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Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra: Don't Be Afraid... The Music of Charles Mingus

by Jack Bowers
November 1, 2005

With the Mingus Big Band keeping the music of its namesake alive and flourishing, the question arises, is there a need for another band to canvass the same territory? Apparently the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra believes so, hence its newest album, Don't Be Afraid... The Music of Charles Mingus. Well, some of the music anyway, as the half-dozen songs therein barely scratch the surface of Mingus's prodigious output. On the other hand, some is better than none, and in any ...

Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra: Don't Be Afraid... The Music of Charles Mingus

by Jim Santella
October 22, 2005

Six compositions by Charles Mingus give the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra something different to work with. The swing is still there, but each piece echoes with the emotional strength and ferocity that its composer espoused through his ensembles. As with the original, you get a powerful bass line that leads the way, and you get thrilling soloists who provide impeccable examples of musicianship. What's missing is the passion that Mingus took with him everywhere he went.

Wynton Marsalis ...

Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra: The Music of Paul Whiteman

by Daniel Kassell
February 27, 2005

To appreciate how Paul Whiteman's Orchestra advanced music after the Ragtime Era an understanding of what preceded the First World War is required. Before recorded sound there was a piano in every house, John Philip Sousa's Marching Bands, Ringling Circus Bands, Community Bands, School Bands performed for every holiday or event in America. What most would call Pre- Swing, the period writer Will Friedwald designated, “American vernacular music". The beginnings of radio brought show business, electronic recorded 78s, symphonic orchestrations ...

Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra: A Love Supreme

by Jim Santella
February 1, 2005

Getting into the spirit of John Coltrane's seminal suite of reverential devotion, the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra explores classic jazz from an emotional angle. They swing, and they move cohesively with a big band's full sense of itself; however, the orchestra does not succeed fully in bringing the kind of emotional feeling to the forum that Coltrane had intended. The band is more interested in pursuing its rhythmic groove and maintaining its balanced orchestration than in creating emotional impact.

Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra: A Love Supreme

by C. Michael Bailey
January 4, 2005

The Marsalis brothers are going to single-handedly turn John Coltrane's crowning achievement into a jazz standard. Branford Marsalis recently released a DVD/CD set of his quartet's performance of the jazz suite, recorded live in Amsterdam at Bimhuis Jazz Club. Now younger brother Wynton has provided the suite with a new spin, a big band treatment arranged by Marsalis for his Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra. The suite opens with the familiar four bass notes that are followed by a ...