Back (Anti-)
Frank Foster, Well Water (Piadrum)
William Parker & The Little Huey Creative Music Orchestra (Victo)
Joey DeFrancesco (Concord)
Kurt Elling (Concord)
Tony DeSare (Telarc)
David Liebman (Tone Center)
Conrad Herwig (High Note)
Turtle Island Quartet (Telarc)
Grady Tate (Half Note)
Scott Whitfield (Summit)
Bill Evans Trio (Shanachie, DVD)
Wycliffe Gordon (Nagel Heyer)
Wycliffe Gordon/Jay Leonhart (Bluesback)
Pat Martino (Prestige)
Pete Levin (Motema)
Gal Costa (DRG)
Chie Imaizumii (Capri)
George Kontrafouris (Chicken Coup)
Night Crawlers (Cellar Live)
Rebecca Parris (Saying It With Jazz)
Chris Byars (Smalls)
Huazzteco (Parga)
Pierrick Pedron (Nocturne)
Sten Sandell Trio (Intakt)
Chico Buarque (DVD)

BLUES
Willie Pooch (Chicken Coup)
Elliott Sharp’s Terraplane (Intuition)
T.K. Webb (The Social Registry)
Tad Robinson (Severn)
David Bromberg (Applesed)
Phillip Walker (Delta Groove)

Beyond: King Crimson
The Condensed 21st Century Guide To To King Crimson (DGM)
The Collectable King Crimson, Volume One (DGM)

Reissues:
Memphis Slim & Buddy Guy: Southside Reunion (Sunnyside)
Gatemouth Brown: Gate’s On The Heat (Sunnyside)
T-Bone Walker: Good Feelin’ (Sunnyside)
Clifton Chenier: Frenchin’ The Boogie (Sunnyside)
Loren Connors: Night Through (Family Vineyard)
John Mayall: Essentially Mayall (Eagle)

Book:
Richard Cook: It’s About That Time: Miles Davis On And Off Record (Oxford University Press)

Destaques da DownBeat de Abril de 2007





Michael Brecker como "cover story". Mui merecidamente.


"When Michael Brecker died on Jan. 13, the music world lost one of its truly great artists and all-around beautiful human beings. To pay tribute to Brecker, we talk to the musicians with whom he collaborated and those he influenced. We tell the story of how a young post-Coltrane tenor saxophonist from Philadelphia emerged on the scene to redefine the role of his instrument."

Entre os reviews, algumas curiosidades:
três estrelas para "Not Too Late" de Norah Jones, quatro para "Estrada de Terra" do tecladista Philippe Baden Powell (dá-lhe Brasil!) e, pasmem!, apenas uma estrela para "From the Plantation to the Penitentiary", o mais recente manifesto tradicionalista-rancoroso (e ultrapretensioso) de Wynton Marsalis para a Blue Note.


Eis um trecho do artigo sobre Michael Brecker:
Remembering A Titan
By Dan Ouellette
Michael Brecker has died, yet he lives. His saxophone is silenced, but his music survives. We grieve the void, yet celebrate his mighty feats: the sonic trembles that shaped new continents of jazz and the telling snapshots of his heroics, such as his first onstage meeting with McCoy Tyner—at Yoshi’s in 1995—and his final public exhilaration, guesting with Herbie Hancock at Carnegie Hall last summer.

In conversation with fellow saxophonists Dave Liebman and Joe Lovano at the time of their Saxophone Summit Gathering Of Spirits CD release (October 2004 DownBeat cover story), Brecker said: “Jazz is not entertainment. It’s an art dealing with complicated and subtle things. It’s not an easy listen. It involves close and open communication among musicians and a lot of trust onstage. That’s partially what makes this music so powerful.”

Brecker was a bona fide jazz star, but he could have been the music’s most modest figure. He was a shy man who blew torrents and mused rhapsodies, without boast or swagger. He channeled John Coltrane, but found sanctity in his own horn.

“The power, mystery and spirituality in Coltrane’s music inspired me,” Brecker said in the ’04 interview. “That was enough to propel me to choose music as my life’s endeavor.”

Saxophonist Tim Ries, who was first a fan of Brecker’s and then became a close friend, said, “Mike’s ego was never in the way. Seeing how intensely he practiced and always pushed to the next level was inspiring. But aside from the music, as a person, there are few people so kind and willing to spend time encouraging other musicians as Mike.”

“It was never about the limelight for Michael,” said Dave Love, whose Heads Up label will release Brecker’s highly anticipated new album, Pilgrimage, on May 22. “He was the consummate artist and gentleman. He was an artist’s artist. So many people looked to him for their growth. He’ll go down in jazz history as one of the greatest saxophonists of all time. He carried on the Coltrane tradition in a respectful way.”

“Mike got better and better as an artist until the day he passed,” said older brother and trumpeter Randy Brecker. “He was so intent on learning and expanding his vocabulary. He was like Coltrane in that way—dedicated to practicing, committed to the music as an art form, never staying the same. Whenever we played together, it was always a joy. I would get all pumped up and ready to keep up with him. And every time, he would add something new that would blow me away, and I’d have to slink away with the bell between my legs.”

Brecker died Jan. 13 in a New York hospital. He was 57. The official cause of death was leukemia, which was brought on by his two-year battle against MDS (myelodysplastic syndrome), a rare form of cancer where the bone marrow stops producing healthy blood cells. His death was directly linked to a failure to find a suitable donor for a blood stem cell and bone marrow transplant after an exhaustive worldwide search for a person with a genetically matched tissue type.

Initially reluctant to go public with his illness, Brecker, convinced he could help others, offered his name to a cause that would aid those in similarly dire situations by getting people to sign up with a donor registry. “Many lives have been saved as a result of Mike’s perseverance,” Randy said. “There was a shortage of potential donors.”

“Even though he was such a private man, Mike was always concerned about others,” said Darryl Pitt, Brecker’s manager since 1986. “He talked about his illness, but only to make people aware of the need for donors.”


E leia também:

ICP Orchestra
In For Life
By Michael Jackson

The Instant Composer’s Pool, as a record label, musical collective and modus operandi, was established by Willem Breuker, Misha Mengelberg and Han Bennink 40 years ago in Amsterdam. In 1967 there was no precedent for what two Dutchmen and a pianist born in Kiev had in mind. “Except,” Mengelberg said, “maybe in America with those women around Paul Bley—Carla Bley and Annette Peacock—what they were up to with the Jazz Composers Guild.”

Saxophonist Breuker, perhaps the ICP’s primary catalyst, broke away to form his Kollektief in 1974. Since that time Mengelberg and Bennink have persevered as one of the most enduring tag-teams in creative music—the portly pianist playing a wryer Hardy to the gangly drummer’s knowingly slapstick Laurel. Seeking comparatives to their inimitable act is tempting, but folly.

“When people sit in a concert hall they are used to this and that, and then suddenly the piano player is eating a cake, or the drummer is taking his cymbals off and winding them on the floor,” Bennink said. “Then we talk a little bit, and people think it’s Laurel and Hardy. I never have that intention.”

When the two toured the Midwest with the ICP Orchestra last spring, their relationship resembled a matador and picador—Han the goader, and Misha the spiker. Bennink didn’t buy the analogy. “When you go and look at a painting as a spectator, there always should be room to come into a painting, grow into it, find your place,” Bennink said. “When I played with Misha there was always so much space that there was time to make up these thoughts.”

Mengelberg was more sympathetic. “I’m not courageous enough to stab with a sword and go through to the kill,” he said. “I stab with a pin. I like to hinder people.”

Neither man lacks courage of conviction, even if Bennink is the more physically demonstrative of the two. During separate solo performances orbiting their concert with the orchestra, both flouted compromise. Bennink remains protean, his antics refusing to pall in the way aspects of the Kollektief’s schtick have over the years, in large part due to his sheer athleticism (despite being almost 65) and his reliance on precipitous site specifics. At his performance at the Intuit art gallery in Chicago, he put 10-foot planks into service as ungainly drumsticks. In the meantime, he annihilated several loaner snares and used a cupped hand to spookily control reverberations from a surviving snare drumhead.

Some express longueur at Bennink’s forays from the kit, at which he is a deep catalyst of swing feel and meister of brushwork amid the gamut of traditional skill. Yet his improv theatrics demand a more nerve-wracking sense of timing.

Mengelberg will start a performance with a blank slate in the same fearless manner, commencing with a scribble on the keys, a nursery rhyme—“a little nonsense” as he would term it—then coax it into something, or perhaps nothing. To him, either is acceptable. Beginning his solo set at Chicago’s Claudia Cassidy Theater, he tossed his leather jacket on the apex of the open piano lid and let it hang as an affront to concert society. Mengelberg was riddled with sniffles, so his rather disgusting deployment of tissues and throat coughs rendered literal the music as phlegmatic.

Though Mengelberg’s connection with the Fluxus movement from the 1960s has been overplayed, such unapologetic interpolation of chance conditions is part of his general manifesto, calculated to set bourgeois teeth on edge. To top off his set of miniaturized ruminations and underscore disregard for audience expectation, Mengelberg pranced across the stage like a sugarplum fairy.

The true wonder of the ICP Orchestra, however, is not the idiosyncrasies of these two giants of dada-jazz, but how they have magnetized a loyal league of uppercrust musicians—the “Lifers”—whose personalities also define the group.

“ICP changed quite a bit in 40 years,” Bennink reminisced. “How the band sounds now, how they work for each other and they are all good improvisers, it reminds me of the Duke Ellington band. It’s not a showoff band. It’s a band that’s interested in music. It can only work the way it works now with these people.”


Bobby McFerrin
Out Of The Woods
By Bill Banfield


The idea that one was in the woods—perhaps lost, or maybe searching for and attaining spiritual insight—conjures up a powerful image of a symbolic journey: crossing over, coming out of the valley, making it to the other side. Bobby McFerrin’s musical life is more than symbolic in this way. For almost a year-and-a-half, he retreated to his rural home in the outskirts of Philadelphia for a sabbatical.

“You know what’s wonderful about living in the woods?” McFerrin asked last December at his home near Chestnut Hill, Pa. “When it rains you can see the rain, when it’s windy you can hear the wind. You can hear the snow fall. I have had the wonderful blessing to sit and drink all that in. Now I am anxious and eager to see what will come out.”

McFerrin moved here with his family in 2001, after living in Minneapolis, where he served as creative chair of the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra from 1994–2001. His move to the East Coast was immediately followed by a blistering tour itinerary of performances, clinics and conducting. He exhausted himself, became sick and in 2005 made the decision to stop performing and teaching so he could stay home, spend time with his family, contemplate his music and faith, compose and recharge his batteries.

His home is surrounded by nature, with deer sightings a regular occurrence and no other houses visible in any direction. Large bay windows offer views of the forest, and porches extend out into the woods. It’s integrated into the environment, so he can enjoy and appreciate the surroundings. Inside, there’s a music room, leisure room and Bible room, which contains a piano, rare recordings and his comfortable reading chair. He owns more Bibles than a library should be allowed to hold.

“I did this to find my center again, to get quiet inside, to be still,” McFerrin said as he walked with his two dogs, Harley and Mo (for Mozart), around the acres of woods that surround his home. “To sleep in my own bed, raid my own refrigerator, be with my family, snuggle with wife, hug my daughter, walk the dogs, sit on my front porch swing, read my Bible and pray, get up early when it’s dark, look at the stars, take deep, deep breaths—now that’s living, and I was successful in doing all those things.”

Now, he’s back in a capacity that audiences around the world know him: He’s performing. His sabbatical is over, and McFerrin has emerged from the woods prepared to set new musical trends and show the world a new face. “I was so tired of entertaining,” he said of his state of mind before taking his break. “You never want to get to the place when you walk out on a stage, look out at the audience and not recognize yourself. We live in a society that’s so fast. We want fast solutions to our problems. We need to know immediately what we are supposed to do. It took me a year-and-a-half to figure out where I wanted to start again creatively. I am so glad that I took this long.”


Fire Music Renaissance
New Music from the Likes of Vijay Iyer, Mike Ladd, Soweto Kinch, Terence Blanchard, Charlie haden, Wynton Marsalis and Others Offers a Surge of Political Dissent
By John Murph

Three years ago, in discussing his ambitious and political-minded jazz big band disc, Goodbye Swingtime (Accidental), British electronica composer Matthew Herbert said, “If you look 50 years into the future at today’s music charts, there would be zero indication that there was a war going on. It shows a great deal about what music has become.”

Herbert directed most of his indictment at the pop world. But how true do his statements ring for jazz today? By scratching beneath the surface, a surge of political dissent in modern jazz becomes apparent.

One doesn’t have to scratch too hard. In the wake of such decade-defining events as the 2000 presidential election, 9/11, the Iraq war and overall war on terror, and the botched response to Hurricane Katrina, a sizable number of jazz albums voicing sociopolitical angst have emerged. This decade has produced such stirring works as violinist Billy Bang’s personal exorcism Vietnam, The Aftermath (Justin Time, 2001) and its equally poignant follow-up, Vietnam: Reflections (Justin Time, 2005); Vijay Iyer and Mike Ladd’s elaborate In What Language? (Pi, 2003); Dave Douglas’ Strange Liberation (RCA, 2004); Charlie Haden’s Liberation Music Orchestra’s Not In Our Name (Verve, 2005); Alex Coke’s Iraqnophobia/Wake Up Dead Man (Documentary Sound Art, 2005); and the World Saxophone Quartet’s Political Blues (Justin Time, 2006).

This trend isn’t slowing down. Already this year, Iyer and Ladd released Still Life With Commentator (Savoy Jazz), which takes on today’s blogosphere media culture. Wynton Marsalis’ provocative new disc, From The Plantation To The Penitentiary (Blue Note), picks up the sentiments expressed by Bill Cosby in 2004, when he questioned the advancement and current leadership of Black America after the 50th anniversary of the Brown v. Board of Education decision.

In England, trumpeter Abram Wilson’s recent sophomore effort, Ride! Ferris Wheel To The Modern Day Delta (Dune), amounts to a brooding meditation on his cultural roots in New Orleans, while saxophonist and rapper Soweto Kinch delivers an autobiographical portrait at life spent in his Birmingham, England, housing project on his new disc, A Life In The Day Of B19: Tales Of The Tower Block (Dune). Even the seemingly benign pop jazz chanteuse Norah Jones shared some of her political concerns with the salty ditty “My Dear Country” from her new disc, Not Too Late (Blue Note).

The Hurricane Katrina catastrophe has sparked the most recent wave of socially conscious releases. The federal, state and local governments’ foul ups in their Gulf Coast rescue efforts, most pointedly in New Orleans, can be viewed as a direct diss to jazz, considering the Crescent City’s role in nurturing the music. “When we think about the war in Iraq and other stuff facing this country, we’ve mostly been giving a blind eye,” claimed New Orleans trumpeter Terence Blanchard, who’s working on a jazz interpretation of the score he composed for Spike Lee’s four-part HBO documentary on the hurricane and its aftermath, When The Levees Broke. “But Katrina has made people say, ‘Enough is enough!’ and speak up.”

Albums that address post-Katrina New Orleans include Dr. John’s four-song cycle, Sippiana Hericane (Blue Note, 2005), the Dirty Dozen Brass Band’s What’s Going On (Shout Factory, 2006), Elvis Costello and Allen Toussaint’s The River In Reverse (Verve Forecast, 2006), and Harry Connick, Jr.’s 2007 Oh, My NOLA! (Sony) and Chanson Du Vieux Carré (Marsalis Music). The political voice on all of these vary, but the overall theme is “New Orleans matters.”

Players

Andy Statman
Gordon Grdina
Paoli Mejias
Steve Swell

Blindfold Test

Pianist Larry Willis was tested on the following tracks for the "Blindfold Test":
Gonzalo Rubalcaba: "The Hard One" from Supernova (Blue Note)
Chano Dominguez: "No Me Platiques, Mas" from Con Alma (Venus)
Denny Zeitlin: "Bemsha Swing" from Solo Voyage (MaxJazz)
Marcin Wasilewski: "Plaza Real" from Trio (ECM)
Oscar Peterson: "Sweet Lorraine" from Freedom Song (Pablo)
Dave McKenna: "C-Jam Blues" from Live At Maybeck Recital Hall, Vol. 2 (Concord Jazz)
Jason Moran: "Out Front" from The Bandwagon (Blue Note)
Bebo Valdes: "Lamento Cubano" from El Arte Del Sabor (Blue Note)

Also In This Issue

Musicians Gear Guide; Keith Jarrett transcription; Brooklyn Jazz Underground; Backstage With ... David S. Ware; Sly Stone reissued; George Wein sells Festival Productions; Ethan Iverson Insider column; Alice Coltrane tribute; Panama Jazz Festival, Horace Silver tribute and Dizzy Reece return reviewed; dozens of CD reviews; and much more!

Destaques da DownBeat de Março

COVER
David Sanborn -- When the alto saxophonist emerged on the scene in the 1970s, he quickly became one of the most influential in jazz, with a sound which also steeped in blues, soul and funk. Today, he’s often imitated, but his playing is immediately recognizable. We caught up with Sanborn to talk about his landmark albums of the 1970s and ’80s, as well as to see what new musical ideas he has up his sleeve.

FEATURES
Legacy of Bradley’s -- A decade ago, the piano bar Bradley’s shut its doors. The Manhattan bar was a meeting place for the generations, a spot where the legends traded ideas with each other, emerging stars showed off their new concepts and the masters tutored the youngsters on the bandstand. Here are tales from this legendary club.

Joey DeFrancesco & Bobby Hutcherson -- Last year, the Hammond B-3 organist and vibraphone player collaborated on the album Organic Vibes, one of the most swinging albums of ’06. Now, they’re touring together; and when we met up with the pair, they showed why they have such a phenomenal bandstand rapport.

John Hollenbeck -- Through his work with The Claudia Quintet, the WDR Big Band and his Large Ensemble, the Grammy nominated drummer has emerged as one of the most innovative composers in modern jazz.

SPECIAL SECTION: Summer Camp Guide -- Our second annual guide to where to study jazz when school’s out of session.

SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION: Indie Record/Label Spotlight -- 1/6 page, 4-color blocks for $500 net each.

BLINDFOLD TEST -- Joe Henry

PLAYERS
Steve Kuhn (piano)
Wally Schnalle (drums)
Omar Avital (bass)
Ellen Johnson (voice)

THE BEAT
• Riffs—Jazz News From Around The Globe
• Vinyl Freak; The Question; Living Jazz; The Archives; The Insider
• Caught: Tri-C Jazz Festival’s Latin Night; Skycap Festival in Boston
• Billy Strayhorn Documentary and All-Star Tribute Soundtrack
• New Visitor Center at Louis Armstrong House and Museum
• Last Call at Joe Segal’s

WOODSHED
• Master Class: Breathing for Vocalists, by Cheryl Bentyne
• Jazz on Campus: Mike Gellar’s online Jazz Master Classes
• Transcription: Marcin Wasilewski’s piano solo on “The Soul Of Things Part 3,” from
Tomasz Stanko’s quartet CD The Soul Of Things.

REVIEWS
Hot Box
Charles Tolliver, With Love (Blue Note)
Otis Taylor, Definition Of A Circle (Telarc)
Nicholas Payton/Bob Belden/Sam Yahel/John Hart/Billy Drummond, Mysterious Shorter (Chesky)
Reginald Robinson, Man Out Of Time (88 Playa Music)

Reviews
Bebo Valdés & Federico Britos (Calle 54)
Sylvain Luc (Dreyfus)
Bebo Valdés (Calle 54)
Bobby Darin (Hyena)
Harry Connick Jr. (Marsalis Music & Columbia)
John Hammond (Back Porch)
Rob Ickes, Andy Leftwich, Dave Pomeroy (Earwave)
The Four Bags (NCM East)
Ruthie Foster (Blue Corn Music)
Vusi Mahlasela (ATO)
Brubeck Brothers Quartet (Koch)
Frank Wright (ESP)
Keefe Jackson’s Fast Citizens (Delmark)
Chico Hamilton (Joyous Shout!)
Bucky Pizzarelli (Arbors)
Jimmy Heath Big Band (Planet Arts)
Stefano Bollani (ECM)
Matt Wilson Arts & Crafts (Palmetto)
Charlie Mariano, Ali Haurand, Daniel Humair (Konnex)
Patti Austin (Rendezvous)
Hendrik Meurkins (Zoho)
Chris Washburne and the SYOTOS Band (Jazzheads)
Terry Gibbs (Jazzed Media)
Soweto Kinch (Dune)
Joe Zawinul Big Band (Heads Up)
Billy Strayhorn (Blue Note)

Reissues: Tony Williams Mosaic Select
Books: Gayle Wald, Shout, Sister, Shout (Beacon Press)

Destaques da Down Beat de Fevereiro


COVER
Derek Trucks & Susan Tedeschi -- Music is a family affair for husband and wife Trucks and Tedeschi. For Trucks, he leads his band through an innovative mix of blues, jazz, Indian classical, Afro-Cuban and Southern rock. Tedeschi offers a much more traditional sound, as one of the freshest voices on the contemporary blues scene. We caught up with them as they took their groups out on tour together this past fall.

FEATURES
Gonzalo Rubalcaba -- The pianist has usually done his talking through notes and tones. But recently, he opened up to us about his relationship to his native Cuba and its music, as well as the hardships he faced when he first came to the United States in developing his musical identity, as well as the resistance he received from Cuban defectors.

Anita O'Day - Rebel Song Stylist O'Day Dies

Matt Wilson -- One of the most in-demand drummers in jazz today, Wilson appears as a sideman on a vast array of albums and live projects. But he’s also quite the bandleader, best witnessed by his Arts & Crafts Quartet, which has a new album in the works for early 2007.

Los Angeles Big Band Scene -- From the Gordon Goodwin Big Phat Band and the Chris Walden Big Band to the Clayton–Hamilton Jazz Orchestra and Gerald Wilson Orchestra, L.A. currently boasts an active and innovative big band scene.

SPECIAL SECTION: 100 Great Jazz Clubs -- Our list of 100 great places to catch live jazz around the world, featuring descriptions of each club. In addition, we feature a story on 10 great moments over the Blue Note’s 25 years in New York.

BLINDFOLD TEST: Bill Henderson

PLAYERS
Dave Burrell (piano)
Asha Puthli (voice)
Yosvany Terry Cabrera (saxophone)
Mark Egan (bass)

THE BEAT
• Riffs—Jazz News From Around The Globe
• Vinyl Freak; The Question; European Scene; The Archives
• Caught: Edgefest; Cecil Taylor with Henry Grimes at Iridium; Zawinul Syndicate returns to L.A.
• JazzBoston new web site; Andrew Hill Nonet performs Music Of Passing Ships for first time.
• Story behind new Heath Brothers documentary; Ronnie Scott’s reopens in London

WOODSHED
• Master Class: Rachel Z
• Jazz on Campus: Columbia College Quintet & Orchestra project with Doug Lofstrom
• Transcription: Duke Ellington & Ray Brown’s piano/bass duet improv on “Things Ain’t
What They Used To Be,” from the 1972 recording This One’s For Blanton (Pablo)

REVIEWS
Tin Hat: The Sad Machinery Of Spring (Hannibal)
Sonny Rollins: Sonny, Please (Doxyt)
Gil Goldstein: Under Rousseau’s Moon (Half Note)
Ron Miles: Stone/Blossom (Sterling Circle)
Nils Petter Molvaer (Thirsty Ear)
Roseanna Vitro (Challenge)
Janice Borla (Blujazz)
Ben Riley’s Monk Legacy Septet (Concord)
One More (IPO)
Rudy Linka (Jiri Vanek)
Royce Campbell (Moon Cycle)
John Ettinger (Ettinger)
Paul Murphy/Larry Willis (Mapleshade)
Anthony Wilson Nonet (Groove Note)
Delfeayo Marsalis (Troubadour Jass)
John Taylor/Martin France/Palle Danielsson (CamJazz)
Ellen Johnson (Vocal Visions)
Available Jelly (Ramboy)
Chris Tarry Group (Cellar Live)
Rob Reddy’s Gift Horse (Reddy Music)
Exploding Star Orchestra (Thrill Jockey)
Chet Doxas Quartet (Justin Time)
Alex Bellegarde Quartet (Justin Time)
Ithamara Koorax (JSR)
Neal Miner (Smalls)
Kahil El’Zabar (Delmark)
Andrew Rathbun & George Colligan (Fresh Sound/New Talent)
Armen Donelian & Marc Mommaas (Sunnyside)

Blues
Lil’ Ed & the Blues Imperials (Alligator)
Linda Hopkins (Free Ham)
Paul Speidel Band (independent release)
Robert Cray (Nozzle/Vanguard)
Robi Zonca & Luther Kent (Mousemen)
Johnny Nicholas (Top Cat)

Beyond
Tom Waits: Orphans: Brawlers, Bawlers And Bastards (Anti-)