Book / Magazine News

Book / Magazine

AllAboutJazz-New York January 2009 Issue Now Available!

Source: All About Jazz
December 27, 2008

With our January issue featuring our Best Of 2008, we give our readers plenty of reason to brave the chill winds of winter.

Please browse our two-page spread (pgs. 26-27) for categories such as Record Labels, Debut Albums, Boxed Sets as well as Albums and Performances of the Year. Even as jazz becomes more and more of a niche market, there are plenty of fine releases from the past 12 months, making the job of picking the best from an ...

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Book / Magazine

Shelly's Manne Hole

Source: All About Jazz
December 26, 2008

By early 1967, the list of artists that had played the Manne-Hole read like a Who's Who of jazz. The bandstand at the Manne-Hole had to be expanded for the big bands Shelly brought in. The bands of Kenton, Herman and Gerald Wilson were among them. Shelly continued to insist that the help not hustle the patrons for drinks.

He would use the quintet opposite some of the headliners on weekends - imagine seeing visiting name artists and Shelly's band ...

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Book / Magazine

The Karaoke King

Source: All About Jazz
December 26, 2008

Brooklyn-based writer and karaoke obsessive Brian Raftery has written a book about his passion for belting out songs in public. Don't Stop Believing: How Karaoke Conquered the World and Changed My Life follows the hobby from its Japanese origins across the ocean to America and into Raftery's heart.

With over ten years of karaoke experience, from the cheaply produced laser discs to live action performances backed by the Georgia-based indie rock group Of Montreal, Raftery has sung it all. TIME ...

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Book / Magazine

Jazz: Renolds Jazz Orchestra - Cube

Source: All About Jazz
December 22, 2008

"Cube" (Shanti) is a big band and vocal suite based on the Biblical events of Easter. (Reviewing it at Christmastime isn't out of place, considering the main character in each celebration.) The album features an all-star European and American group led by Swiss reedman and composer Fritz Renold. Helen Savari-Renold, his wife, handles vocals. The 10 performances, from “Grave Intrigues," early warnings of Jesus' trial to come, to the finale, the title composition, with Jesus reigning in heaven. Renold writes ...

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Book / Magazine

Victor Fleming: An American Movie Master

Source: All About Jazz
December 22, 2008

The Gist: Scholars tend to lionize directors who develop groundbreaking styles, or who come to dominate and define a genre men like Hitchcock, Welles, Hawks and Ford. But what of the filmmaker who didn't try to stick out so much as fit in; the man-for-hire who could saddle up to any studio assignment even a work in progress and mold it to perfection? In Victor Fleming: An American Movie Master, Baltimore Sun film critic Michael Sragow argues that ...

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Book / Magazine

American Library Association Names Whale Music Book a Top Ten

Source: All About Jazz
December 10, 2008

Thousand Mile Song: Whale Music in a Sea of Sound (Basic Books, 2008) by NJIT humanities professor, author and clarinetist David Rothenberg, has been named one of the ten best science and technology books for 2008 by Booklist on Line, a publication of the American Library Association. To research the book and learn about whale music, Rothenberg traveled from Hawaii to Russia to play his bass clarinet while playing and recording interspecies duets with the melodic mammals. The corollary compact ...

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Book / Magazine

Enjoy Life Magazine Features Austin's First Lady of Jazz: Pamela Hart

Source: All About Jazz
December 7, 2008

Recently, Pamela Hart had the amazing pleasure to “sit down" with Ms. Lakesha S. Woods, Editor of Enjoy Life Magazine for an engaging and enlightening conversation. Ms. Woods was able to accurately and sincerely capture the essence of the amazing Pamela Hart and the results of the “sit down" are featured in the latest edition of Enjoy Life Magazine. We invite you to read Pamela's feature in the monthly Music Box Feature. Pamela said, It takes a certain intelligence to ...

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Book / Magazine

Recommended Reading: Week 53

Source: RVAjazz
December 6, 2008

Here's a taste of what's going on out there, straight from the Google Reader:--Taylor Barnett wrote a great essay about free improvisation at RVANews. He cites his experience in Devil's Workshop Big Band, and a great clip accompanies the essay. Referring to the opening of every set at Bogart's Back Room, he says, “The 'Free Tune' was like a trust exercise, but instead of falling backwards into each other's arms, we jumped into the musical abyss, having faith ...

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