Jazz Articles about Kevin Mahogany

Another Time Another Place - Happy Birthday Pamela Baskin-Watson

by Mary Foster Conklin
August 10, 2020

The show begins with birthday greetings to pianist and composer Pamela Baskin-Watson and vocalist Kevin Mahogany, with new releases from drummer Jeff Hamilton, pianist Christian Sands, vocalists Paulette McWilliams, Brenda Nicole Moorer, Susie Meissner and flutist Ragan Whiteside, plus more birthday shoutouts to pianists Hank Jones, Josh Nelson, Shamie Royston and Diane Moser. Thanks for listening and please continue to support all of these fine musicians, buy their recordings in this time of lockdown. Playlist Bobby Watson “The ...

“Old” School

by H William Stine
February 28, 2019

Old hat; same old same old; you can't teach an old dog new tricks. I don't get it why people are so negative about the word, old. Some of our greatest songwriters have used that word in some of their best songs. And some of our youngest singers are giving new voice to these old songs. I say, this grievous mistake must be corrected (or am I just up to my old tricks, trying to fill two hours with music? ...

Kevin Mahogany: Kevin Mahogany Big Band

by Jack Bowers
March 14, 2005

Kevin Mahogany, the Kansas City cyclone, would sound terrific singing in the shower or standing on his head. The presence of a big band (actually four) on nine of the ten selections on his newest album is merely icing on the cake. No, this isn't actually “the Kevin Mahogany Big Band, but the four bands represented here will do quite nicely, thank you..

Mahogany is blessed with a voice that is instantly seductive--smooth as butter, sweet as honey and deep ...

Kevin Mahogany: Pride & Joy

by C. Michael Bailey
June 1, 2002

The Tamala-Motown songbook...

Kevin Mahogany is a bit of a quandary. A very fine jazz vocalist, Mahogany is not content just to recapitulate the standards. His current Pride & Joy and 2000's Pussy Cat Dues-- The Music of Charles Mingus are both tightly focused efforts intent on shining a light on little illuminated corners of jazz. Pride & Joy is a swinging tribute to Motown. Mahogany opens his tribute with a down-on-the-corner a cappella “Signed, Sealed, and Delivered." Marvin Gaye's ...

Kevin Mahogany: Pride & Joy

by Dave Nathan
May 19, 2002

Kevin Mahogany seems to have been focusing on very specific themes for his last three albums. My Romance dealt strictly with love songs and Pussy Cat Dues was dedicated to the music of Charles Mingus. Now for his first album for Telarc, the singer takes his rich baritone voice to the land of Motown's sophisticated R & B, honing in on a play list that recalls that style's heyday of the 1960's and 1970's, adding a jazz inflection to the ...

Kevin Mahogany: A Portrait of Kevin Mahogany

by Dave Nathan
January 1, 2001

On his 4th album for Warner Bros., Kevin Mahogany pulls all the genre stops and pays tribute to those by whom he clearly has been influenced. There's that funky R & B with Fats Domino's “I'm Walkin" with a raucous sax and Larry Golding's organ making the whole thing go. As much as any track, “I Love You More Than You Ever Know" reveals a Mahogany debt to Joe Williams where he and Golding's organ (again) merge to bring a ...

Kevin Mahogany: Pussy Cat Dues

by Dave Nathan
August 1, 2000

Not since the 1979 effort of Joni Mitchell has a top vocalist taken on the daunting task of recording the music of Charles Mingus. In 1995, Kevin Mahogany was invited by the Cologne-based Bill Dobbins-directed WDR big band (Westdeutscher Rundfunk) to participate in live concert of Mingus music. For this important musical event, Mahogany is joined by ex-Mingus compatriots, alto saxophonist Charles McPherson and trombonist Jimmy Knepper, as well as the big band. Although the concert took place in 1995, ...