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Musician

Doug Watkins

Born:

Douglas Watkins was an American hard bop jazz double bassist from Detroit. An original member of the Jazz Messengers, he later played in Horace Silver's quintet and freelanced with Gene Ammons, Kenny Burrell, Donald Byrd, Art Farmer, Jackie McLean, Hank Mobley, Lee Morgan, Sonny Rollins, and Phil Woods among others. Some of Watkins' best-known work can be heard when as a 22-year-old he appeared on the 1956 album, Saxophone Colossus by tenor saxophonist Sonny Rollins, with Max Roach and Tommy Flanagan. From that session, the tunes "Blue Seven" and "St. Thomas," especially, have become revered not only as evidence of Rollins' original genius but as fine examples of Watkins' work. According to Horace Silver's autobiography, Let's Get to the Nitty Gritty, Watkins, along with Silver, later left Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers because the other members of the band at the time (Kenny Dorham, Hank Mobley and Blakey) had serious drug problems, whereas Watkins and Silver were tired of being harassed and searched by the police every time they went to a gig in a new city and club. In 1958 Watkins would join Donald Byrd for a European tour, taking up extended residence at Le Chat Qui Pêche, a jazz club on Paris' Left Bank

Album

Wade Legge Trio

Label: Fresh Sound Records
Released: 2023
Track listing: Play, Legge, Play; Flabbee-Do; Bagdad Express; I Only Have Eyes for You; Perdido; Dream a Little Dream of Me; Wade Leg’s Blues; A Swedish Folksong (Dear Old Stockholm); Dance of the Infidels; Aren’t You Glad You’re You; These Foolish Things; Why Don’t You Believe Me; Sweet Sue, Just You; All the Things You Are; The Squirrel; Gene’s Stew; Spice; Music House; Joyce’s Choice; Spice; Bradley’s Beans; Sugar Hips.

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Article: Album Review

Dorothy Ashby: With Strings Attached, 1957-1965

Read "With Strings Attached, 1957-1965" reviewed by John Chacona


Imagine if Sidney Bechet, Charlie Christian and Jimmy Smith were barely remembered and recordings of their music were long unavailable and known only on the geekiest corners of Discogs. That is essentially the status of harpist Dorothy Ashby. Like the three figures cited above, Ashby essentially created a language for her chosen instrument, the harp, where ...

Article: Profile

Dorothy Ashby: With Strings Attached, 1957-1965

Read "Dorothy Ashby: With Strings Attached, 1957-1965" reviewed by Angelo Leonardi


Questo lussuoso cofanetto di sei LP in edizione limitata dedicato all'arpista Dorothy Ashby è un importante contributo che colma l'attuale vuoto di registrazioni e rende giustizia a un'artista tanto importante quanto dimenticata. Non troverete il suo nome sulle massime storie ed enciclopedie del jazz, e la sua morte prematura dell'aprile 1986 (aveva 55 anni) fu data ...

4

Article: Rising Stars

Introducing Bassist Adi Meyerson

Read "Introducing Bassist Adi Meyerson" reviewed by Sanford Josephson


This article first appeared in Jersey Jazz Magazine. As a teenager in Israel, Adi Meyerson played the electric bass and was “into fusion and rock, listening to Jaco (Pastorius) and stuff. I was about 17, and I think it was a family friend who gave me a bunch of Sonny Rollins albums. I kinda ...

45

Article: Building a Jazz Library

Horace Silver: His Only Mistake Was To Smile

Read "Horace Silver: His Only Mistake Was To Smile" reviewed by Chris May


In his sleeve note for the audio restored Horace Silver album Live New York Revisited (ezz-thetics, 2022), British writer Brian Morton cut to the chase. “[Silver]'s only mistake," he wrote, “was to smile while he was playing... a challenge to the notion that jazz should be deadly serious and played with a pained rictus."

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Article: Building a Jazz Library

Sonny Rollins: Ten Colossal Albums

Read "Sonny Rollins: Ten Colossal Albums" reviewed by Chris May


The history of modern jazz is a short one, but even so there are few musicians whose careers began in the bop era and who are still with us in 2022. Drummer Roy Haynes is one. Tenor saxophonist Sonny Rollins is another. Both players recorded with trumpeter Fats Navarro and pianist Bud Powell in 1949.

13

Article: Interview

Bill Charlap: Intellect And Emotion

Read "Bill Charlap: Intellect And Emotion" reviewed by R.J. DeLuke


"I don't ever remember a time when I didn't play the piano," reflects pianist Bill Charlap, who has become one of the giants of his generation on his instrument of choice, as evidenced by the array of other great players with whom he has performed. With his deft and agile approach he can summon a fiery ...

13

Article: Interview

Murray Brothers: A Law Unto Themselves

Read "Murray Brothers: A Law Unto Themselves" reviewed by Ian Patterson


They are two of the most promising jazz musicians to have emerged from Ireland in some years. Bassist Conor Murray and twin brother Micheal Murray (alto saxophone) grew up with Irish traditional music in the small, Gaeltacht—Gaelic-speaking—town of Falcarragh, in County Donegal. Both discovered jazz in their early teens and have been regulars at the annual ...

64

Article: Building a Jazz Library

Charles Mingus: An Essential Top Ten Albums

Read "Charles Mingus: An Essential Top Ten Albums" reviewed by Chris May


Charles Mingus was rarely a happy man and yet his music possessed a power to uplift listeners unlike that of most other composer / bandleaders before or after him. It still has that power in 2021, four decades after his passing and on the eve of his hundredth anniversary in 2022. In his personal life, too, ...


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