Jazz Articles about Max Roach

About Max Roach

Radio & Podcasts

Random Acts of Roach 2, Charlie Haden, Basie!

by David Brown
January 31, 2024

This week we continue with our Random Acts of Roach in celebration of the centennial of the birth of the legendary Max Roach; we'll also visit two piano trio sets anchored by bassist Charlie Haden, three bits of Basie, and a set of Dizzy Gillespie & Lalo Schifrin works. New and recent releases and gems from past will round out the show. Old, new, in, out... wherever the music takes us. Each week, we will explore the elements of jazz ...

Radio & Podcasts

Random Acts of Roach, Knoel Scott, Jimmy Rowles

by David Brown
January 16, 2024

This week, we'll kick off our celebration of the Max Roach Centennial with a weekly set titled Random Acts of Max Roach; the show will also include a pair of tunes featuring saxophonist Knoel Scott of the Sun Ra Arkestra, jazz interpretations of Neil Young songs, and a set showcasing pianist Jimmy Rowles. Welcome friends and neighbors to The Jazz Continuum. Old, new, in, out... wherever the music takes us. Each week, we will explore the elements of jazz from ...

Album Review

Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Bud Powell, Charles Mingus, Max Roach: Hot House: The Complete Jazz at Massey Hall Recordings

Read "Hot House: The Complete Jazz at Massey Hall Recordings" reviewed by Richard J Salvucci

by Richard J Salvucci
December 28, 2023

This is the stuff of legend, one for the ages. It all started here; the greatest jazz concert of all time. How many times has the Massey Hall Concert (Toronto, 1953) been described that way? For the average All About Jazz reader, Massey Hall happened before he or she was born. Besides, there were other famous jazz concerts such as The Carnival of Swing (Randall's Island, NY, 1938), Benny Goodman's 1938 Carnegie Hall Concert (that remained unreleased until 1958), Gene ...

Film Review

Salvation through rhythm: Max Roach—The Drum Also Waltzes

by Peter Jones
October 19, 2023

Max Roach--The Drum Also Waltzes Directed by Sam Pollard and Ben Shapiro PBS American Masters2023 Anyone who enjoyed the recent Wayne Shorter documentary Zero Gravity might also dig this--a more conventionally structured but equally fascinating look at the life of Max Roach. Filmmaker and interviewer Sam Pollard began making it in October 1987, then--for reasons which are not explained--left it alone for years before resuming again at some point after Roach's death in 2007.

Album Review

Thelonious Monk: Brilliant Corners

Read "Brilliant Corners" reviewed by Richard J Salvucci

by Richard J Salvucci
October 19, 2023

Writing about being “lost for words" is not the ideal way of starting a review, but it may be the plain truth. Perhaps Thelonious Monk is an acquired taste. Perhaps not. Whatever the case, this particular release of Brilliant Corners is just that--brilliant.The whole package is superb and really defines Craft Recordings “Small Batch" vinyl series. The technical literature accompanying the recording says “Each edition is cut from its original analog tapes by Bernie Grundman and pressed on ...

Album Review

Thelonious Monk: Celebrating 75 Years Of His First Recordings Revisited

Read "Celebrating 75 Years Of His First Recordings Revisited" reviewed by Chris May

by Chris May
October 26, 2022

Another stone resurrection from the Swiss-based ezz-thetics label, Celebrating 75 Years Of His First Recordings Revisited collects 23 of the tracks Thelonious Monk recorded for Blue Note between 1947 and 1952, remastered by ezzthetics' sonic jedi Michael Brändli at Hardstudios in Winterthur. Situated north of Zurich, Winterthur is Switzerland's equivalent of Silicon Valley and Hardstudios looks like something out of a sci-fi movie. The audio quality Brändli achieves there for ezz-thetics' has been raved about many times on these pages. ...

Album Review

Charlie Parker: Be Bop Live

Read "Be Bop Live" reviewed by Mark Corroto

by Mark Corroto
February 6, 2021

The name of the record label is ezz-thetics, which was also a composition by George Russell and an album of the same name (which featured Eric Dolphy) released by Riverside Records in 1961. Maybe a better moniker for the label is “Lest We Forget." Not that we could ever abandon Charlie Parker, but today when streaming services replace CDs and LPs, which also replaced 78s and live radio broadcasts (the streaming service of its day), Parker has the possibility of ...