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Louis Stewart's Out On His Own: A Landmark Solo Guitar Recording
by Ian Patterson
Dublin's finest export? Not Guinness, but Irish jazz guitarist Louis Stewart (January 5, 1944--August 20, 2016). A guitarist of tremendous skill, invention and personality, Stewart was certainly the first world-class jazz musician to emerge from Ireland and make a name on the international stage. During a fifty-plus-year career, Stewart played with Benny Goodman, Lee Konitz, Clark Terry, Tubby Hayes, Joe Williams, J.J. Johnson, George Shearing, James Moody and fellow six-string maestro Martin Taylor. Not bad for a ...
read moreLouis Stewart & Noel Kelehan: Some Other Blues
by Ian Patterson
Hot on the heels of the reissue of Louis Stewart's seminal 1977 album Out On His Own (Liva Records, 2023)--one of the great solo jazz guitar albums--the revitalized label inspired by the Dublin guitarist launches another gem from its treasure trove of archival recordings. Previously unreleased, Some Other Blues captures Stewart in a duo setting with pianist Noel Kelehan, an important figure on the Irish jazz scene who mostly flew under the radar. It is something of a ...
read moreLouis Stewart: Out On His Own
by Ian Patterson
In his lifetime, Irish guitarist Louis Stewart was probably more celebrated abroad than at home, winning the Best Soloist prize at Montreux Jazz Festival in 1968, playing in the house band at Ronnie Scott's and touring with Benny Goodman, J.J. Johnson and George Shearing. His third album, his extraordinary solo opus Out On His Own, was released in 1977 on Gerald Davis' Livia Records. The label folded upon Davis' passing in 2005, but thanks to Dermot Rogers the label and ...
read moreLouis Stewart & Jim Doherty: Tunes
by Ian Patterson
It seemed like a good idea at the time. It was a good idea at the time. Ireland's best known jazz musicians, guitarist Louis Stewart and pianist Jim Doherty have played together since the days of the famous Irish show bands in the early 1960s and have recorded together on numerous projects, but the idea to record a duo album of the jazz standards they cherish has taken fifty years to move from seed to fruition. The simply titled Tunes ...
read moreLouis Stewart / Egil Kapstad / Terje Venaas / Eyvind Olsen: Core Business
by Bev Stapleton
Given that music is one of Ireland's principal exports--be it rock from Van Morrison to U2, or the folk music that has found legions of followers across the globe--it's striking that there are so few international Irish jazz stars. Maybe the “craic" (and the porter) at those traditional sessions is so good that there's little incentive to lock yourself away learning jazz changes!The major exception, of course, is guitarist Louis Stewart, a veteran of the '60s Irish jazz ...
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