Jazz Articles about Sheila Jordan

Sheila Jordan & Steve Kuhn Trio at Birdland

by Tyran Grillo
May 29, 2015

Sheila Jordan & Steve Kuhn Trio Birdland New York, New York April 3, 2015 Sheila Jordan is a natural. Still going strong at 86, she does more than sing with her voice. She plays it like an instrument. Like any great jazz improviser, she bends notes to their expressive potential, traveling far but always returning home. Among few other musicians could this have been clearer than pianist Steve Kuhn, bassist Steve Laspina, and drummer Billy ...

Jazz Child: A Portrait of Sheila Jordan

by Ian Patterson
November 12, 2014

Jazz Child: A Portrait of Sheila Jordan Ellen Johnson 234 pages ISBN: 978-0-8108-8836-4 Rowman & Littlefield 2014 That Ellen Johnson's revealing portrait of Sheila Jordan is the first full biography of the eighty five-year old Pennsylvanian-born singer reaffirms the notion that the dominant jazz narrative has always lionized certain artists to the exclusion of others. As the progenitor of the bass and vocal duo Jordan was an innovative figure from ...

Sheila Jordan: Charlie Parker, Now's The Time

by William Ellis
November 12, 2014

Sheila Jordan: At home, New York City, 11th February 2014 “This is the first jazz recording I ever heard, it's not even bebop! It's a rebopper! Charlie Parker's Reboppers. “There's a whole story behind this record. Charlie Parker alto, Miles Davis, trumpet, Curley Russell, bass and who's on piano? Hen Gates: that was Dizzy [Gillespie]—he couldn't give his real name—and Max Roach on drums. So on the other side is “Billie's Bounce"—same personnel.

Sheila Jordan: Now's The Time

by Ian Patterson
November 12, 2014

Sheila Jordan, one of the last great jazz vocalists from the bebop era turns eighty six on 18 November. Happy Birthday Sheila! There's much to celebrate. The Pennsylvanian-born singer's remarkable life story has just been published--the first complete biography to cover Jordan's life and career in detail. Written by Ellen Johnson over seven years, Jazz Child: A Portrait of Sheila Jordan (Rowman & Littlefield, 2014) relates Jordan's life from her upbringing in real poverty and her first steps as a ...

Sheila Jordan / Harvie S: Yesterdays

by Nicholas F. Mondello
May 16, 2012

With Yesterdays, singer Sheila Jordan yet again proves she can take a worn-to-a-sow's-ear standard and--voila!--turn it into a diamond-encrusted silk purse. Her partners in that magic are Harvie S and his beautifully resonating double bass--both assisting ever so deftly in the creative conversion.Offering previously unreleased material from a 1990 live performance, Jordan and S grab onto more than a dozen Great American Songbook warhorses, proving (among other things) that there are additional treasures hidden in these regularly-explored goldmines. ...

Sheila Jordan: Winter Sunshine

by Marcia Hillman
December 24, 2008

Sheila Jordan has reasons to celebrate: her 80th birthday, a new record company connection and this new CD release, her 21st album under her own name. Taped live at a Montreal jazz club in February of this year, Jordan is joined by a trio of Steve Amirault (piano), Kieran Overs (bass) and Andre White (drums) for an eclectic collection of standards, originals and little-done material along with interspersed dialogue. Jordan has retained the little ...

Sheila Jordan: Winter Sunshine

by Jerry D'Souza
December 19, 2008

Sheila Jordan has stamped her class as a jazz singer over a career that has spanned 60 years. She has an articulate sense of phrasing and rhythm and she can ad lib at the turn of a note, but it is the emotion she draws out of a lyric that makes her standout. Jordan proves her calibre all over again with Winter Sunshine a CD she recorded live at Upstairs, a jazz club in Montreal, in February 2008.

The selection ...