Results for "JazzWax by Marc Myers"

Steven Allen and Oliver Nelson

August 1, 2018

Let's downshift slightly today during this week of little-known jazz albums with big-name arrangers conducting supersized orchestras. On Monday, I told you about Jimmy Smith's Portuguese Eyes (with Thad Jones) and yesterday I showcased Billy Taylor's Right Here, Right Now! (with Oliver Nelson). Today, let's look at two albums that Oliver Nelson recorded with TV host, ...

Jimmy Smith: Portuguese Soul

July 30, 2018

One of organist Jimmy Smith's most interesting albums is Portuguese Soul. Recorded for Verve in February 1973, the album remains unknown by many, largely because it was out of print for years. The album wasn't helped by the cover, which has a horror film poster thing going on in the design. Those who do know the ...

Interview: Chubby Jackson

July 27, 2018

Bassist Chubby Jackson is largely forgotten now, but in his prime he was one of the most dynamic band leaders in the late 1940s and '50s. For example, in 1949, his band featured Norman Faye, Al Porcino and Charlie Walp (tp); Mario Daone and Rob Swope (tb); Frank Socolow (as); Ray Turner and Al Epstein (ts); ...

The Gene Krupa Story

July 19, 2018

Cannonball Adderley on Kung Fu

July 16, 2018

Between 1972 and 1975, David Carradine starred in a TV series called Kung Fu. He played Kwai Chang Caine, a Chinese Shaolin monk in the Wild West with only his Buddhist spiritualism and marshal-arts skills. Throughout the series, Carradine's character helped those who were defenseless and did away with those who hurt or harmed them. Along the ...

T-Bone Walker: T-Bone Blues

July 12, 2018

In the early 1940s, when African-Americans in the South and Southwest moved north to the Midwest and west to Los Angeles in search of job opportunities at war-time factories, they packed their souls. As the Great Migration filled cities such as Chicago, Detroit and Cleveland and South Central in L.A., transplants from places such as Mississippi ...

Electrifying Track: Speak No Evil

July 11, 2018

On the day before Christmas in 1964, when tenor saxophonist Wayne Shorter recorded his fourth leadership album, Speak No Evil, he had already joined Miles Davis's second great quintet. The song Speak No Evil developed from Shorter's fascination with Buddhism and the concept that every action has a reaction, that every cause has an effect. As ...

"Groove" Holmes in Popsville

July 10, 2018

A good number of jazz organists of the early and mid-1960s were put in a box. Many of their albums from this period were larded with tedious original blues and a handful of ancient Songbook standards. This mind-numbing approach allowed labels to avoid steep copyright bills, but the strategy also resulted in countless dull cookie-cutter recordings ...

Django Festival Allstars

July 6, 2018

One of the best kept secrets in jazz is the Django Festival Allstars. Formed in 2002, they recapture the joyous and nostalgic sound of gypsy jazz made popular in Paris by Django Reinhardt and Stephane Grappelli just before World War II. It's infectious music, and once you hear it, you get caught up in the bounce ...

Videos: Jazz Guitars Galore

July 5, 2018

Last evening, before New York's July 4th fireworks, I was roaming around YouTube looking at footage of great jazz guitarists. Rather than tell you what I found, why don't I show you [pictured above, from left, are Johnny Guarnieri, Carol Stevens, Barry Galbraith and Milt Hinton in After Hours]... Here are guitarists Jimmy Raney and Scott ...