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Will Evans
Smoke Jazz Club Announces October 2025 Lineup Including A Two-week Thelonious Monk Festival With Orrin Evans, Terri Lyne Carrington, Melissa Aldana, Joe Lovano, And More
Source:
AMT Public Relations
SMOKE Jazz Club today announced its concert schedule for October 2025. The month’s capstone is a two-week Thelonious Monk Festival (Oct 8-19) celebrating the unparalleled genius of the legendary composer/pianist Thelonious Monk (born 10.10.17) with performances by some of today’s top artists including Melissa Aldana, winner of the 2013 Thelonious Monk International Jazz Saxophone Competition. Other highlights this month include the return of club audience favorites Nicholas Payton, Steve Davis, and one of the greatest organ trios Goldings/Bernstein/Stewart. For the ...
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Ryan Truesdell: Gil Evans and Shades of Sound
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
I love producers and performers who fall madly in love with legacy jazz artists and go the distance to pay tribute to them. I'm thinking of what producer-director Kristian St. Clair did with his 2006 documentary and album This Is Gary McFarland and what jazz historian and album producer Gary Carner did in 2012 with baritone saxophonist Pepper Adams by compiling Joy Road: The Complete Works of Pepper Adams (Motema). Another spectacular obsessionist is Ryan Truesdell, a multi-Grammy-winning producer, composer ...
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Bill Evans: 'Moon Beams' and 'Interplay' (1962)
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
In April, May, June and July of 1962, pianist Bill Evans was ferociously busy in recording studios. Ten months earlier, his first working trio was at its peak, recording in exquisite form at New York's Village Vanguard. The three musicians had realized Evans's dream of playing conversationally—each member playing off the other two as equals rather than the piano taking the lead with the bass and drums merely playing supportive roles. At the Vanguard, the bassist was Scott LaFaro and ...
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YouTubers Dig Bill Evans (Guitarists)
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
I love watching videos of musicians covering songs made famous by jazz legends. I've posted quite a few of these as part of my YouTubers Dig series. Today, I thought I'd share 10 clips with you of guitarists covering songs recorded by Bill Evans: Here's Waltz for Debby... Here's Two Lonely People... Here's Time Remembered... Here's Interplay... Here's Peace Piece... Here's How My Heart Sings... Here's Israel... Here's Turn Out the Stars... Here's Laurie... And here's Little Lulu... Bonus: If ...
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Perfection: Bill Evans - Reflections in D
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
In 1953, Duke Ellington recorded a solo piano piece that was lush, dreamy and introspective. The song was composed in the key of D, and Ellington called it Reflections in D. Ten years later, dancer Alvin Ailey choreographed an expressive modern dance for a solitary dancer set to the Ellington ballad. Ailey created the brief dance as an interlude to hold the audience's attention as the company's other dancers changed costumes between ballets. In early 1978, pianist Bill Evans decided ...
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Bill Evans: Stockholm, Sweden, 1964
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
Thank God for Europe and Scandinavia. If not for their government-sponsored TV stations, we'd never have intimate footage of American jazz stars in action. Today, two clips of the Bill Evans Trio in Stockholm, Sweden, in August 1964, with Evans on piano, Chuck Israels on bass and Larry Bunker on drums. Plus a bonus track: Here's an extraordinarily intense rendition of My Foolish Heart... And here's Johnny Carisi's Israel... Bonus: Here's audio of Bill Evans, bassist Eddie Gomez and drummer ...
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hudson hall Announces A Semi-staged Musical Drama Based On The Life Of Frederick Douglass no Cowards In Our Band, November 2, With Musical Arrangement By Orrin Evans
Source:
AMT Public Relations
Concept and Libretto: Anthony Knight, Jr. Musical Arrangement: Orrin Evans Director: Michael Hofmann Masud Olufani, Frederick Douglass Nia Drummond, soprano Edward Washington II, tenor Gregory Sheppard, bass Orrin Evans, piano Saturday, November 2, 2024, at 7:00 p.m. Hudson Hall Hudson Opera House 327 Warren Street Hudson, NY 12534 Tickets on sale now. Hudson Hall at the historic Hudson Opera House announces No Cowards in Our Band, a powerful musical drama ...
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Pianist Michael Wolff Guests with Bassist Leon Lee Dorsey and Drummer Mike Clark on Evocative Tribute Album, 'Letter to Bill Evans'
Source:
Lydia Liebman Promotions
For their seventh outing together as a close-knit, collaborative rhythm tandem, bassist Leon Lee Dorsey and drummer Mike Clark tapped pianist Michael Wolff as third man in their ongoing trio adventures. Wolff, who had previously appeared with Dorsey and Clark on 2020’s Play Sgt. Pepper, was indeed the perfect choice to complete the triumvirate on this heartfelt tribute to the late, great pianist-composer known for his contributions to Miles Davis’ Kind of Blue as well as his hugely influential trio ...
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Bill Evans: Waltz for Debby
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
Bill Evans performed his composition Waltz for Debby at dozens of clubs and concert halls and recorded it several times in the studio between 1955 and 1980. In my opinion, he aced it only once. Waltz for Debby sounds deceptively easy to play but it isn't. Having played Bill Evans transcriptions in my teens, I can tell you that it's loaded with complex passages that are easy to rush, trip over or simply miss the right feel. Which was true ...
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Bill Evans: Here's That Rainy Day
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
I've always loved Bill Evans's solo interpretation of Here's That Rainy Day from Alone in 1968. He opens with enormous sensitivity and delivers a measured ballad reading, followed by rising intensity and swing as the tempo quickens. The master take that appears on the album never fails to thrill me. Yet despite his beauty, Evans didn't bother to hold onto it like some other songs. Perhaps he felt that the Alone version was as good as he was ever going ...
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