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The Roma: The Roots of Flamenco, Gypsy Jazz, and Miles Davis' "Sketches of Spain"
by Martin McFie
In 1959, a magical year for jazz albums, Miles Davis, inspired by some flamenco performances he had heard, recorded Sketches of Spain (Columbia, 1960) at Columbia's 30th Street studio. Half of the album is a beautiful orchestral interpretation of the classical guitar piece “Concierto de Aranjuez," written twenty years before the Davis recording, by Joaquin Rodrigo, ...
Canaries In A Musical Mineshaft
by Richard J Salvucci
1955 was an interesting year. Disneyland opened in Anaheim, CA The Mickey Mouse Club made its TV debut. A quiz show called “The $64,000 Question," (we might call it, with reason “The $1,000,000 Question" today) was all the rage. The singer Donna Brooks briefly joined Hal McIntyre's band. At the relatively late age of 30, Philadelphia ...
Vince Guaraldi’s Christmas Sauce: Adding Spice to Charlie Brown Vanilla
by Arthur R George
It's not simply that pianist Vince Guaraldi slipped jazz past the unsuspecting in composing A Charlie Brown Christmas, the evergreen “Peanuts" animation and soundtrack that has become inescapably part of the holiday. First broadcast in 1965, going on to six decades ago, A Charlie Brown Christmas is a tradition unto itself. It returns to television through ...
Phil & Me
by Keith Henry Brown
When I first came to work at Jazz at Lincoln Center in 2001, I was deeply intimidated. I was hired by Wynton Marsalis himself, and I honestly wasn't sure how I'd do, working with such incredibly smart and talented people. Over time, I settled into a groove and made friends and allies. First among ...
The New York Jazz Museum: 1972-1977
by Howard E. Fischer
As a lawyer with a new office in 1967, I was sitting there trying to figure out how I was going to get clients. At that time, lawyers were not permitted to advertise. How different from today! I started reading the Village Voice newspaper and saw a two-line ad on the back ...
Alan Rubin: Mr. Fabulous in Every Way
by Nicholas F. Mondello
In the Hebrew language, the ancient word “Rubin" translates as “Behold, a son!" Yes, Alan Rubin, trumpeter, actor, studio phenomenon, beloved friend, respected colleague, loving husband and soulmate to his wife, Mary, was something to behold. Many people—even non-musicians— remember Rubin as a stalwart member of the “Saturday Night Live" and Blues Brothers Bands and as ...
Transforming A Popular Song
by Matthew Michael Sweeney
One of the most transformative experiences in my life happened while drifting around the Museum of Modern Art in New York a few years ago, standing in awe before Picasso's Seated Woman, one of the many “portraits" of his mistress Marie-Therese Walter. I was astounded at the huge discrepancy between her photograph, which was displayed along ...
Clifford Brown’s Trumpet and One Summer in Atlantic City
by Arthur R George
Part 1 | Part 2 For 22-year-old trumpeter Clifford Brown, the summer of 1953 in Atlantic City, New Jersey, was transformative. Playing with bebop elders, he cumulatively opened the door for what came next: a groove-oriented swinging style, in which small groups used structured arrangements like big bands, with room for improvisation, but less ...
The Mysterious Ms. Morel
by Richard J Salvucci
“Never heard of her." —Me “Rings a bell." —Angela Levey “An underground singer." —Terry Gibbs “The mysterious Ms. Morel." —Michael Steinman, Jazz Lives All these descriptions fit a singer from Philadelphia whose memory has almost completely faded. It's true, there are some web sites dedicated to following female singers ...
That Slow Boat to China: How American Jazz Steamed Into Asia
by Arthur R George
A kind of jazz was already waiting in Asia when American players arrived in the 1920s, close to a hundred years ago. However, it was imitative and incomplete, lacked authenticity and live performers from the U.S. Those ingredients became imported by musicians who had played with the likes of Joseph “King" Oliver, Louis Armstrong, Earl Hines, ...
