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Jimmy "Junebug" Jackson
A well meaning journalist once asked a famous trumpet player to define jazz. The response was "Man, if you don't know by now, you ain't never gonna know!" A definition of jazz is indeed elusive, but On My Way Home, by Jimmy "Junebug" Jackson, is jazz. Period. It displays a sense of timelessness and universality, a link between past and present, and that is what great art is all about.
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Jimmy Junebug Jackson: On My Way Home
by Stephen Latessa
Drummer and vocalist Jimmy “Junebug Jackson steps out from the shadow of his former employer, Jimmy Smith, to pay tribute to two other legends, Cannonball Adderley and Nancy Wilson, on this recording. In particular, On My Way Home salutes the eponymous duet album Adderley and Wilson cut together in 1961.
As is fitting for an homage to Adderley, this music has a warm and gracious feel that emulates the spirit of its inspiration. Jackson is a sterling drummer, ...
Continue ReadingJimmy Madison To Release His Autobiography 'Drummer Boy' On September 1st, 2025
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Jimmy Madison
Internationally renowned jazz musician, Jimmy Madison, will release his candid, long-awaited autobiography that intersects the worlds of music and mountain climbing on September 1, 2025. In Drummer Boy, Madison shares both his vocation and his avocation from peak moments spent behind his drum kit to breathtaking moments climbing mountain peaks across the globe. His energy and devotion to both passions fill this gripping story that takes readers onto famous stages and into base camps at extreme altitudes. The New Yorker ...
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Jimmy Greene Quintet – 'As We Are Now' Album Release Celebration At The Artists Collective On Thursday, June 12th, 2025
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Lori Reynolds
Exactly thirty-five years after his first life-changing encounter with Jackie McLean at the Artists Collective, saxophonist Jimmy Greene returns to the Collective with his quintet on June 12 to celebrate the release of his latest album, As We Are Now (Greene Music Works). Joining Greene for this special night are the same all-star musicians who appear on the recording: guitarist Mike Moreno, pianist Aaron Goldberg (original member of the Artists’ Collective Twin Towers Quintet, alongside Greene, in 1994), bassist Dezron ...
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Perfection: Jimmy Forrest - 'Soul Street' (1960)
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
Dial Records initiated the “tenor battle" concept in 1947 when the label brought bebop saxophonists Dexter Gordon and Wardell Gray into the studio to record Gordon's composition The Chase. Prestige Records then perfected and exploited the dueling-tenors format, starting in 1950, with Sonny Stitt and Gene Ammons recording of Blues Up and Down and other 78 sides. Among Prestige's series of tenor pairings between 1950 and '60 were Sonny Rollins and John Coltrane playing Tenor Madness (1956); Very Saxy in ...
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Jimmy Mundy: Swing Era Barnstormer
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
Like Fletcher Henderson, Don Redman, Edgar Sampson and Sy Oliver, Jimmy Mundy was one of the architects of the swing era in the early 1930s. Born in Cincinnatti, Ohio, in 1907, Mundy played the tenor saxophone in regional bands, where he developed an ear for arranging. He first worked as an arranger for Earl Hines in the early 1930s and joined Benny Goodman in late 1935 after selling the bandleader a chart. Goodman needed a strong, authentic swing arranger of ...
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PJ Morton, Will Downing, Paul Jackson Jr, Jeff Lorber, Everette Harp, Tito Puente Jr, Maysa & More At The 6th Annual Dymally Jazz Festival
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Daryl Sweeney
The 6th Annual Dymally International Jazz & Arts Festival is being held at Dignity Health Sports Park on the campus of California State University Dominguez Hills on April 26th, 2025 with two stages, a visual arts pavillion and specialty retail and food vendors. The event is set to please jazz lovers from around the globe. The festival is co-produced by Rainbow Promotions, producers of the Long Beach and San Diego Jazz Festivals. This year's festival lineup will include Grammy Winner ...
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Saxophonist/Composer Javon Jackson And Poet Nikki Giovanni Nominated For NAACP Image Award In 'Outstanding Jazz Album' Category
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Braithwaite & Katz Communications
Javon & Nikki Go to the Movies, a collaboration between the groundbreaking poet and activist Nikki Giovanni and saxophonist/composer Javon Jackson, has been nominated for a 56th NAACP Image Award in the category of Outstanding Jazz Album. Recognized as the nation’s preeminent multicultural awards show from an African American point of view, the NAACP Image Awards celebrates the outstanding achievements and performances in the arts, as well as individuals and groups who promote social justice through their creative endeavors. The ...
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Backgrounder: Jimmy Forrest - Out of the Forrest
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
Tenor saxophonist Jimmy Forrest began his recording career in 1943 with Andy Kirk's band. There, he learned all he needed to know about swing. By 1949, he was touring and recording with Duke Ellington. Next came his first leadership album, Night Train, in 1951, featuring the hit title song. Night Train, a lift from Ellington's Happy Go Lucky Local (1946), which was featured in Ellington's The Deep South Suite. But in all fairness to Forrest, he took an Ellington riff ...
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Perfection: Jimmy Smith - 'Too Old to Dream'
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
In April 1960, organist Jimmy Smith joined forces with tenor saxophonist Stanley Turrentine and recorded Back at the Chicken Shack for Blue Note. One of the tracks was “When I Grow Too Old to Dream," by Oscar Hammerstein II, Sigmund Romberg. The song was introduced in The Night Is Young (1935) and was given a gospel-soul shove on the 1963 album by Smith, Turrentine and Donald Bailey on drums. (Guitarist Kenny Burrell appears on two tracks but not this one.) ...
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Backgrounder: Jimmy McGriff - Step 1
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
Philadelphian Jimmy McGriff began as a pianist but fell in love with the organ after hearing Richard “Groove" Holmes play the Hammond B3 at his sister's wedding. He bought his first organ in 1956, spent six months at New York's Juilliard School of Music and then studied the organ privately with Milt Buckner, Jimmy Smith and Sonny Gatewood. He began leading an organ combo in 1960. Step 1 was recorded for producer Sonny Lester at Capitol Records in 1970. The ...
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Jazz Drumming Legend Jimmy Junebug Jackson Has Died
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Karen Frieske
Jazz drumming legend and Blue Canoe Recording Artist Jimmy “Junebug" Jackson has died. He was 55. Jackson's family announced that the musician died on Saturday, January 28th, 2012 in Washington, DC where he lived and performed until his death from congestive heart failure. For over twenty years, Jackson toured the world with legendary organist Jimmy Smith. In his time with Smith, Jackson performed with jazz greats McCoy Tyner, George Benson, Christian McBride, Mose Davis and many others. His latest recording ...
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