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Making A Jazz Blockbuster
by Jeff Fitzgerald, Genius
Reprinted from June 2005. Hey kids, summer will soon be upon us like Julie Kaiser in 10th grade; long, hot and filled with endless entertainment possibilities. So let's make a jazz-themed summer blockbuster movie. It'll be fun, educational, bring newfound attention to jazz, and might just earn us all enough money to plunge ourselves ...
Yana Bibb: Afternoon In Paris
by Chris Mosey
In the beginning: Leon Bibb. Born 1922, he sang at the first ever Newport Folk Festival, was a friend of Paul Robeson and, like him, blacklisted in the McCarthy era for his left-wing sympathies. After fighting segregation in Mississippi in the 1960s, he went to live in Canada. Next came his son, Eric ...
Cedric Burnside Project at 2016 Juke Joint Festival
by C. Michael Bailey
Cedric Burnside Project Delta Theater Juke Joint Festival Clarksdale, MS April 16, 2016 The Mississippi River Delta is an imperfect song played perfectly by an old woman losing her mind... It occurred to me, as the bus in which I was riding, passed through what approximates downtown Des ...
Jazz Musician of the Day: Bessie Smith
All About Jazz is celebrating Bessie Smith's birthday today! “Empress of the Blues” She embodied the meaning of the blues, living the life she sang about. Bessie Smith set the standard for blues singers on how it should be done. Bessie Smith, born on Apr. 15, 1894, in Chattanooga, Tennessee, was one of ten children. Her ...
Steve Miller and Jimmie Vaughan at Jazz at Lincoln Center
by Nick Catalano
No matter what the style where African-American influences and developments upon the modern music scene have been pervasive--work songs, ragtime, jazz, stride, and boogie-woogie, the most important contribution has been the Blues. The country Blues as heard by pioneers such as Robert Johnson, The City Blues epitomized by Ma Rainey and Bessie Smith, Rhythm n' Blues ...
Sue Sheriff: Better Than Anything
by C. Michael Bailey
It was in one of those art pieces often used to close an hour out on National Public Radio where a jazz vocalist was being interviewed about the durability and longevity of the Great American Songbook." The singer remarked that as long as listeners age and have life experience, the standards composed between 1920 and 1960 ...
New Release "Angels" by Andy Scott, Featuring Cyrus Chestnut, Dezron Douglas And Evan Sherman
Andy Scott is a jazz singer… but that’s like saying Al Pacino is an “actor” and Julia Childs a “cook.” Scott comes from the tradition of the classic ballad/American Songbook style but he’s not “retro”—like the best singers he melds the best of the past with the immediacy of the Eternal Now, with an eye on ...
Stan Getz
by Mark Barnett
The story of Stan Getz (1927-1991) has to begin with Lester Young. Before Young, tenor sax players seemed awash in testosterone. Their sound was full, rich, deep, blown hard out of the instrument's lower registers, with emotion pouring out in lavish swoops and honks. Then along came Lester. In the post-war 1940s, he invented a new ...
Spirit Of Abbey Lincoln Invoked Through Up And Coming Jazz Singer's Theatrical Tribute And New Album Release
For two weekends in March, up and coming jazz singer-songwriter Kosi, accompanied by a four-piece band of world class musicians (Brendon Biagi, Aron Marchak, Christopher Hall, and Isaiah Pierce), will be performing a tribute to recently departed jazz icon Abbey Lincoln at the WOW Cafe Theater in New York City. This tribute, called Ghosts Appearing through ...
Danielle Reich: While We Were Dancing
by C. Michael Bailey
The Austin Texas satellite of the Houston Jazz Mafia, vocalist Danielle Reich, follows her debut recording This Year's Kisses (Self Produced, 2011) with a stripped-down recital right out of the heart of the Great American Songbook. Reich pares down her piano-led standard hard bop quintet to a guitar-driven (capably played by Mitch Watkins) trio. Less is ...


