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Meredith d'Ambrosio in 10 Tracks
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
What I love most about vocalist Meredith D'Ambrosio is her ability to exude innocence and sophistication at the same time. Her first album, Lost in His Arms, was recorded in 1978 and from then on, Meredith has amazed me with her talent and artistry. She's a composer, an arranger, a painter (her paintings grace virtually all of her album covers), a mosaicist and a pianist. She's also a wonderful soul. Happy birthday, Meredith! Here are 10 favorite tracks by Meredith ...
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Video: Brew Moore, 1961
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
Many tenor saxophonists in the late 1940s and '50s played like Lester Young—once they figured out how to run alternate melody lines on the chord changes of standards and blues in the upper register. One of the San Francisco's foremost disciples of Young was Brew Moore. He was so enamored of Young, he held his saxophone off to the side just as Young did. But rather than mimic his mentor, he combined the Young approach with Charlie Parker's ferocity. Sadly, ...
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Sonny Rollins: Soundtrack
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
With the coronavirus forcing most people around the globe indoors, the lockdown has given us a chance to listen to music with more care and gratitude. While writing yesterday, I pulled nine recordings by Sonny Rollins that, when assembled, become the thematic soundtrack for this new age of sheltering in place: Here's Time on My Hands from 1951... Here's The Scene Is Clean, featuring Sonny with the Clifford Brown-Max Roach Quintet in 1956... Here's Sonny's Pent-up House in 1956 on ...
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Oliver Nelson + Eric Dolphy
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
The blues were in Oliver Nelson's blood. Virtually everything he wrote and arranged had an indigo hue. But Nelson's original works weren't your average blues. They were blues cathedrals constructed with flying-buttress passages, gargoyle phrases and stained-glass voicings. When Nelson played the alto or tenor saxophone on these blues, there was a warm clarity to his tone and a sweetness to how he dragged notes. Nelson recorded head-to-head albums with Eric Dolphy, a blues master of another stripe. Dolphy's blues ...
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StLJN Saturday Video Showcase: Introducing Kandace Springs
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St. Louis Jazz Notes by Dean Minderman
This week, let's take a look at some videos featuring singer, songwriter and keyboardist Kandace Springs, who will be making her St. Louis debut with performances starting Wednesday, March 18 and continuing through Sunday, March 22 at Jazz St. Louis. Springs, 31, grew up in a musical family in Nashville, and first came to wide attention after moving to New York City and signing with Blue Note Records in 2014. After releasing a self-titled EP that year, she subsequently has ...
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Brazilian Jazz Quartet: Pepper Pot
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
Last week, I was listening to early Brazilian bossa nova albums from the late 1950s when I came across an obscure one from 1958. The album was by a Rio group known as the Brazilian Jazz Quartet. Recorded in 1958 for Columbia, Coffee and Jazz featured alto saxophonist José Ferreira Godinho Filho (better known as Casé), pianist Moacyr Peixoto, bassist Luiz Alves and drummer Rubens Alberto. What sets this album apart is that Casé sounds an awful lot like Art ...
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Herbie Mann in 10 Tracks
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
Love him or hate him, flutist Herbie Mann was in the groove and on top of just about every major music trend between mid 1950s and the 1980s and paved the way for World Music in the '60s. Admittedly, not all of his albums were great, but he did have a knack for being in the right place at the right time to catch a wave. Here are 10 Herbie Mann tracks through a wide range of music genres: Here's ...
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Video: McCoy Tyner, 1986
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
Yesterday, Jimi Mentis sent along a link to a terrific concert video featuring pianist McCoy Tyner with trumpeter Freddie Hubbard, tenor saxophonist Joe Henderson, bassist Avery Sharpe and drummer Louis Hayes. The concert was recorded at the Jazz Ost-West Festival in Nürmberg, Germany, in 1986. The songs were Birdlike, Just Feeling, As Me Now, Caravan and Inner Glimpse. Here's where the songs fall along the time bar: Birdlike at 00:00 (full quintet), Just Feeling at 05:25 (just the trio), As ...
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