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Interview

Interview: Betty Bennett (Part 1)

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers
July 5, 2011

Back in May, in one of my Sunday “Oddball Album Covers of the Week" posts, I showcased two LPs featuring women stretched out on lawns. One was Nobody Else But Me, a 1955 album by vocalist Betty Bennett for Atlantic Records that was arranged by Andre Previn and Shorty Rogers. The point of my post was to show how art directors at the time seemed to fancy showing attractive women relaxing on grassy glades. [Pictured: Betty Bennett in 1948] A ...

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Interview

Something Else! Interview: Delfeayo Marsalis, Producer and Trombonist

Source: Something Else!
July 1, 2011

Delfeayo Marsalis, recipient of the 2011 NEA Jazz Masters Award, stepped out with a rare recording as a leader this year—just his second since the 1990s. Sweet Thunder: Duke and Shak, a canny reworking of Duke Ellington's 1957 suite Such Sweet Thunder on Troubadour Jazz, led to a 36-date theatrical jazz production that ran through May. Still, he's more associated with his work as record producer. It is in that capacity that Delfeayo Marsalis has helped shape his family's sound, ...

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Interview

Bernard Herrmann at 100

Source: Sound Insights by Doug Payne
June 29, 2011

Composer Bernard Herrmann emerged from the Golden Age of cinema and contributed a signature sound to some of history's most significant films. While his name may not be known to most of today's filmgoers—he died, after all, a full generation or two ago in 1975—Bernard Herrmann's music is undoubtedly some of the best and best known the cinema has ever produced. Chances are, if you care about film or film music, you know who Bernard Herrmann is and you either ...

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Interview

Who Shot Miles?

Source: The Independent Ear by Willard Jenkins
June 29, 2011

From 1965-1985 one of the New York metro area's hotspots for live jazz was the Blue Coronet in Brooklyn—the Bedford-Stuyvesant community to be exact. Sometimes I wonder if perhaps Brooklyn should be labeled the Second City instead of Chicago, given the backseat that storied borough so often takes to its little sister Manhattan (Brooklyn being by far the bigger land mass). Case in point, while surfing the web in search of additional background on the Blue Coronet, consistently the only ...

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Interview

Leading Questions: Jim Wilke

Source: Seattle Jazz Scene
June 29, 2011

The best advice I've ever received is “you're not talking to an audience of thousands, you're talking to thousands of audiences of one or two." When I was 14 I was playing alto sax in concert band and listening to Western Swing on the radio during the day and jazz late at night. Broadcasting jazz has meant introducing others to some of the most creative musicians who ever lived. If I could do it all over again, I probably wouldn't ...

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Interview

Bassist Jair-Rohm Parker Wells Summer 2011

Source: Jair-Rohm Wells
June 27, 2011

Jair-Rohm Parker Wells is a bassist who knows no limits. From ground-breaking slap bass on pop hits to avant-garde electronica to Jazz and Blues. He literally covers all basses. Jair-Rohm rounded out last year with a new quartet release as well as a residency at the Lima Lima club in Pattaya, Thailand with other former members of the Dr. Alban touring band (of which he's been a member since the mid-nineties). This autumn, the bassist will host a series of ...

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Interview

Latin Jazz Conversations: Benny Velarde (Part 3)

Source: The Latin Jazz Corner by Chip Boaz
June 26, 2011

For better or worse, musicians that stay in the business over several decades experience a number of changes. In some cases, they get to experience the wide variety of talent that emerges and develops within their area and all over the world. They hear musical evolution and push their musicianship to follow the developments with artistic integrity. They become mentors, teachers, role models, and experienced veterans that help push the music into the next generation. At the same time, they ...

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Interview