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Content by tag "Babatunde Lea"
Omar Sosa: Bringing The World To The World
Pianist/composer Omar Sosa was born in Cuba in the first decade of Fidel Castro's rule over the island, and grew up listening to forbidden American jazz with his music school friends in secret, the radio discretely turned low, though eventually the rules changed and the music was broadcast in Cuba, too. After Cuba and a short ...
read moreDave Bass: Gone
Gone, as pianist and composer Dave Bass reflects in his notes to this fine album, has many meanings: for the Beat Generation, it was a state of mind, but it can also suggest physical absence. Bass himself was gone for 20 years--out of the music business, following a wrist fracture in the mid-1980s. He studied law, ...
read moreDave Bass: Gone
California Deputy Attorney General, Dave Bass, is a legal eagle who has, once again, immersed himself in the musical passion that was his first love, soaring mightily on the impressive Gone. An attorney by profession and a pianist by design, Bass once supported himself as a musician, early on in his life, where he worked both ...
read moreDave Bass Quartet Featuring Ernie Watts, Babatunde Lea, Mary Stallings, and Gary Brown Release "Gone"
David Bass on Gone
The word Gone has several meanings for me...
There's the 20-plus years I was away from the music scene, then there's the feeling when your lover leaves and your heart breaks... alone and empty, and finally, the beatnik/hipster notion of an irrevocably cool person.
I have returned to music and am proud ...
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David Bass: Gone
If Dave Bass ever decides to give up his day job as a Deputy Attorney General, he can validate that decision based on the quality of Gone. Bass returns to jazz after more than twenty years, but his priors include stints with Bobby McFerrin, global percussionist Babatunde Lea, and interpretive jazz vocalist Jackie Ryan. His Gone ...
read moreBabatunde Lea Quintet tributes Leon Thomas at Catalina Bar & Grill
Babatunde Lea Quintet
Tribute to Leon Thomas
Catalina Bar & Grill
Hollywood, California
March 10, 2010
Four musicians quietly walked onto the Catalina Bar & Grill stage greeted by enthusiastic applause. But where was the bandleader? From the dressing room, Babatunde Lea sang to the packed room, with ...
Visionary Percussionist Babatunde Lea's "Umbo Weti" - A Musical Tribute to Leon Thomas
Visionary Drummer/Percussionist Babatunde Lea Releases UMBO WETI - A Musical Tribute to Legendary Jazz Vocalist & Songwriter Leon Thomas
Percussion virtuoso Babatunde Lea first envisioned a tribute to legendary jazz vocalist and composer Leon Thomas shortly after the singer passed in 1999. The efforts reach fruition on Lea's latest release for the Motma label, UMBO WETI. Featuring ...
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Babatunde Lea: Suite Unseen: Summoner of the Ghost
The summoner of the ghost goes on an African-inspired journey in jazz on Suite Unseen. That certainly says something for the music, and if that tag is the bait, then band of musicians that Babatunde Lea has gathered for the adventure is the lure. And there is no disappointment on this exciting journey with the call ...
read moreBabatunde Lea: Suite Unseen: Summoner of the Ghost
Suite Unseen: Summoner of the Ghost is yet another practical reminder that one should never judge an album by its cover. Or its shamanistic title or overwritten liner notes, for that matter. What looks conspicuously like a sprawling world music effort is actually a relatively straight-ahead jazz session linked by African folk chants and Afro-Caribbean polyrhythms. ...
read moreBabatunde Lea: Suite Unseen: Summoner of the Ghost
An homage to ancestral spirits sets the context for Babatunde Lea's Suite Unseen: Summoner of the Ghost. The drummer/percussionist and educator has created a suite with a unique jazz flavor, complemented by additional musical textures and held together by a spiritual overtone. The stylistic nuances together generate an imaginative piece of music that is unpredictable yet ...
read morePoll Results
All About Jazz would like to thank the 4,000 members who participated in our poll to help us identify the world's top jazz venues. For a recap, click here.
Jazz Story
By Brian O'Connor
Member since: 2009
In the fifties I enjoyed latin music. Then in the sixties I heard Stanz Getz and Charlie Byrd with Desafinado. That led me on the path to jazz. Always interested in photography, so in the early '70s I started combining the two
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