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Video / DVD

Fabulous Dorsey Brothers in Hi-Fi

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers
July 24, 2019

When trombonist and bandleader Tommy Dorsey died in November 1956 at his 23-room mansion in Greenwich, Ct., his financial affairs were a mess. Married to his third wife, Janie New, Dorsey passed away several days shy of a court appearance to reply to New's divorce suit. According to the autopsy, Dorsey, 51, had thrown up while he slept, and food lodged in his windpipe and lungs. For whatever reason, Dorsey did not have a will, and he reportedly left only ...

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Video / DVD

Linda, Slim and David

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers
July 21, 2019

This week in The Wall Street Journal, I interviewed retired singer Linda Ronstadt for my “House Call" column in the Mansion section (go here). We talked about growing up in Arizona, singing around her family house, Linda's fondness for Bing Crosby and Rosemary Clooney, and her new diagnosis (it's not Parkinson's). Here's Linda singing Tracks of My Tears in 1975... Jan Menu. Following my post on 10 Gerry Mulligan tribute albums, readers wanted to know a little more about baritone ...

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Video / DVD

StLJN Saturday Video Showcase: Jazz documentary film festival, part 2

Source: St. Louis Jazz Notes by Dean Minderman
July 21, 2019

With the schedule of touring jazz and creative musicians visiting St. Louis looking sparse for the next couple of weeks, this feature once again is back in “lazy summer" mode, setting aside the usual custom of previewing an upcoming concert to offer a mini-festival of jazz-related documentary films. First up is Love You Madly, a documentary about Duke Ellington produced in 1965 for San Francisco public TV station KQED by famed jazz journalist, critic and author Ralph J. Gleason. You ...

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Video / DVD

Get Out and Get Under the Moon

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers
July 20, 2019

I was 12 on July 20, 1969. We had just moved to the Town of Cortlandt, a wooded hamlet an hour north of New York. The public schools were becoming too rough and classes too crowded in northern Manhattan, and my artist parents didn't have the means for private school. So on that Sunday, I was in my room with my father's reel-to-reel recorder taping the audio of CBS anchor Walter Cronkite coming out of a small white portable TV ...

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Video / DVD

Video: Bill Evans Plays Nardis, '78

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers
July 19, 2019

On July 19, 1978, Bill Evans performed at the Umbria Jazz Festival in Perugia, Italy, with Marc Johnson on bass and Philly Joe Jones on drums. What's fascinating about the following clip of Nardis is how fractured and percussive Evans's playing is. Was it the uncomfortable stool? Disgust with the piano? Drugs? Or the sheer tedium of the song? Or all of the above? What we see and hear on this video is a different Evans—an artist distraught, exceedingly aggressive ...

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Video / DVD

Black Keys Film Funny Or Die Musicians 'MasterCourse' [VIDEO]

Source: HypeBot
July 17, 2019

“Every song on a record is trying to accomplish something,” Dan Auerbach of The Black Keys quips at the start of a new 'MasterCourse filled for Funny Or Die. “That song, in particular, was trying to get me a new pool.” “It means a lot to be a drummer," says Black Key drummer Patrick Carney. “One of the things it means is that you’re not a good guitarist – or as good as someone else that you know who’s in ...

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Video / DVD

10 Tributes to Gerry Mulligan

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers
July 17, 2019

Gerry Mulligan's contributions to jazz are monumental. As an arranger, the baritone saxophonist pulled drummer and bandleader Gene Krupa into the bebop era in the mid-1940s, gave bandleader Claude Thornhill a hip sound in the late 1940s, made major contributions to the Miles Davis “Birth of the Cool" recording sessions at the tail end of the '40s, created a revolutionary pianoless quartet with Chet Baker in Los Angeles in 1952, influenced arrangers Bill Holman and Shorty Rogers on the West ...

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Video / DVD

StLJN Saturday Video Showcase: Charlie Hunter Trio with Lucy Woodward

Source: St. Louis Jazz Notes by Dean Minderman
July 14, 2019

This week, let's take a look at some videos featuring guitarist Charlie Hunter's latest trio with singer Lucy Woodward and drummer Keita Ogawa, who are coming to St. Louis to perform on Sunday, July 28 at Off Broadway. Hunter, whose distinctive technique on the seven-string guitar lets him play leads, bass lines and accompaniment more or less simultaneously, has played St. Louis a number of times in recent years with various configurations of musicians. And while he's frequently used the ...

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