Jazz Articles about Charles Earland

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Charles Earland: Blowing the Blues Away

by Jack Bowers
October 1, 1998

In spite of its tasteless and repulsive jacket illustration, this is my kind of Jazz! — thoroughly energetic, grandly inventive and swinging from start to finish. Also, one of the finest outings to date by young tenor lion Eric Alexander, which is saying a lot, as I admire almost every note he’s played since he started recording on the heels of a second–place finish (behind Josh Redman) in the 1991 Thelonious Monk competition. Alexander is superb throughout this dynamic and ...

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Charles Earland: Jazz Organ Summit

by Joel Roberts
April 1, 1998

One night last spring in Chicago, four masters of the Hammond B-3 organ - Charles Earland, Lonnie Smith, Johnny “Hammond" Smith, and Jimmy McGriff - got together for a one-time-only showcase. The results are captured here on a must-buy album for jazz organ fans.

Each performer is featured in a brief solo segment, before all four join together for a funky, jam-session finale. Earland lives up to his nickname ("The Burner") with a sizzling version of the pop hit “I ...

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Charles Earland: Living Black

by AAJ Staff
July 1, 1997

Occasionally, an improviser will manage to come up with something that has as much commercial appeal as it does artistic integrity. Charles Earland accomplished this in 1969, when his jazz interpretation of The Spiral Staircase's blue-eyed pop/soul hit “More Today Than Yesterday" became a hit among R&B audiences. For all its accessibility, the Philadelphia organist's soul-jazz was faithful to jazz's spirit of improvisation and its sense of spontaneity.

Out of print for more than a few years, ...