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Fire Music: When Jazz Speaks Out - Part 3
by Ludovico Granvassu
As Martin Luther King put it in the opening address to the 1964 Berlin Jazz Festival, “Jazz speaks for life. The Blues tell the story of life's difficulties, and if you think for a moment, you will realize that they take the hardest realities of life and put them into music, only to come out with some new hope or sense of triumph. This is triumphant music. Modern jazz has continued in this tradition, singing the songs of a more ...
Continue ReadingCelebrate songwriters Abbey Lincoln and Bernice Petkere
by Mary Foster Conklin
Many special birthdays in this episode of A Broad Spectrum as we honor the great Abbey Lincoln and remember Bernice Petkere, named the “Queen of Tin Pan Alley" by Irving Berlin for her songs “Close Your Eyes" and “"Lullaby of the Leaves." Playlist Linda Dachtyl “A Late One" from A Late One (Chicken Coop Records) 00:00 Pucci Amand Jhones “Key Largo" from Love, Jhones (Candace Jazz) 04:20 Benny Carter “Blue Moonlight" from Benny Carter Songbook, Vol. 2 ...
Continue ReadingAbbey Lincoln: African Queen in a Top Hat
by Joan Gannij
(This interview was conducted in 2002) Abbey Lincoln made a stop in Amsterdam in 1998 for a rare appearance at the 110-year old Concertgebouw, where Sonny Rollins likes to play when he comes to town. The sellout crowd was composed mainly of seemingly staid yet perennially hip “pensionados" (as the Dutch like to refer to their restless retirees) but by the end of the final encore, the historic hall had reached a collective groove and the ghosts ...
Continue ReadingMax Roach: We Insist! Freedom Now Suite
by Chris May
Re-released following the passing of drummer Max Roach in August 2007, We Insist! Freedom Now Suite (Candid, 1960) remains a work of enduring musical and social importance. Notwithstanding Roach's central role in the creation of bop, or his later hard bop explorations with trumpeter Clifford Brown, it is, by some margin, the most perfectly realised album he recorded. 1960 was the year in which black Americans' struggle for civil rights reached critical mass. In February, anti-segregationist lunch-counter sit-ins ...
Continue ReadingAbbey Lincoln: Abbey Sings Abbey
by Suzanne Lorge
At almost 77 years of age Abbey Lincoln has been composing, writing and/or performing for almost sixty years, and Abbey Sings Abbey is a stunning collection of some of the singer's most memorable works. Lincoln is a writer of some depth and the eleven original tunes on this CD offer strong testament to her poetic talents. The lyrics of each song impart a serious message, it's true, but her matter-of-fact acceptance of life's crummier bits leaves one feeling ...
Continue ReadingAbbey Lincoln: Abbey Is Blue
by David Rickert
In 1959 Abbey Lincoln was poised to make a truly great album, and Abbey Is Blue was it. Not only was it a breakout performance for Lincoln, who delivered on the promise she had already shown, it was also a breakthrough performance in jazz singing.
With the civil rights movement looming over the horizon, no longer did singers need to stick with standards and Tin Pan Alley tunes and could truly sing about subjects that mattered to them. ...
Continue ReadingAbbey Lincoln: Spirited and Spiritual
by R.J. DeLuke
Music serves many purposes for people on this planet. It's fun. It can be an escape. It can be soothing and even nostalgic. But for some it carries a deeper meaning, a deeper purpose. In this realm lies the art of Abbey Lincoln. At age 73, she is one of the last of the great jazz singers of her generation. Lest anyone get the wrong idea, now is not the time for considering her epitaph. This artist is still thinking, ...
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