Jazz Articles about Stan Levey

Stan Levey: Jazz Heavyweight

by Chuck Koton
December 4, 2016

Stan Levey: Jazz Heavyweight Frank R. Hayde 224Pages ISBN: #13978-1-59580-086-2 Santa Monica Press 2016 When one thinks of Bebop, the names Bird and Dizzy along with Monk, Max and Bud immediately pop up. In the mind's eye, one can see those classic Herman Leonard jazz photos of these Cats playin' in smoke-filled clubs like Minton's in Harlem and the 3 Deuces on 52nd Street. But someone else, virtually unknown, by comparison, deserves to ...

Stan Levey: Jazz Heavyweight

by David A. Orthmann
April 24, 2016

Stan Levey: Jazz Heavyweight Frank R. Hayde 224 Pages ISBN: #13-978-1-59580-086-2 Santa Monica Press 2016 During the course of Stan Levey: Jazz Heavyweight, Frank R. Hayde integrates Levey's personal perspective by frequently including excerpts of interviews released with the cooperation of the drummer's family. In a little over two hundred pages, Hayde's third person narrative and Levey's commentary illuminate a large complicated life filled with musical and personal transformations. Not unlike a ...

Drummer Stan Levey Improvised His Life with a Steady Beat

by Victor L. Schermer
April 16, 2016

Stan Levey: Jazz Heavyweight Frank R. Hayde 224 Pages ISBN: # 13-978-1595800862 Santa Monica Press 2016 The word “Heavyweight" in the title of this fast-paced biography of the late great jazz drummer Stan Levey is not just a metaphor for his reputation as a musician. Levey, in addition to having been a revered drummer who helped jump-start the bebop movement, was also a fair to middlin' prize fighter! Growing up in Prohibition ...

Stan Levey: The Original Original

by Jack Bowers
February 14, 2005

Stan Levey The Original Original StanArt Productions 2004

One of the real pleasures for me during the 32nd annual conference of the International Association for Jazz Education (IAJE) last January in Long Beach, CA, was shaking hands with one of the great drummers of the bop era and beyond, Stan Levey, who was there to promote a new autobiographical DVD, Stan Levey: “The Original Original."? Stan hasn't played drums in a number of years, ...

Ben Webster: Soulville

by John Ballon
October 27, 2003

I accidentally lucked into the music of Ben Webster while sifting through the “W" section of some dusty used record bin years ago. The cover looked cool, with its classic profile shot of an unsmiling, world-weary Webster featured beneath the boldly printed title, Soulville. I impulsively bought the disc, took it home, and a few days later got around to playing it. Whoa! Had I stumbled onto something BIG? From that record on, I no longer thought of jazz as ...

Ben Webster: Soulville

by David Rickert
May 11, 2003

A photograph on the inside of Soulville 's CD cover shows Webster with his head tilted back, eyelids drooping and a cigarette dangling from his mouth. It’s a great photo, simply because Webster approaches soloing in much the same way. A relaxed and patient improviser who first made his name with Ellington’s band playing one definitive solo after another, the tenor saxophonist really blossomed once he struck out as a solo artist where he wasn’t boxed in by the confines ...

Hampton Hawes: The Sermon

by David Rickert
May 14, 2002

Hampton Hawes recorded The Sermon a few days before he was sent to prison for five years on drug charges. The session remained imprisoned for much longer, only receiving a brief release after Hawes’ death. Finally out on CD, The Sermon, as one might expect, is an album of spirituals and church hymns given the jazz treatment. This concept has been tried before, but many of these projects are too solemn and reverent, or feature less jazz than ...