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Wessell Anderson
It wasn't long before Anderson got his first big break, when Wynton Marsalis asked Anderson to tour with the Wynton Marsalis Septet. Soon, Anderson was off to the studio and the road with Marsalis, helping make some of the most defining music of the late-'80s and early-'90s jazz revival. Although Marsalis disbanded the group in 1995, Anderson is still the first string alto saxist with Marsalis' Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra.
It was during his time with Marsalis' group that Anderson began to develop his own sound: a mix of traditional New Orleans jazz (likely Batiste's influence) and a sweeping blues style similar to that of Cannonball Adderly. Anderson's 1994 debut album, Warmdaddy In the Garden of Swing (Atlantic Records), featured Anderson playing a set of all original compositions with big-name sidemen like pianist Eric Reed and bassist Ben Wolfe. Anderson truly came into his own, however, with 1998's Live at the Village Vanguard, which found him in top form with his own hand-picked band of powerhouse young players, including trumpeter Irvin Mayfield, bassist Steve Kirby, pianist Xavier Davis, and drummer Jaz Sawyer. His latest release "Warm It Up, Warmdaddy!" has been released by the ground breaking label Nu Jazz Entertainment exclusively as a digital download. "Warm It Up, Warmdaddy" was released as the first jazz album that has exclusive video content for download from iTunes and other digital download services
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Wessell Anderson: Warm It Up, Warmdaddy!
by Terrell Kent Holmes
Alto saxophonist Wessell Anderson is a traditionalist who clearly enjoys upending tradition. On Warm It Up, Warmdaddy! several of the songs rework the harmonic structures of some cherished standards and their titles are the work of someone who embraces the classics without taking them too seriously. The mischief begins with What Is Dat Thang?," a riff on What Is This Thing Called Love." Anderson lays down high-energy, upper register lines over a dynamite vamp by the rhythm ...
read moreWessell "Warmdaddy" Anderson: Warm It Up Warmdaddy!
by Bruce Lindsay
Wessell Warmdaddy" Anderson has been playing alto saxophone professionally for over 20 years, much of the time with the Wynton Marsalis Sextet and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, but has only four albums to his name as a leader. Warm It Up Warmdaddy! is a re-packaging, by Nu Jazz Records, of his self-released 2006 CD, Space. As his nickname suggests, Warmdaddy's sax playing has a rich and welcoming ton,e and coupled with the equally warm and swinging styles of ...
read moreWessell "Warmdaddy" Anderson: Live at the Village Vanguard
by Jack Bowers
Every so often, floating above the over–abundance of cookie–cutter mimes who overspread today’s mainstream Jazz scene, one hears a fresh and earnest new voice that causes him to do a double–take and say to himself, “Did I hear what I thought I heard?” That was my wholly unanticipated reaction as I listened for the first time to Wessell Anderson’s high–powered concert date recorded last May at New York’s Village Vanguard. Here’s a player with great chops, copious soul and prolific ...
read moreWessell Anderson: Wessell "Warmdaddy" Anderson Live at the Village Vanguard
by C. Michael Bailey
Big Alto Saxophonists. A copy of Sherman Irby's new disc, Big Mama's Biscuits (also reviewed this month) recently crossed my desk and got me to thinking about alto saxophone players who were also physically large men, such as the corpulent Irby. While this specialized population would include Bird when he was healthy, I was thinking more along the lines of Julian Cannonball" Adderley and those that followed him. I went on to listen to a lot of Cannon's music, from ...
read moreA Quadruple Return for a Man Doubly Missed
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Michael Ricci
For a certain breed of New York jazz fan the alto-saxophonist Wess Anderson is the one that got away. Nearly twice. Mr. Anderson, a Brooklyn native, emerged in the late 1980s as a sideman with Wynton Marsalis, and later a charter member of Mr. Marsaliss efforts at Jazz at Lincoln Center. Fondly known as Warmdaddy, he was on board there until about four years ago, when he joined the jazz faculty at Michigan State University. So Mr. Anderson was already ...
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