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Perfection: Phil Urso - P.U. Stomp (1952)
Man, tenor saxophonist and arranger Phil Urso could swing! And he pops up all over the place in the tastiest places. He was paired with Art Pepper on Picture of Heath (formerly known as Playboys); with Allen Eager at Birdland with Terry Gibbs in 1952; with Brew Moore in Kai Winding's Septet of 1953; with Zoot ...
Joe Diorio: A Guitarist's Guitarist
I first became aware of guitarist Joe Diorio in the1970s, when I bought a pair of Sonny Stitt albums on the Argo label—Move on Over (1963) and My Main Man (1964). I was instantly struck by how tasty Diorio played behind Stitt, especially his driving rhythm figures and fills. Born in Waterbury, Ct., in 1936, Diorio ...
Vince Guaraldi: Two Albums With a Latin Feel
Best known for his success composing and playing music for the Charlie Brown and Peanuts TV specials of the 1960s, Vince Guaraldi actually had a struggling jazz career through much of the 1950s. Born in the North Beach section of San Francisco, he started out playing with local vibraphonist Cal Tjader in 1951. His first leadership ...
The Airmen of Note Meets Stan Kenton
Today in the U.S., it's Memorial Day, a national holiday. To honor the men and women of the military who sacrificed their lives in service of our country and those we were defending, today we're listening to the Airmen of Note playing a set of Stan Kenton's music. Created in 1950 to continue the tradition of ...
Backgrounder: Marge Dodson - Lovely Way to Live
Vocalist Marge Dodson recorded just three albums. Her first two for Columbia were straightforward songbook efforts: In the Still of the Night (1959) and New Voice in Town (1960). But the third, for Decca, was way more interesting and so 1960s! A Lovely Way to Live (February 1968) was swinging, brash and groovy, from the psychedelic ...
Perfection: Harry James in the Late '50s/Early '60s
Two big bands that knock me out from the late 1950s and early 1960s are the ones led by Count Basie and Harry James. Both could swing the house sideways, but both knew when enough was enough. Basie, of course, invented the concept of just enough, but James's decade-straddling band is often overlooked for the same ...
Who Was George Adams?
The reason you may not be familiar with George Adams or his music is that much of it was recorded in Italy. Born in Covington, Ga., in 1940, the tenor saxophonist and flutist did most of his recording as a leader or co-leader in a range of Italian studios. Adams is probably best known for his ...
BBC Documentary: Jac Holzman's Elektra Records
Rock 'n' roll in the 1950s and pop rock in the early '60s had largely been a 45rpm affair. Even the Beatles' and Stones' early 12-inch albums were merely collections of three-minute singles. Then in 1966, along came Elektra Records, which had been founded in 1950 by Jac Holzman as a folk label. Thanks to lush ...
John Cameron: Off Centre (1969)
John Cameron has had some career. The British jazz pianist, arranger and composer of film, TV and stages scores came up at the height of Swinging London in the mid-1960s. He had been playing piano professionally since age 14 in his hometown of Croydon and he attended Cambridge University. One of his first pop jobs was ...
Backgrounder: Grant Green and Sonny Clark
Throughout jazz history, there have been magical pairings of musicians in recording studios. Sometimes the union was established jointly by the two musicians. At other times, producers brought them together. These couplings include Louis Armstrong and Jack Teagarden, Bix Beiderbecke and Frankie Trumbauer, Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis and John Coltrane, Shirley Scott and ...
