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Jazz Articles about Vanessa Perea
Various Artists: Swinging In The Holidays
by Jim Trageser
With a warm, wood-paneled vintage glow, a new Christmas collection inhabits the space formerly reserved for top-flight crooners like Nat King Cole, Frank Sinatra and Tony Bennett: blending pop and jazz into comfort food for your ears. While few of the next-gen" (as the album's publicity tag puts it) performers here will be known to those unfamiliar with the contemporary New York City scene, their chops are undeniable and the arrangements flattering to the performers' strengths.
Continue ReadingChampian Fulton: Flying High - Big Band Canaries Who Soared
by Richard J Salvucci
If memory serves, Woody Herman was once quoted as saying it's tough to be a canary," or words to that effect. Canary" of course, was just one of the many euphemisms used for female big band singers in the 1930s and 1940s. Herman's pointed observation was spot on. He thought, correctly, that most female singers were being evaluated--by male critics, of course--on their physical attributes primarily, not on their vocal prowess. This is no place to go into detail, but ...
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