Jazz Articles about Francesca Tanksley

Mark Masters Ensemble: Dance, Eternal Spirits, Dance!

by Jack Bowers
May 24, 2025

In 2023-24, the celebrated arranger Mark Masters led his superb southern California-based ensemble into studios to record a pair of tribute albums. The first, Sam Rivers 100, was dedicated to the music of the late saxophonist on the one hundredth anniversary of his birth; the second, Dance, Eternal Spirits, Dance!, to that of another renowned saxophonist, Billy Harper, who is not only very much alive at age eighty-two but serves as guest soloist on both recordings. Unlike ...

Francesca Tanksley: Journey

by Terrell Kent Holmes
June 25, 2003

After years of playing as an acclaimed side musician and serving as a mainstay in the Billy Harper Quintet, pianist Francesca Tanksley has finally made her debut with Journey. Joining her on this trio set are her fellow rhythm section players from Harper's quintet, bassist Clarence Seay and drummer Newman Taylor Baker. All of the songs on Journey are her originals, composed over a 12-year period. The opening tune, "Into the Light," is a bright, mid-to-up-tempo tune ...

Francesca Tanksley: Journey

by AAJ Staff
May 18, 2003

Resemblances can sometimes cloak reality. It took me a while to get over the fact that Francesca Tanksley looks like my childhood piano teacher. (That sort of musical Freudianism can be hard, you have to understand.) It also took me a while to get over the way her music downright drips with the raw essence of McCoy Tyner. While there may not be much of a formal connection, Tyner lives in her block chords, her steaming delivery, and the way ...

Francesca Tanksley: Journey

by Tom Pierce
November 1, 2002

Pianist Francesca Tanksley has long captured the respect of musicians and audiences not only in the United States, but also worldwide, as an integral member for many years of the dynamic quintet of saxophonist Billy Harper.

Her career has expanded to include more of her own trio work, with stirring live appearances as well as this CD debut as a leader, Journey (Dreamcaller 7168). It features her arresting original compositions, accompanied by superb bassist Clarence Seay and propulsive ...