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About Lonnie Liston Smith

Album Review

Lonnie Liston Smith: Jazz Is Dead 17

Read "Jazz Is Dead 17" reviewed by Richard J Salvucci

by Richard J Salvucci
November 14, 2023

If someone has not released a recording in twenty five years, it must be a special occasion. Lonnie Liston Smith went out west, met a Fender Rhodes piano and, voila, conjured up the '70s again. So, technology and memory presumably explain the appearance of this recording, part of the ironically named Jazz is Dead label's series, founded in 2017 by music producers Adrian Younge, Ali Shaheed Muhammad (A Tribe Called Quest), concert producer Andrew Lojero and industry veteran Adam Block. ...

Album Review

Lonnie Liston Smith: Jazz Is Dead 17

Read "Jazz Is Dead 17" reviewed by Chris May

by Chris May
May 10, 2023

Having kicked off 2023 with one of the strongest albums in its catalogue--Phil Ranelin and Wendell Harrison's Jazz Is Dead 16--Ali Shaheed Muhammad and Adrian Younge's label continues on a roll. Jazz Is Dead 17 finds the two producers in their funked-up comfort zone and relishing it. Strange but true, Jazz Is Dead 17 is Lonnie Liston Smith's first newly recorded album release since 1998. And while it does not rise to the heights of classics such ...

Album Review

Lonnie Liston Smith & The Cosmic Echoes: Expansions

by Chris May
June 17, 2020

If ever a first wave jazz-funk album deserved a 180gm vinyl reissue in 2020 it is this near masterpiece. It was originally released in 1975 on Flying Dutchman, the label Bob Thiele set up after he left Impulse!. Jazz-funk divided the jazz world in the 1970s as much as free-jazz had done a decade earlier. And with reason. Much of it was crap. Just like a lot of jazz-rock was crap. More or less desperate attempts by ...

In Pictures

Norfolk Waterfront Jazz Festival 2017

by Mark Robbins
August 9, 2017

They were the last act of the two night 35th Annual Norfolk Waterfront Jazz Festival held July 14 and 15 at Town Point Park. Because of inclement weather the festival had to be moved inside to the 46 year old Scope Arena. The star studded smooth jazz festival featured Russ Freeman with the Rippingtons, Najee, Pieces of a Dream, Euge Groove, Spyro Gyra and then the last act “The Superstars of Jazz Fusion"--Lonnie Liston Smith, Roy Ayers, Ronnie Laws and ...

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Reassessing

Lonnie Liston Smith: Astral Traveling

by Chris May
November 16, 2011

Lonnie Liston SmithAstral TravelingFlying Dutchman1973 For many jazz fans, pianist Lonnie Liston Smith irredeemably blotted his copy book decades ago. Right enough, for Smith's smooth jazz and quiet storm albums of the 1980s and 1990s were bland, blissed-out, insubstantial affairs. But between 1965, when he was featured on saxophonist (Rahsaan) Roland Kirk's Here Comes The Whistleman (Atlantic), and the early 1970s, when he was a member of trumpeter Miles Davis' electric ...

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Profile

Lonnie Liston Smith

by Terrell Kent Holmes
August 21, 2005

It's been suggested that if anyone bridged the gap between John Coltrane and Earth, Wind & Fire, it was keyboardist Lonnie Liston Smith. Born December 28th, 1940 in Richmond, Virg., he began his jazz career playing acoustic piano as a sideman with such luminaries as Pharoah Sanders, Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Betty Carter and Gato Barbieri. A stint with Miles Davis in the early '70s influenced Smith to switch from acoustic to fusion, a career change that has since defined him. ...

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Album Review

Lonnie Liston Smith: Explorations: The Columbia Recordings

Read "Explorations: The Columbia Recordings" reviewed by Jim Santella

by Jim Santella
June 1, 2002

Reissued from four albums, Columbia's 2-CD set reveals all the energy and large-scale production effort that was placed into Lonnie Liston Smith's work from 1978-80. Two that had not before been released on CD, Love Is The Answer and A Song For The Children, as well as Exotic Mysteries and Loveland, reflect the funk attitude that scored big time in the '70s and rivaled disco as the popular beat of the decade. Smith is a lyrical pianist who surrounds himself ...