Results for "Hank Jones"

Hank Jones

The oldest of the three Jones brothers (Hank, Thad and Elvin), Henry "Hank" Jones was born in Vicksburg, Mississippi and grew up in Pontiac, Michigan, where he studied piano at an early age and came under the influence of Earl Hines, Fats Waller, Teddy Wilson and Art Tatum. By the age of 13 Jones was performing locally in Michigan and Ohio. While playing with territory bands in Grand Rapids and Lansing he met Lucky Thompson, who invited him to New York City in 1944 to work at the Onyx Club with Hot Lips Page. In New York, Jones regularly listened to leading bop musicians, and was inspired to master the new style

Impulse! Records: An Alternative Top 20 Zeitgeist Seizing Albums

By CHRIS MAY

There can be little argument that a jazz label ever captured a zeitgeist more completely than Impulse! did during its original 1960s incarnation. In the US, the fight back against white racism was cresting, opposition to the Vietnam war was growing, outrage over the assassinations of figures of hope such as President Kennedy, Martin Luther King ...

My Early Years With Bill Evans, Part 1

By CHUCK ISRAELS

Bassist and composer, Chuck Israels was raised in a musical family. Paul Robeson, Pete Seeger and The Weavers were visitors to his home and the appearance of Louis Armstrong's All Stars in a concert series produced by his parents in 1948 gave Chuck his first opportunity to meet and hear jazz musicians. Chuck studied the cello ...

Jazz & Film: An Alternative Top 20 Soundtrack Albums

By CHRIS MAY

Jazz and the movies have a shared history stretching back almost a hundred years. The relationship came into its own in the US in the mid twentieth century. Elia Kazan's 1950 movie Panic In The Streets is an early example of how film makers used jazz-based soundtracks to enhance drama and atmosphere and create ambiances of ...

Fire Music: When Jazz Speaks Out - Part 3

By LUDOVICO GRANVASSU

As Martin Luther King put it in the opening address to the 1964 Berlin Jazz Festival, “Jazz speaks for life. The Blues tell the story of life's difficulties, and if you think for a moment, you will realize that they take the hardest realities of life and put them into music, only to come out with ...

Daniel Erdmann's Velvet Revolution Featuring Théo Ceccaldi & Jim Hart: Won't Put No Flag Out

By IAN PATTERSON

Chance meetings, in a French café with Théo Ceccaldi, and on the London-to-Paris Eurostar with Jim Hart, prompted Daniel Erdmann to found one of contemporary jazz's more unusual trios. The convergence of violin/viola, vibraphone and tenor saxophone is, perhaps, unique in the jazz firmament but, as the trio's fine debut A Short Moment of Zero G ...

It Takes Two to Jazz: Part II

By LUDOVICO GRANVASSU

Second part of this week's exploration of the duo format with a special emphasis on duos featuring saxophonists as well as drummers. For the first part of this show click here PlaylistBen Allison “Mondo Jazz Theme (feat. Ted Nash & Pyeng Threadgill)" 0:00 Vincent Peirani, Emile Parisien “Egyptian Fantasy" Belle Époque ...

Bruce Jones: Growing Up With Jazz

By LA-FAITHIA WHITE

The impact of living in a musical household, witnessing your dad and your uncles jamming in the basement can definitely create a positive and meaningful outlook for a young kid. Stories of growing up jazz come to mind for Bruce Jones, the eldest son of trumpeter, composer, and band leader Thad Jones. Bruce is also the ...

Mal Waldron: Free At Last

By KARL ACKERMANN

The sensitivity reflected in much of Mal Waldron's music was a deep aspect of his psyche. The Harlem-born pianist, who died in Brussels, Belgium, in 2002, worked downtown with saxophonist Ike Quebec at Café Society in the early 1950s and went on to record on several Charles Mingus recordings including Pithecanthropus Erectus (Atlantic), Jazz Composers Workshop ...

The Fred Hersch Trio: 10 Years / 6 Discs

By MARK CORROTO

You might be surprised by pianist Fred Hersch's response to a near-death coma in 2008. Quoting from his memoir Good Things Happen Slowly: A Life In And Out Of Jazz (Crown Archetype Press, 2017), “a confrontation with death brings home the preciousness of life... It was the newest, brightest, shining, most surprising, most uplifting feeling I ...