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About Brenda Earle Stokes
Instrument: Piano and vocals
Brenda Earle Stokes: On Music, Motherhood, and Being Here For Everything
by Andrea Wolper
This past May, New York-based pianist, singer, composer, and teacher-entrepreneur Brenda Earle Stokes released her fifth album, Motherhood, reviewed on All About Jazz as “an honest and open-hearted look at the scope of selflessness and self-discovery involved with maternal matters." A fully-realized thematic album, Motherhood's ten songs take us through the intricate emotional and experiential landscape of becoming, and then being, a mother and working musician. Recorded in New York City in October, 2023, the album features Stokes ...
Continue ReadingBrenda Earle Stokes: Motherhood
by Dan Bilawsky
Motherhood is a salient subject if ever there was one. Yet few jazz musicians ever touch on it in their work, never mind dedicating an entire record to the topic. The real or keenly felt need to keep up with the Joneses in a musical atmosphere that typically applauds and promotes standard bearers, hyper-masculine happenings, politically charged firebrands, and cutting-edge quests doesn't leave much room for an honest and open-hearted look at the scope of selflessness and self-discovery involved with ...
Continue ReadingShawn Maxwell: Expectation & Experience
by Jack Bowers
On Expectation & Experience, his tenth recording as a leader, Chicago-based woodwind specialist Shawn Maxwell is accompanied by almost thirty musicians—but never by more than three on any of its seventeen tracks. Maxwell says the compositions were written during the global Covid-19 pandemic, and the musicians were mustered singly, most in their own homes. While each of the compositions has a “theme," none is readily apparent from its performance, and listeners should feel free to overlook that aspect and focus ...
Continue ReadingBrenda Earle Stokes: Solo Sessions Volume 1
by C. Michael Bailey
Canadian Brenda Earle Stokes is, at once, a pianist, vocalist, composer, and educator, not to mention a wife and mother. From this crowded life, she has managed five recordings to her credit, including the well-received Song for a New Day (Self Produced, 2009) and Right About Now (Magenta Label Group, 2014), and the present, Solo Sessions, Volume 1. Solo Sessions puts Stokes in her most intimate format, one that she mentions is a bit daunting. That is something to consider. ...
Continue ReadingBrenda Earle Stokes: Right About Now
by Dan Bilawsky
Is Brenda Earle Stokes primarily a vocalist, a composer, or a pianist? That's an unanswerable question if ever there was one. The marketplace typically forces artists to list their chief credential first, making it easier to categorize and pigeonhole them, but that's a problem for Stokes; she's equally talented in all three areas, as demonstrated throughout Right About Now. This album marks Stokes' return to recording after a five year hiatus. During that time, her life, outlook, ...
Continue ReadingBrenda Earle: Songs For A New Day
by Marcia Hillman
Brenda Earle has a well-trained, sweet-sounding, pure voice and piano and songwriting skills that are displayed ably in this, her fifth album. The New York-based Canadian native is abetted by Ike Sturm (bass), Jackie Lewis (guitars) and Jared Schonig (drums), as well as guest appearances of one track each by saxophonist Joel Frahm and cellist Lauren Riley-Rigby. The material is an array of standards, original compositions and covers of songs by Top 40 artists ranging from Crowded House ...
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