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Perfection: Paul Desmond, Any Other Time (1964)
Alto saxophonist Paul Desmond recorded six albums for RCA backed by guitarist Jim Hall between 1962 and 1965. One of the finest was Glad to Be Unhappy, recorded between July 1964 and early September. And on that album, the most exquisite track was Desmond's own composition “Any Other Time," recorded on August 20, 1964, with Eugene ...
Duke Ellington at 125 Years Young
April 29 marked the 125th anniversary of Duke Ellington's birth in 1899. Catching the Ellington bug over the weekend, I figured what better way to kick off the week than with seven celebratory video clips and a bonus album: Here's Ellington conducting the Dick Cavett band on August 8, 1969. Bill Kirchner sent this one along. ...
Backgrounder: Frank Rosolino - Frankly Speaking
In 1954, as the recording industry expanded to meet increased demand, Stan Kenton was keen on retaining key members of his orchestra. Many of these top artists were restless to make names for themselves and lead recording sessions. To keep them in the fold, Kenton launched an album series for Capitol under the banner “Stan Kenton ...
Art Blakey & the Jazz Messengers: Free for All
Art Blakey & the Jazz Messengers' Free for All was recorded in February 1964 and released in July 1965. Only four tracks were recorded, two per side. And yet the album is one of the hard-bop sextet's finest and most ambitious works. The band is firing on all cylinders. The lineup in 1964 featured Blakey on ...
10 Clips: João Bosco at Birdland Next Week
João Bosco, Brazil's legendary master of bossa nova and post-bossa nova pop known as música popular Brasileira will be making a rare appearance at New York's Birdland club next week, June 4-8. He'll be joined by Ricardo Silveira (guitar), Guto Wirtti (bass) and Kiko Freitas (drums). I don't know how producer Pat Philips does it, but ...
Backgrounder: Maynard Ferguson - Around the Horn
Recorded in November 1955 and May 1956, Maynard Ferguson's Around the Horn With Maynard Ferguson remains a spectacular album. All 12 tracks were composed and arranged by the late Bill Holman, and the band was top notch. The band featured Ferguson (tp,b-tp,vtb); Buddy Childers and Ray Linn (tp); Bob Burgess (tb); Herb Geller (as); Georgie Auld ...
Lee Ritenhaur and Dave Grusin: Brasil
Just as sunshine pop offered a counterweight to psychedelic hard rock in the late 1960s, soft jazz evolved in the 1970s as a lighter FM alternative to the mystical psychedelic jazz fusion movement. Two artists who helped pioneer soft jazz were guitarist Lee Ritenour and keyboardist Dave Grusin. Mind you, these categories weren't exclusive. There was ...
Take Five With Mandolinist Joe Brent
by AAJ Staff
Meet Joe Brent Called, “one of the truly exceptional musicians of his generation," a mandolinist about whom it has been said, “there has never been a mandolinist with greater technical skills," and a composer whose music, “touches and communicates the essence of what it means to be an alive, feeling human being," Joe Brent has forged ...
Backgrounder: Sonny Stitt's Night Crawler
When I was collecting Sonny Stitt albums as a kid in the early 1970s, my purchases divided into three categories: not bad, meh and perfection. Back then, there was no internet. Instead, I listened religiously to jazz FM radio stations and entered favorites in a small notebook that fit in my back pocket. Everyone I knew ...
John Pisano (1931-2024)
John Pisano, a Los Angeles studio guitarist who began recording in the mid-1950s and was so proficient that he appeared on some of jazz's finest chamber jazz recordings and pop's flashiest hits, died May 2. He was 93. [Photo above of John Pisano] Pisano, like dozens of other excellent Italian jazz guitarists of the era who ...
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