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Terry Waldo & the Gotham City Band: Treasury, Volume 2

by Jack Bowers
Like any other handiwork you can name, contemporary jazz did not emerge from a vacuum. It sprang forth from a variety of sources, including but not limited to bebop, cool jazz, swing, trad jazz (Dixieland), blues, stride and perhaps the granddaddy of them all, ragtime. Yes, ragtime. Before there was King Oliver or Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington or Woody Herman, Charlie Parker or Dizzy Gillespie, Oscar Peterson or John Coltrane, there was ragtime. And for those who surmise that ragtime ...
Continue ReadingMolly Ryan: Sweepin' the Blues Away

by Jack Bowers
New York City-based vocalist Molly Ryan makes an auspicious impression from the outset on her latest album, leading her splendid back-up quartet through the charming song, Get Yourself a New Broom (and Sweep the Blues Away)" a light-hearted but little- known treasure written in 1938 by Ted Koehler & Harold Arlen. Ryan seems to specialize in unearthing such overlooked gems, presenting several other prototypes in an anthology that spans the years 1909 to 1941. Even to someone ...
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