Articles by Leo Sidran
Coding the Self: Theo Bleckmann on Finding Your Own Language
by Leo Sidran
Theo Bleckmann has spent decades living in the space between: between categories, between careers, between composition and improvisation, even between apartments. Born in rural Germany, he trained as both a boy soprano and a competitive figure skater, before coming to New York at 23 to study with the legendary singer Sheila Jordan. Quickly he found a home among musical misfits. Since then, he has built a singular life in music that balances jazz, avant-garde experimentation, composition, performance art, and teaching. ...
Continue ReadingVera Brandes on Köln 75
by Leo Sidran
The Köln Concert (ECM) by Keith Jarrett is one of the most iconic recordings in jazz history--a completely improvised solo piano performance, recorded in 1975, that became both the best-selling solo album and the best-selling piano album of all time. And yet, the concert almost didn't happen. The new film Köln 75, directed by Brooklyn-based filmmaker Ido Fluk, tells the remarkable true story behind that night through the eyes of Vera Brandes, the 18-year-old German concert promoter whose ...
Continue ReadingLeonor Watling always wore many hats
by Leo Sidran
Leonor Watling grew up in Madrid, just as Spain itself was waking up after four decades of dictatorship. Her father was a Spanish academic, her mother an Englishwoman raised in Africa. From the start, Leonor inhabited multiple worlds--speaking different languages, moving between cultures--yet never quite belonging fully to any one of them. She grew up with an unusual awareness of mortality. Her father was ill throughout her childhood. She lost two aunts in a car accident when she ...
Continue ReadingThe Magic of Stella Cole
by Leo Sidran
Stella Cole didn't set out to become the face of a jazz revival. Growing up in Springfield, Illinois, she fell in love with The Wizard of Oz and movie musicals. By the time she reached college at Northwestern, she nearly abandoned singing altogether--discouraged by a culture that told her the “old" songs weren't marketable. Then the pandemic hit. Locked down at home, she turned back to the comfort movies and music of her childhood, and began posting short ...
Continue ReadingBen Sidran at 82: Still auditioning for the role of myself
by Leo Sidran
Every year on his birthday, my dad Ben Sidran and I sit down for a conversation. It started when he turned 76, and we've done it ever since--capturing an ongoing record of where his head and heart are at that particular moment. Over the years we've talked about music, memory, politics, travel, the craft of performing, and the art of living. These annual conversations have become a kind of time-lapse portrait: the same two people returning to the ...
Continue ReadingTeach A Man To Phish
by Leo Sidran
I won't bury the lede. Last week I saw Phish in concert at Forest Hills Stadium on two consecutive nights. It was a long time coming for me. Loyal listeners of my The Third Story podcast have noticed a quiet apprehension about the Phish phenomenon--or more broadly, the jam band scene--threaded through past conversations. Some friends of the podcast have even sent me playlists and videos to gently nudge me toward listening to Phish. Conversations with Billy Martin ...
Continue ReadingMoses Patrou on songwriting, survival, and his new album Confession of a Fool
by Leo Sidran
New York-based multi-instrumentalist Moses Patrou has quietly carved out a singular career over the last two decades--as a drummer, percussionist, singer, songwriter, organist, and sideman to many (including Amy Helm, Ben Sidran and Will Bernard). With the release of his new album Confession of a Fool, Patrou steps into the spotlight with what feels like a definitive personal statement--one shaped as much by life experience as by musical instinct. While his 2007 debut, Introducing Moses Patrou (which I ...
Continue ReadingJoe Henry's Code of the Road
by Leo Sidran
For Joe Henry, truth in songwriting doesn't come from confession or fact. It comes from presence, from listening, from surrender, from giving shape to the ineffable. As he puts it: “Total presence--that is the code of my road." Henry's road has taken him across both the literal and metaphorical map of American music. Born in North Carolina, raised in Georgia and Ohio, and coming of age in Michigan, he grew up suspended between North and South, white and ...
Continue ReadingSing like nobody's streaming: Aron's Vintage Pop
by Leo Sidran
Aron! born Aron Stornaiuolo, grew up in North Carolina. He began his musical life playing guitar, eventually discovering jazz and the American songbook through an 80 year old teacher he met at a music store. He studied classical guitar at the North Carolina School of the Arts and went on to major in jazz guitar and film scoring at the University of Miami. Along the way, he played indie rock, fell in love with Nat King Cole, and even performed ...
Continue ReadingTerri Lyne Carrington: Only An Open Hand Receives
by Leo Sidran
Terri Lyne Carrington started playing drums as a child in Boston. By the time she was 10, she was gigging with Clark Terry. At 11, she had a drum endorsement.By 20, she was already building a remarkable career. And by 30, she had worked with Herbie Hancock and Wayne Shorter--two of the most visionary artists of their generation.Today she is a Grammy Award-winning drummer, composer, producer, educator, and activist whose trailblazing career spans over four decades. ...
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