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Marian McPartland & Friends: 85 Candles - Live in New York
by Ken Franckling
Pianist Marian McPartland has made a boatload of friends during her many years in jazz. Many of them turned out for her 85th birthday soirée at New York's Birdland club two years ago. That's right, the grand dame of jazz is now 87! Fortunately for jazz history buffs and McPartland fans alike, a large number of them took active roles in the four-hour midtown bash as performers. Some took the stage with Dame Marian to mix it up musically, while ...
read moreMarian McPartland & Friends: 85 Candles: Live in New York
by Jim Santella
On the day after Marian McPartland turned 85, this large group of her jazz friends got together at Birdland in New York to celebrate with her. She played piano with them in an endearing program of love songs that belie their affection for each other. Everybody loves Marian McPartland and respects her for her many accomplishments.
Concord's 2-CD set captures this event in detail. It has aired on NPR several times. McPartland enjoyed the get-together. Of the evening's ...
read moreMarian McPartland and Lionel Hampton: Marian McPartland's Piano Jazz with Lionel Hampton
by Aaron Rogers
For over twenty years, jazz pianist Marian McPartland has hosted NPR's Piano Jazz, a radio broadcast that showcases some of the most important artists in jazz history. Piano Jazz not only presents McPartland's piano playing along with the music of jazz greats like Bill Evans and Dizzy Gillespie, but it also provides a forum for her to engage in informative and delightful conversation with guest artists about their lives in the colorful world of jazz.
On Marian McPartland's Piano Jazz ...
read moreMarian McPartland: Windows
by Steven Robinson
Windows is a combined CD reissue of two out-of-print albums recorded by pianist Marian McPartland in 1979. Disc one, originally released as Portrait of Marian McPartland, is a studio trio recording with Brian Torff (bass) and Jake Hanna (drums) with the addition of the immensely talented Jerry Dodgion. It’s simply a great set. The trio plays an appealing mix of standards and originals with warmth, style and intimacy. Dodgion’s flute solo on the McPartland original “Time and Time Again” is ...
read moreMarian McPartland: Piano Jazz with Mary Lou Williams
by Terrell Kent Holmes
Pianist and world treasure Marian McPartland, who received a NARAS Trustees Award at this year’s Grammy Awards, has hosted her radio show Piano Jazz for about a quarter century. The Jazz Alliance label has captured a few of these jewels on CD, including the wonderful premiere featuring the very underappreciated pianist, arranger and composer Mary Lou Williams (1910-1981). From the moment McPartland gushes “Mary Lou!” the listener is in for a special treat: two jazz legends and good friends, performing ...
read moreMarian McPartland in Huntsville, Alabama, February 27, 2004
by Ken Dryden
Still going strong at 85, Marian McPartland hardly coasts her way through a concert, playing a predictable set. She does have her favorite quips, quoting Lawrence Welk’s insistence on introducing Billy Strayhorn’s best known composition as Take a Train," or dedicating Chick Corea’s Windows" to Microsoft founder Bill Gates, but her performances always contain (as Whitney Balliett describes memorable jazz) the sound of surprise."
Two favorite collaborators from Chicago, bassist Jim Cox and drummer Charles Braugham, accompanied her ...
read moreMarian McPartland: Windows
by John Kelman
While the time has hopefully passed where a person’s gender should have any impact on the recognition they receive for their art, still it should be noted that pianist Marian McPartland, now entering her eighty-sixth year, has been both a musical trend-setter and role model for more than one generation of aspiring female jazz instrumentalists.
In a time where a woman’s association with jazz was, at best, relegated to the role of vocalist, McPartland not only emerged ...
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