Jazz Articles

Our daily articles are carefully curated by the All About Jazz staff. You can find more articles by searching our website, see what's trending on our popular articles page or read articles ahead of their published dates on our Coming Soon page. Read our daily album reviews.

274

Album Review

The Hank Levy Alumni Band: An 'Odd-Time' Was Had by All

Read "An 'Odd-Time' Was Had by All" reviewed by Jack Bowers

by Jack Bowers
March 31, 2005

As a rule, a big-band album's song titles are followed by the name(s) of composer and arranger, playing time, and perhaps the names of the various soloists, if there are any. It's rare that one sees time signatures as well, but the late Hank Levy wasn't your garden variety, four-beats-to-the-measure writer. To Levy, who wrote for such musical pacesetters as Stan Kenton and Don Ellis, time was an elastic ingredient, to be expanded, compressed and otherwise adapted to suit the ...

307

Album Review

The Hank Levy Alumni Band: Hank at Home

by Jack Bowers
April 12, 2002

Disproving the poet T.S. Eliot’s sardonic observation, composer / arranger / educator Hank Levy’s life ended not with a whimper but a bang, thanks to a group of his former students who decided to hand their mentor the reins for one last exhilarating buggy ride. The album’s title means exactly what it says — Hank at Home was recorded at Oak Crest Village in Baltimore, MD, where Levy resided until his passing last September at age 73, barely six months ...