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How Rock 'n' Roll Happened
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
Sixty years ago today, Bill Haley's Rock Around the Clock hit #1 on all three of Billboard's pop charts at the time. It was the first time an R&B song accomplished that feat, and it signaled the birth of rock 'n' roll. Not the music, the attitude. As I write in today's Wall Street Journal (go here), rock in the decades that followed the record's release would be inextricably linked with teenage rebellion against parents and authority figures. But the ...
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Jon Armstrong Jazz Orchestra, An Ensemble Linked To LA’s Burgeoning Jazz Scene, Are Set To Release A Cinematic Music Video
Source:
lorena endara
Twenty two piece ensemble, Jon Armstrong Jazz Orchestra will release their first music video. “The gifted Los Angeles tenor saxophonist,” (The Sydney Morning Herald) teamed up with Los Angeles based multimedia company Producciones Con Sal to produce and direct the music video for “Dream Has No Friend” off their debut album Farewell. The cinematic Jazz music video is set to premiere this July 10th at ArtShare LA in Downtown Los Angeles. “Dream Has No Friend” was composed by Jon Armstrong ...
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StLJN Saturday Video Showcase: Ken Burns' Jazz
Source:
St. Louis Jazz Notes by Dean Minderman
This week, celebrate the nation's birthday with a screening of Jazz, the ten-part history of the music directed by famed documentary filmmaker Ken Burns and originally aired on PBS back in 2001. Although the series was acclaimed by some as the most comprehensive filmed treatment of jazz history to date, many fans and critics also found plenty to criticize. Many of the negative comments focused on the series' heavy emphasis on older styles, the short shrift given to developments after ...
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Aretha Franklin: Amsterdam 1968
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
In May 1968, Aretha Franklin was in her prime when she performed in Amsterdam during her first tour abroad. She was there to promote her new album, Lady Soul, after switching to Atlantic Records. Aretha and the Sweet Inspirations, her backup singers, were placed on a stage crowded with musicians and fans with little security down front at the city's famous Concertgebouw. There, she performed for a near-hysterical audience that had no problem throwing what appear to be flower petals ...
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Armstrong and Bernstein, 1956
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
On July 14, 1956, Louis Armstrong and His All-Stars participated in the Guggenheim Concert at Lewisohn Stadium in New York. The stadium was on the campus of City College in Manhattan (and was razed in 1973). This was the first concert by the New York Philharmonic to feature jazz musicians, with the Dave Brubeck Quartet performing during the first half followed by Armstrong. Here's Louis Armstrong and His All Stars with conductor Leonard Bernstein performing St. Louis Blues. The famed ...
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Fluter's Ball: Flutes Revealed
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
Last November, I posted on Henry Mancini's Fluter's Ball, a wistful song with four flutes from his score for the suspense-thriller Experiment in Terror (1962). The problem at the time of my post is that the personnel on the session was never captured, so there was no way of knowing who the flutes were. Soon after my post, Los Angeles composer and arranger Roy Phillippe wrote and offered to track down at least the four flutists. Here's Roy's note: “I recently ...
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Mary Lou Williams: 1978
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
Three years before her death in 1981, pianist Mary Lou Williams performed an extraordinary concert at the Montreux Jazz Festival. Here's nearly an hour of her playing solo, which will give you a full sense of her brilliance and significance. If you can't watch all of it, let it run in the background as you work. Her technique and soul are breathtaking. In my opinion, Williams has never been fully recognized as a musical innovator on par with Earl “Fatha" ...
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