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Interview: Herb Geller (Part 5)
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
For years, the events surrounding pianist Lorraine Geller's sudden death at age 30 in October 1958 have been shrouded in mystery. Depending on what you've read or who you've listened to, rumored causes have ranged from a weak heart to a drug overdose, with plenty of other reasons in between. For the sake of setting the record straight, Herb Geller relived those terrible days in the late 1950s when we spoke. Herb also talked about what happened after the death ...
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Interview: Herb Geller (Part 4)
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
Starting in the mid-1950s, Los Angeles became a boomtown for many trained jazz musicians. With the rise of the 12-inch LP and expansion of the movie studios, the demand for gifted musicians who could read music and record perfectly spiked. Many of the musicians who had relocated to the area were in the right place at the right time. If you were good, and many were, you could record at a movie studio in the early morning, hit a couple ...
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Interview: Herb Geller (Part 3)
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
By the early 1950s, the number of big bands that traveled the country's roads to perform was dwindling. The reasons were a matter of economics and fizzling demand. Transporting, housing and feeding upward of 18 musicians required solid money, and with married couples going out less often to dance and preferring to stay home and play records, fewer band opportunities remained. In New York, with the rise of the suburbs, the once booming club business was shrinking as well, and ...
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King Britt Interview
Source:
Giant Step
It may be hard to believe but the legendary Philadelphia DJ/Producer King Britt has been in the music game for twenty years now. Beginning his career in 1990 as E-Culture on the Strictly Rhythm label, Britt quickly became the DJ for the Grammy winning hip-hop group Digable Planets. Segueing into production work, hes remixed tracks for The OJays, Macy Gray, Bebel Gilberto and Roy Ayers amongst hundreds of others as well as dropping acclaimed albums like Adventures In Lo-Fi while ...
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Artie Shaw: Swing and Loathing
Source:
Michael Ricci
Artie Shaw, the swing era's other great clarinetist, knew just about every romantic self-immolator in the history of jazz. He roomed with both Bix Beiderbecke and Bunny Berigan, he hired Billie Holiday to sing with his band and--at least by his own account--he turned down Charlie Parker's bid to join his saxophone section. ("I said, 'Bird, you couldn't play in my band, you're too much of an individualist!' “) Superficially, Shaw couldn't have been less like these doom-bound drunks and ...
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Diana Krall, Sellout?
Source:
Rifftides by Doug Ramsey
A few years ago, Gene Lees and I fell into serious agreement. It happened in one of our long talks over a glass of wine, or two, at the big table just off the kitchen in his and Janet's house in Ojai. We were kicking around the peculiar effect that popular acceptance of an artist often has on the perception of critics and fellow musicians. We discussed the Modern Jazz Quartet, Cannonball Adderley, the Dave Brubeck Quartet and Diana Krall, ...
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Sonnenberg Sings Lees
Source:
Rifftides by Doug Ramsey
A man named Paul Sonnenberg has posted a medley of songs with Gene Lees' lyrics. If you go here, you'll learn as much about Mr. Sonnenberg as I know. If you watch the video below, you'll see and hear him sing the songs, largely in tune, with a feel for the Brazilian samba idiom and with, for the most part, the correct English lyrics. In “Quiet Night of Quiet Stars," it should be, “...how lovely," not “...so lovely," but that's ...
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