Jazz Articles about Billy Higgins

Charles Lloyd/Billy Higgins: Which Way Is East

by David Adler
July 2, 2004

“We got to keep workin’ on this music.” Four months before his death, drum shaman Billy Higgins spoke those words to Charles Lloyd. The two were in the midst of some of their final conversations, both verbal and musical. Higgins had been in and out of hospitals, battling liver failure, and he and Lloyd knew their time together was short. So they hunkered down in Montecito, California in January of 2001 to play. The resulting two-disc package, Which Way Is ...

Charles Lloyd/Billy Higgins: Which Way Is East

by Mark Corroto
June 6, 2004

Name your religion. Seriously, these days everyone from President “Dubya" to freedom fighters is wearing his or her religion on their sleeves. Why not jazz musicians?

And jazz musicians seem to “get it." The spiritual part, that is. From Coltrane to James Moody and Dizzy Gillespie—it’s all about the love supreme, if I can steal a title.

For drummer Billy Higgins and his long-time friend Charles Lloyd the big picture hovers close to this two-disc, ...

Charles Lloyd/Billy Higgins: Which Way Is East

by Mark F. Turner
April 12, 2004

Which Way Is East documents a simply magical recording between two lifelong musicians and friends: saxophonist Charles Lloyd and drummer Billy Higgins. The recording is significant for a number of reasons. Besides the musical affinity the two musicians shared, a spiritual bond also permeated their music. Having collaborated many years on numerous projects their recent efforts on ECM with Voice In The Night, The Water is Wide, and Hyperion With Higgins, the newly released Which Way Is East would be ...

Charles Lloyd/Billy Higgins: Which Way Is East

by John Kelman
April 10, 2004

There has always been an inherent spiritual element in Charles Lloyd's work, but nowhere as overt as on Which Way is East , a series of duets recorded with drummer and, as it turns out, multi-instrumentalist Billy Higgins, who passed away only four months after these sessions were recorded. In the liner notes Higgins is quoted as saying, “Everybody got to go sometime. But it's a drag if I have to come back and do this all over again. I ...

Cedar Walton: Three Sundays In The Seventies

by AAJ Staff
December 1, 2000

Label M launched its new enterprise with a stunning live and previously unreleased concert by Stan Getz at the Famous Ballroom in Baltimore. With more than 200 tapes recorded by Baltimore's Left Bank Jazz Society legally in its possession, the label continues to remaster and enhance the tapes from a home recorder that captured the spirit of the concerts. In some respects, the Society recorded during what has become a golden age for some of the greatest musicians in jazz.

Lee Morgan: Taru

by Jim Santella
March 1, 2000

Just look at that rhythm section. One of the best in the business. The personnel on Lee Morgan’s 1980 album make this one valuable right from its opening bars. George Benson only appears on three tracks, but Morgan’s regular sidekick Bennie Maupin was in his prime. As was Morgan and the rhythm section. John Hicks, Reggie Workman and Billy Higgins each offer a unique sound while fitting Lee Morgan’s upbeat mold. Recorded February 15, 1968 but released in 1980, the ...

Charles Lloyd: Voice in the Night

by Larry Koenigsberg
May 1, 1999

Although Voice in the Night marks Charles Lloyd's return after over three decades to recording with guitar rather than piano as the chordal instrument, the most notable feature of his new CD is his return to form, as opposed to merely a return to format. He sounds the best he has since he left his Big Sur retreat to perform and record for ECM with Michel Petrucciani and Bobo Stenson. Indeed, the whole band sounds on, in this sequence of ...