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Charles Earland: Black Talk!
by Jeff Dayton-Johnson
One of the all-time classic soul-jazz records gets its turn at remastering by Rudy van Gelder, the original engineer of the 1969 session. Charles Earland had a strong affinity for the organ, though he didn't start on the instrument. He began his career as a saxophonist, playing in groups with organists like Jimmy McGriff and Gene Ludwig before making his unconventional instrumental switch, eventually joining Lou Donaldson's group. His playing exploits the organ's capacity for sustain and ...
read moreCharles Earland: Black Drops
by Derek Taylor
“The Mighty Burner” isn’t the kind of moniker bestowed on just any man. Charles Earland earned it by cultivating one of the grittiest and greasiest organ attacks of the early Seventies. His skills behind the B-3 are in full effect on this smoldering slab of fusion-laced funk from '70. Regular sidemen like Pruden and Jones take their place beside surprise reed wild card Jimmy Heath in the horn frontline and dig into an eclectic set of standards from the jazz, ...
read moreCharles Earland: The Almighty Bu rner
by John Sharpe
Jazz/funk organist Charles Earland, who died on December 11, 1999 of a heart attack at age 58, began his musical career playing saxophone in a high school dance band. Earland switched to the Hammond B-3 in 1963 and like so many who have taken up that instrument he would never scale the heights or escape the comparisons to organ maestro Jimmy Smith. However, Earland did enjoy limited commercial success with a series of fine records during the late-60s and early-70s ...
read moreCharles Earland: The Almighty Burner
by Mark Corroto
The organ-jazz revival of the 1990s brought a flood of reissues from Jimmy Smith, Jimmy McGriff, and John Patton along with the new stars of the organ Joey DeFrancesco, Larry Goldings, and John Medeski. Charles Earland’s career got a boost too, reviving his 1960’s soul sound. Earland a bop-ishly straight-ahead B-3 man, died last year at the age of 58. His beginnings, with Pat Matino and Lou Donaldson, established a theme of the saxophone/organ and guitar/organ sound that could be ...
read moreCharles Earland: The Almighty Burner
by Mark Corroto
The organ-jazz revival of the 1990s brought a flood of reissues from Jimmy Smith, Jimmy McGriff, and John Patton along with the new stars of the organ Joey DeFrancesco, Larry Goldings, and John Medeski. Charles Earland’s career got a boost too, reviving his 1960’s soul sound. Earland a bop-ishly straight-ahead B-3 man, died last year at the age of 58. His beginnings, with Pat Matino and Lou Donaldson, established a theme of the saxophone/organ and guitar/organ sound that could be ...
read moreCharles Earland: Slammin' & Jammin'
by Douglas Payne
In a year notable by the too-high incidence of jazz losses, Charles Earland quietly left this planet on Saturday, December 11, 1999. Known as the Mighty Burner for the intense way he commanded the Hammond B-3, the always working, too-heavy 58-year-old Earland made his departure via heart failure following one last performance in Kansas City.Originally a saxophonist who taught himself the unwieldy organ during a sax stint in Jimmy McGriff's band, Earland made waves as Lou ...
read moreCharles Earland: Cookin' With The Mighty Burner
by Douglas Payne
Charles Earland - organ jazz's Mighty Burner -- hit hard in 1969 applying his own B-3 groove to soulful pop hits like “More Today Than Yesterday." After a fairly adventuresome set of records for the Prestige label in the early 1970s, Earland drifted to disco for Mercury in the mid-1970s and fusion for Columbia later in the decade. By the 1980s, the organist returned to his roots for the Muse label, cutting many low-key records in the lounge organ mode.
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Cleveland Time by Matthew Alec
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