Results for "band/orchestra"

International Sweethearts of Rhythm

Active since: 1937

International Sweethearts of Rhythm - band/ensemble This was the first racially integrated women's band and it lasted for over a decade, playing to primarily black audiences in theaters and ballrooms across the country. At the Howard Theater in Washington, D.C., the band set a new box office record of 35,000 patrons in one week of 1941. The band was founded in 1937 at the Piney Woods Country Life School for poor and orphaned black children in Mississippi. The intent was for the group to be a profit-making enterprise to support the school. However, by 1941 the Sweethearts severed their ties with the school, moved to Virginia and recruited some seasoned professionals

Incognito

Active since: February 19, 1979

The enduring success of Incognito is one of the great stories of UK music during the last four decades. Look at the recent history of soulful UK artists and you will find any number of short-lived acts that have achieved pop success. Narrow it down to those that have created a uniquely British sound and have endured as a global phenomenon on their own terms, and the list becomes short. Dues, then to Jean-Paul “Bluey” Maunick and Incognito, formed in 1979 and celebrating almost 40 years of positive vibes and undiluted Jazz Funk and Soul. A central component of the band’s massive and passionately loyal fan base has always been their powerful and energetic live shows. The band has never lost it’s creative drive since conception

ICP Orchestra

In 1958, guitarist Jim Hall, in notes to a Jimmy Giuffre record, used the term "instant composition" to describe improvising. A few years later, Misha Mengelberg, knowing nothing of this, recoined the term, and it stuck. A quiet manifesto, those two English words countered notions that improvising was either a lesser order of music-making than composing, or an art without a memory, existing only in the moment, unmindful of form. Misha's formulation posited improvisation as formal composition's equal (if not its superior, being faster). Yes but: Misha says he was thinking of "instant coffee," stuff any serious java drinker (count Misha in: espresso cup rattling in its saucer announces his approach to a stage) recognized as a sham substitute, however aggressively sold

Holmes Brothers

Over the course of their 30-plus year career, The Holmes Brothers (bassist/vocalist Sherman Holmes, guitarist/pianist/vocalist Wendell Holmes, drummer/vocalist and brother-in-spirit Popsy Dixon) have been feeding the souls of their devoted and ever-growing fan base with a joyous and moving blend of blues, gospel, soul, R&B, rock ‘n’ roll and country. Their amazing three-part harmony singing, mixing Wendell’s gruff and gravelly vocals with Popsy’s soaring falsetto and Sherman’s rich baritone brings the soul and spirit of gospel music into everything they perform. Equally gripping is the rhythmic foundation laid down by Sherman’s bass playing and Popsy’s drumming, perfectly complementing Wendell’s blues-soaked guitar solos and church-inspired piano playing

Woody Herman

Active since: May 16, 1913

After early experience in Chicago with the bands led by Tom Gerun and Harry Sosnik, Woody Herman toured with Gus Arnheim. In 1934, he joined Isham Jones, and when Jones's group disbanded in 1936 Herman used its leading sidemen as the nucleus for his own orchestra. This band went through a number of changes of personnel, such as the inclusion in 1943 of Chubby Jackson and in 1944 of Neal Hefti, Ralph Burns, Flip Phillips, and Bill Harris (by the mid-1940s, under the name Herman's Herd, it was internationally famous for the force and originality of its music. Herman reformed the band in 1947, and the distinctive feature of the Second Herd was the group of saxophonists (three tenor and one baritone) who came to be known as the Four Brothers; among the musicians who played in the section were Serge Chaloff, Stan Getz, Zoot Sims, Al Cohn, and Gene Ammons. After the demise of the Second Herd in 1949, Herman continued to lead bands; these were perhaps less creative, but their consistently high level of musicianship assured his continuing reputation

Heath Brothers

Headless Household

Born: October 12, 1983

A slippery vehicle of a band which takes liberal detours around its jazz basis, Headless Household has often ventured into rock, polka, free improv, and surf territory in search of...something to do. They released their eponymous debut album on the Household Ink label in 1987, a Christmas tape the same year, and their first CD, Inside/Outside USA in 1994. ITEMS came out in 1996, Free Associations in 1999, and their fifth album, mockhausen, in 2000. In November, 2003, they released post-Polka, a quasi-concept album in polka music is graced with echoes of funk, C&W, punk, Nino Rota, Frank Zappa, Charlie Parker, and other musical ideas along the way..

Harlem Hamfats

Despite their name, the Harlem Hamfats were not from Harlem, but were based in Chicago, and were put together by record producer and entrepreneur J. Mayo Williams simply for the purpose of making records, perhaps the first group to be so created. None of the members of the band were actually from New York. "Kansas" Joe McCoy (guitar, vocals) and his brother "Papa" Charlie McCoy (guitar, mandolin) were from Mississippi; Herb Morand (trumpet, vocals), John Lindsay (bass), and Odell Rand (clarinet) were from New Orleans; Horace Malcolm (piano), Freddie Flynn (drums) and Pearlis Williams (drums) were from Chicago

Greyboy Allstars

On the heels of highly successful reunion tour last year, The Greyboy Allstars met in the studio for the first time in a decade to make What Happened to Television?, which is also the group's first collaboration with DJ Greyboy since their seminal 1995 debut, West Coast Boogaloo. As on that album, which featured former James Brown musical director Fred Wesley, one hears on What Happened to Television? elements of the old-school funk and soul that have always preoccupied the band's namesake DJ, who returns here as co-producer in addition to performing on a track. It was as an extension of Greyboy's weekly residency spinning records at San Diego's now defunct Green Circle Bar that the Allstars first formed in 1993-a diversity of emerging independent musicians who coalesced around a scene-defining DJ and his unique ear for music

Grand Kalle & L'African Jazz

Joseph Kabasele Tshamala was born 1930, in Matadi, Zaire. Considered as the father of modern Zairean music, Kalle's earliest musical experiences were as a member of the church choir in his home town of Matadi. Moving to Kinshasa in 1950, he worked with Orchestre De Tendence Congolaise, a band that specialized in acoustic polka and mazurka rhythms, derived from records brought to the country by colonial settlers. In 1953, keen to develop a genuinely Congolese style, he formed African Jazz, based on the Afro-Cuban tradition and in particular the rumba, samba and cha cha, all played in a distinctively Congolese fashion. African Jazz and later African Team spanned the era from the Belgian colony of the late 1950's to the Independence movement of the mid '60's