Jazz Articles about Bennie Wallace

About Bennie Wallace

In Pictures

Bennie Wallace Quintet at The Jazz Loft

by Dan Bilawsky
July 9, 2026

Tempus Fugit (Time Flies). In May of 2026, Dr. Tom Manuel, the President and Founder of The Jazz Loft in Stony Brook, NY, celebrated that museum/performing arts venue's 10th anniversary. And in June, saxophonist Bennie Wallace, who'll turn 80 before year's end, dropped in with an all-star quintet featuring longtime collaborators--Anthony Wilson, pianist Donald Vega, bassist Peter Washington and drummer Herlin Riley. Together, those five (plus rising star vibraphonist Simon Moullier) appear on Wallace's French Postcard (BackCountry Jazz, 2026), essentially ...

Album Review

Bennie Wallace: French Postcard

Read "French Postcard" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan

by Dan McClenaghan
May 2, 2026

In 2001, saxophonist Bennie Wallace released a breakout album, Moodsville (Groove Note). It was Wallace in the quartet setting, with Mulgrew Miller on piano, Peter Washington on bass, and Lewis Nash on drums--an all-star cast. What was striking about the sound was its immediacy, its authenticity. It was a bunch of time-tested Great American Songbook tunes and jazz standards laid down with an insouciant grace and relaxed confidence. No bells and whistles, but rather an unpretentious trip into the tradition ...

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Album Review

Bennie Wallace: Disorder at the Border, The Music of Coleman Hawkins

Read "Disorder at the Border, The Music of Coleman Hawkins" reviewed by Laurel Gross

by Laurel Gross
January 12, 2008

Left New York's Jazz Standard last month barefoot because the band blew my socks (and even my boots) off. Baby it was cold outside, a December night threatening snow. But Bennie Wallace and the boys had played so hot I was warmed up inside and so immune to any chill. Wallace has been working on his tribute to Coleman Hawkins for some time and to celebrate the 2007 Justin Time CD release of Disorder at the Border: ...

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Interview

Bennie Wallace: Disorder at the Border

by Donald Elfman
January 2, 2008

Saxophonist Bennie Wallace, also known for his clarinet work, moved to New York in 1971 after graduating from the University of Tennessee, playing with Monty Alexander, Sheila Jordan and others before debuting as a leader in 1978. He has released numerous records for Enja and also had a pair of highly-regarded discs for Blue Note in the late 1980s. In the fall of 2007, he brought an ambitious project to New York City, celebrating the work of the legendary Coleman ...

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Album Review

Bennie Wallace: Disorder at the Border: The Music of Coleman Hawkins

Read "Disorder at the Border: The Music of Coleman Hawkins" reviewed by J Hunter

by J Hunter
May 29, 2007

Tenor saxophonist Coleman Hawkins' musical footprints stretch back to the 1920s, when he played with Louis Armstrong in Fletcher Henderson's orchestra. It's true that Hawkins was one of the forerunners of bebop, and went on to play and record with Thelonious Monk, Dizzy Gillespie, and John Coltrane. But Hawk's signature recording of the standard “Body and Soul dates back to 1939, when he was playing in Europe with legends like Benny Carter and Django Reinhardt. Hawkins is a star Bennie ...

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Album Review

Bennie Wallace: Disorder at the Border: The Music of Coleman Hawkins

Read "Disorder at the Border: The Music of Coleman Hawkins" reviewed by Robert R. Calder

by Robert R. Calder
May 22, 2007

This is a stomping band, as Coleman Hawkins said of the Fletcher Henderson orchestra he -- and the hitherto mostly awkward tenor saxophone -- grew up together with. Louis Armstrong and his hero the great cellist Pablo Casals inspired Hawkins' phrasing and timing, Art Tatum and J.S. Bach his harmonic command. His nickname “Bean" referred to high intelligence, he was an instrumental virtuoso with immense stamina and invention qua improviser, a passionate complex man never to be underrated.

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Album Review

Bennie Wallace: The Nearness of You

Read "The Nearness of You" reviewed by Rich Friedman

by Rich Friedman
February 6, 2004

In their quest to beef up a CD’s exposure, good-intentioned industry insiders can sometimes unintentionally steer an album down a dead-end path. On the cover of Bennie Wallace’s The Nearness of You, a voluptuous woman clings to his shoulder looking seductively at his sax. The liner notes feature another babe in a low-cut evening dress resting on a piano with a sax. Viagra-infused lounge lizards trying to impress their first dates with their impeccable taste in mood music—and Park Avenue ...