Articles by Todd R. Brown
New Birth For New Orleans Brass Bands
by Todd R. Brown
You could hear it almost every night of the week: the call of a trumpet piercing the air, saying, “Here is where the party's at! The booming bass drum pounding out a hip hop rhythm, and the sizzling snare building on that beat with choppy, Latin-style syncopation. The trombone crying out with baritone joy, the sousaphone pumping out a bass line and the saxophone winding its cool way through the whole sonic celebration.The musicians would play in clubs such ...
read moreNed Goold Trio: The Flows
by Todd R. Brown
Charles “Ned" Goold is as distinctive an inside-outside tenor player as there is, and he should be a household name given the luck he's had with employment. Besides fronting his own trio on several CDs, he has been a mainstay of Harry Connick Jr.'s bands since the early '90s. Goold's unique tone combines something of the cool, sharp delivery of Sonny Rollins and Archie Shepp with the breathy insistence of Ben Webster and subtle phraseology of Gerry Mulligan.
That sound ...
read more'Let My Children Hear Music': Jazz Lives, and Young People Can Hear it at Chicago's Jazz Showcase
by Todd R. Brown
“Our mission is to save the kids,” said Marshall Vente, 50, a pianist, composer and arranger. That’s the goal the Jazz Showcase, which hosted Vente’s jazz festival in January, had in mind for its Sunday matinees, with free admission for children 12 and under.And part of that mission, Vente said, is to make sure jazz is presented as a living music.The concluding concert of the ninth annual Marshall Vente Jazz Festival, held in January at the River North ...
read moreElevate Me: Michael Blake's New York World-Jazz
by Todd R. Brown
Imagine Duke Ellington's orchestra swinging by camelback caravan through the marketplace of Tangier, Morocco, or Miles Davis and crew funky-tonkin' up the Mekong River in Southeast Asia, and you'll get an idea of what saxophonist and composer Michael Blake's approach to jazz is. Blake, who plays this year's JVC Jazz Festiva in New York on June 24 with Ben Allison & Medicine Wheel, takes the tenors of Ben Webster and Lester Young as pivot points, particularly in the ...
read moreNorah Jones at Ravinia - July 8, 2003
by Todd R. Brown
“Thanks for waiting in the rain, sticking it out – you guys rock !” Norah Jones said to a capacity crowd at the 2003 Ravinia Festival, before launching into her swaggering rendition of Hank Williams’ “Cold, Cold Heart.” All day thunderstorms had drenched the grounds of the suburban-Chicago locale that hosts an annual summer music-showcase, but the lawn still was covered with picnic blankets and folding chairs for what emcee and WXRT disc-jockey Lynn Bremer said was the fastest-selling concert ...
read moreArif Mardin: In Conversation
by Todd R. Brown
Arif Mardin is a mover and shaker in the music business, but at age 10, he was the one being shook. “My father was manager of a Turkish bank in Alexandria, Egypt," Mardin said. “In 1942 we were there; Germans would bomb the city. We would go down to the shelter, and at one point, famous [Field] Marshal Rommel's army was a few miles away--the famous Battles of El Alamein. I remember those vividly."
Mardin survived and went ...
read moreFred Anderson Finally Gets His Due: And His Records Back In Print
by Todd R. Brown
Next door to the Velvet Lounge in Chicago's Near South Side neighborhood is Fitzee's Bar-B-Que, a chicken joint whose counter sports a bullet-proof window separating the kitchen and dining room. Across the street is a recently constructed LaSalle Bank branch, complete with ritzy landscaping. Walking down the street on a recent Saturday night, you might not even notice that the club, which in 2002 celebrates its 20th anniversary, is open.
But inside the Velvet, about 70 patrons pay ...
read moreKermit Ruffins: 1533 St. Philip Street
by Todd R. Brown
An essential ingredient for a great barbecue is to have your coals white-hot before you throw the meat on the grill. Veteran New Orleans trumpeter, singer and bandleader Kermit Ruffins is nothing if not a Barbecue Swinger, and for his latest album, 1533 St. Philip Street , the musicians he’s recruited are ready to burn through every track, from classic blues to vintage bebop to freshly penned second line stomps.
Ruffins’ record is named after the address of his new ...
read moreVarious Artists: Swing This, Baby! III
by Todd R. Brown
Throughout the 20th Century, jazz musicians and fans have maintained that “swing is the thing,” but it takes more than matching zoot suits to make a tune really cook.
And while it’s admirable that a new generation of revved-up fans are reviving America’s pop music of the 30s and 40s, the neo-swing scene is, unfortunately, devoted as much to superficial schtick (in terms of lyrical content as well as fashion) as it is to the hot music of the WWII ...
read moreVandermark 5: Free Jazz Classics - Live at the Empty Bottle
by Todd R. Brown
Tucked away inside 1,000 specially marked packages of the Vandermark 5's latest CD, Burn the Incline , lucky fans can find a bonus disc featuring a live set by the group performing “free jazz classics."The concert was recorded earlier this year at the Empty Bottle club, a cornerstone of Chicago's free jazz/fusion renaissance. Reedsman Ken Vandermark, the V5's leader, has single-handedly spearheaded the Windy City's renewed interest in improvised music.The songs on Free Jazz Classics are ...
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