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Season's Groovings
by Jack Bowers
While I can take credit for writing this month's column, credit for the idea itself must be given elsewhere. My wife recently wandered by the computer while I was hard at work on some review or other and asked, “Why don't you write a column for December on big-band music for Christmas?" Which is exactly what ...
Shoreline Community College: Dig This
by Jack Bowers
There was a time not long ago when college–level Jazz Studies programs didn’t exist. Aspiring musicians learned by listening to the radio or phonograph records, catching personal appearances by well–known groups, or hauling their instruments to local Jazz spots for on–the–job training. The University of North Texas broke the logjam, and today schools from coast to ...
Cal Poly Bands: 12 Seconds to the Moon
by Jack Bowers
Although everything is well–played (despite generally low–grade sound quality), there isn’t much of interest to the Jazz enthusiast in this hour–long recital by the various Cal Poly ensembles aside from the three selections (“Ain’t It Wonderful,” “Cat Race,” “Purple Porpoise Parkway”) recorded by the University Jazz Band. The larger Mustang Band does include among its five ...
Poncho Sanchez: Afro-Cuban Fantasy
by Jack Bowers
If I’d been programming the latest rhythm–saturated release by master conguero Poncho Sanchez and his band, I would have led with the Jazzy mambo/samba “Sambroso” and followed with Dianne Reeves’ marvelous vocal on the ballad “Darn That Dream.” So much for criticism. Everything else here is beyond reproach, from the standards (“Willow Weep for Me,” “Close ...
Rosemary Clooney / Count Basie Orchestra: At Long Last
by Jack Bowers
An early front–runner in the race for most appropriate album title — and most enchanting Jazz/pop album — of the year. If ever there were a symbiotic relationship, this has to be it. Rosie Clooney’s pared–down, smooth–as–syrup vocals and the Basie orchestra’s impetuous brass, reeds and rhythm merge together like bread and butter, ham and eggs, ...
Maynard Ferguson & Big Bop Nouveau: Brass Attitude
by Jack Bowers
Even after traveling the world over, often in primitive conditions, enduring countless one–night stands in towns large and small, and playing lead trumpet in groups of all shapes and sizes, Maynard Ferguson has never wavered in his love for Jazz or lost his enthusiasm for blowing — an enthusiasm that leaps out and grabs you whenever ...
University of Kentucky Jazz Ensemble: Dialogues
by Jack Bowers
The third recording on disc by the University of Kentucky Jazz Ensemble mirrors the forward–leaning temperament of its leader, Miles Osland, with venturesome charts by Bob Mintzer, Gordon Goodwin, Don Menza, Bill Holman and Bryan Murray sharing the bill of fare with more accessible works by Juan Tizol, Gary Foster, Bob Florence, Albert Alva, Ernie Watts ...
Daniel Ian Smith / Yuki Arimasa: Dialogues
by Jack Bowers
These fastidious dialogues between saxophonist Daniel Ian Smith and pianist Yuki Arimasa are seldom less than engaging, sometimes even seductive — but like Pavlov’s dogs, every time Arimasa made an entrance I listened for the sound of bass and drums. It never came. Hidebound traditionalist that I am, I missed it. Others may not. To them ...
Denise Mangiardi: Fine Tuning
by Jack Bowers
This is an earlier release (recorded about three years ago) by vocalist Denise Mangiardi, whose more recent River of My Own we reviewed in November. Again, it consists primarily of her own compositions (eight of eleven) and again, Mangiardi’s lyrics are on the whole inscrutable (at least, to this listener; others may find them easily comprehensible). ...
Bob Lark: First Steps
by Jack Bowers
Most Jazz educators are enterprising players in their own right, and many have an understandable urge to plunge into the far–flung ocean of performance and splash around from time to time. Trumpeter Bob Lark, whose day gig is coordinator of Jazz Studies at Chicago’s DePaul University (and whose resumé includes a doctorate in Jazz performance from ...
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