Jazz Articles about Bennie Maupin

About Bennie Maupin

The Vinyl Post

When trumpeter Woody Shaw passed away in 1989, he left behind a wealth of amazing music, notwithstanding the realized sadness inherent in wondering what more he could have accomplished had he lived a longer life. Back in the mid '60s, Shaw was ubiquitous as a sideman recording iconic albums with the likes of Larry Young, Horace Silver, Chick Corea, Art Blakey, and McCoy Tyner. Despite common misconceptions, Shaw led his first date as a leader in December of 1965, which ...

Album Review

Jack DeJohnette: Sorcery

by Rob Garratt
September 18, 2023

Which Jack DeJohnette is best known? The subtle sticksmith at the heart of Keith Jarrett's Standards Trio, perhaps? Probably the heavyweight hitter driving electric-era Miles Davis' '70s sonic brew. Maybe the percussive upstart propelling Charles Lloyd to crossover flower-power fame? Or even the fearless bandleader behind the ever-thrilling Special Edition band ... At age 81, DeJohnette can (still) fairly claim to be the most in-demand jazz drummer on the planet. But even the most studious acolyte ...

Album Review

Jack DeJohnette: Sorcery

by Scott Gudell
August 7, 2023

Jack DeJohnette gets around. The Chicago born drummer was drawn to R&B and bebop in the late 1950s and eventually toyed with a more avant-garde jazz sound when he spent some time with the esoteric Sun Ra. It seems like DeJohnette played in the big leagues almost from the beginning since, by the time he moved to New York City in the mid-1960s, he was teaming up with other monsters of jazz such as Keith Jarrett and Charles Lloyd. Several ...

Radio & Podcasts

A Tribute to Someone

by Patrick Burnette
November 24, 2022

Sometimes “tribute" can be a dirty word in jazz—a sign a project's only justification is a well-known name—a warning that reverence may have trumped inspiration on a record. But it doesn't have to be that way. This episode, the Bastards look at four 2022 releases that each celebrate a towering figure from jazz's past without getting tangled up in its shadow. With dedicatees as varied as Johnny Hodges, Charles Mingus, Yusef Lateef, and Wes Montgomery, things never get in a ...

Album Review

Various Artists: John Sinclair Presents Detroit Artists Workshop

Read "John Sinclair Presents Detroit Artists Workshop" reviewed by Chris May

by Chris May
November 3, 2022

Valuable as both a curated chronicle of jazz history and as high-grade music, John Sinclair Presents Detroit Artists Workshop: Community, Jazz And Art In The Motor City 1965—1981 comprises around 70 minutes of live recordings by some of Detroit's finest sons along with an informative 24-page booklet. Among the musicians are trumpeters Donald Byrd and Charles Moore, reeds player Bennie Maupin and, resident in the city in the mid 1960s, pianist Stanley Cowell. The backstory: The Artists ...

Album Review

Bennie Maupin & Adam Rudolph: Symphonic Tone Poem For Brother Yusef

Read "Symphonic Tone Poem For Brother Yusef" reviewed by Chris May

by Chris May
May 31, 2022

Had the multi-reed player Yusef Lateef still been alive in 2020, he would have been celebrating his 100th birthday. Sadly, Lateef passed seven years earlier. But 93 years is a good span for a jazz musician, especially one of Lateef's generation, who came of age in time to cut his professional teeth in swing bands. Lateef went on contribute to bop--he was a member of Dizzy Gillespie's band in 1949--and then to hard bop. In the mid 1950s, ...

Album Review

Lee Morgan: The Complete Live at the Lighthouse

Read "The Complete Live at the Lighthouse" reviewed by Mike Jurkovic

by Mike Jurkovic
July 26, 2021

Suffice to say that if Blue Note's original Live at The Lighthouse (1970) lit a fire under you and all the subsequent expanded iterations did nothing to douse said flames, this definitive final word on a very good thing is going to grab your attention fast and hold it hard. Fourteen previously unreleased whirlwind turns around the bandstand complete the picture painted that July weekend in California when trumpeter supreme Lee Morgan and his pirate quintet—Bennie Maupin on ...