Jazz Articles about Earl May

Earl May at the Smithsonian's Jazz Cafe

by Erik R. Quick
November 9, 2007

Earl May Jazz Café, Smithsonian Institute Washington, D.C. October 19, 2007

The Smithsonian Institution hates jazz; at least, their actions may so intimate. For the past few years, Randall Kremer, the intrepid Director of Public Affairs at the National Museum of Natural History and an amateur jazz guitarist, has been booking phenomenal musicians every Friday evening at the museum's Jazz Café. Indeed, the venue has been a most welcome and needed addition to the ...

Earl May Quartet: Swinging the Blues

by Mike Neely
August 31, 2007

He may not have recorded much as a leader, but there are few jazz greats over the past forty years or so that haven't played or recorded with bassist Earl May, including Dizzy Gillespie and Miles Davis. His duet recordings with John Coltrane are unusual in the great saxophonists discography; his recordings with Sonny Stitt and Billy Taylor are also widely appreciated. May has always been lauded for his full, bluesy sound and subtle accompaniment, and these characteristics are fully ...

The Earl May Quartet: Swinging The Blues

by Michael P. Gladstone
April 20, 2006

Over the course of the last half-century, Earl May has been one of the busiest bass players in the New York Area. He spent just about the entire decade of the 1950s with the long-running Billy Taylor Trio. Dr. Taylor arranged for a reunion recording of the original trio (with Percy Brice on drums), which was recorded for Prestige in 2003 as Billy Taylor Trio with Earl May/Percy Brice.

On this latest effort, May shows his ability to ...