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Finally, Myspace Rolls out Redesigned Profiles
Source:
HypeBot
MySpace has long been criticized for poor design and as part of a turnaround effort, the struggling social networker has finally done something about it. The new profiles are not available throughout the site, but Sean Percival, MySpace's VP of Online Marketing, tweeted about his own “clean new" profile early on Friday.
“We're testing a new look and feel of our site among users and the response so far has been positive," according to a MySpace spokesperson. “As always, we're ...
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The Case for Hubert Laws
Source:
The Independent Ear by Willard Jenkins
The 2011 class of National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Masters, the highest honor this country bestows on living jazz artists and advocates, is not without controversy. There's been much conversation about the unprecedented elevation of the entire Marsalis Family; and just the other day while doing some research at the Institute of Jazz Studies at Rutgers University's Newark campus, I overheard two musicians debating the merits of Johnny Mandel being named a NEA Jazz Master to represent the composer/arranger's ...
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He Just Keeps Gettin' Up: Pianist/Composer/Bandleader Orrin Evans
Source:
The Independent Ear by Willard Jenkins
Last Tuesday evening at the Jazz Standard, fortified by a plate of succulent ribs and amidst an appreciative audience, sonic rewards were plentiful from pianist Orrin Evans once again offering ample evidence that his arc continues on the rise. That evening and the next at the agreeable East Side joint, Evans piloted a rough & ready quartet with Eric Revis on bass, that Buddah of zest-for-life drumming Ralph Peterson, and the too often overlooked, ever-dapper tenor man Tim Warfield. Casually ...
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Interview: Paul Bacon (Part 4)
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
I should have told you this from the start but Paul Bacon has had a second career that has been even bigger than his first. Paul is perhaps best known today not as an LP-cover art director but as the inventor of book jacket design as we know it. Starting in the late 1950s, he has designed more than 7,000 covers, many of which were bestsellers, including Catch-22, Portnoy's Complaint, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, The Andromeda Strain and ...
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"Pay Attention!" Celebrating Jake Hanna (August 8, 2010)
Source:
Jazz Lives by Michael Steinman
The greatest artists have a way of making us comfortable. We see them, unannounced, come on the stage, and we relax and get ready to be delighted. “This is going to be wonderful!" we think, before the first note has been played. Hank Jones and Milt Hinton and Ruby Braff and Vic Dickenson and another dozen others always evoked that feeling. And Jake Hanna.
Jake lifted up every session with his beautiful sound, his floating, encouraging time, his own delight ...
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Mike Durham's Brilliant Idea (Another One!)
Source:
Jazz Lives by Michael Steinman
Mike Durham is not only a fine trumpet player and soulful man. He's also the embodiment of musical generosity--with his wife Patti (herself inimitable) he has given the world twenty Whitley Bay International Jazz Festivals. The 2010 one was announced as the final one, and I think all the musicians and listeners had their joy tinged by a certain melancholy: to paraphrase Edward G. Robinson in Little Caesar, “Mother of Mercy, is this the end of Whitley Bay?"
Yes and ...
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Brains, Beauty ... and a Bass
Source:
The Augmented Ear by John Patten
If you've not listened to Esperanza Spalding, you're missing out on a rare treat.Spalding is a 25-year-old dynamo, maybe the best thing to happen to jazz in a decade or two because she has the star quality missing from so many young players. Eldar and Julian Lage are exciting players, but Spalding is not only a capable player--she's also a singer capable of making a song her own.Check out this video of her performing Stevie Wonder's “Overjoyed":
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Interview: Paul Bacon (Part 3)
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
In the early years of LP cover design, there were no rules. The only driving force was that a cover had to be graphically gripping. Designers then often worked with just two colors, and much rested on typeface solutions and the integration of motion, dimension and excitement. As one of the early jazz-album cover designers and art directors, Paul Bacon was free to follow his artistic instincts and invent a fresh, new cover look. But Paul was also on ...
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