Jazz Articles about Ray Smith

About Ray Smith

Album Review

Jack Wood: Movie Magic. Great Songs from the Movies

Read "Movie Magic. Great Songs from the Movies" reviewed by Richard J Salvucci

by Richard J Salvucci
July 23, 2025

Someone could be forgiven for thinking that everyone loves music from the movies. After all: Jule Styne; Leslie Bricusse; Johnny Mandel; Sammy Fain; Harry Warren; Richard Rodgers ; Henry Mancini; Johnny Mercer; Antonio Carlos Jobim; Michel Legrand; Bernice Petkere; and Isham Jones is hardly a list of minor talents, but all are represented on Movie Magic. Is it the music itself, the associated film or both that are compelling? Perhaps an emotional connection to a moment, a time, a person ...

Album Review

Mark Watkins: FOUR + Six

by Chris May
April 5, 2024

We had out of nowhere, we had straight outta Compton. Here comes straight out of Brigham Young University, Idaho, where saxophone quartet FOUR leader Mark Watkins has been director of jazz studies since 1999. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints may not the most abundant source of high-grade jazz--one assumes that Watkins is a member--but FOUR + Six proves it can be. Who would have thunk it? But jazz is a broad church and the album is proof ...