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Why Benny Golson Was Special
The late Benny Golson was rare in jazz. Among his many gifts were original songs with catchy melodies, glamorous harmony and romantic sophistication, His improvisational style was both fluid and relentlessly elegant. Best of all, his music had a way of making you feel sexy and cool. For me, Benny was one of the Sensual Four—a ...
Backgrounder: Hank Mobley Quintet, 1957
Recorded in August 1957, Hank Mobely Quintet featured the tenor saxophonist fronting a band that had been an early lineup of Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers. The only difference was that Art Farmer played trumpet instead of Kenny Dorham. The quintet featured Hank Mobley (ts), Art Farmer (tp), Horace Silver (p), Doug Watkins (b) and ...
Perfection: Byrd and Adams — Bronze Dance, 1959
Trumpeter Donald Byrd and baritone saxophonist Pepper Adams recorded eight albums together between 1959 and 1970. Their combined sound was a perfect fit—Byrd's sweetly piercing trumpet and Adams's grunting attack on the baritone. Their first album together was Byrd in Hand, recorded in May 1959 for Blue Note. The lineup was stunning: Donald Byrd (tp), Charlie ...
Gillespie Quintet Live: Gillespiana, 1961
Like Duke Ellington's Sacred Concerts (1965, '68 and '73) and Chico O'Farrill's Second Afro-Cuban Suite (1954), Lalo Schifrin's Gillespiana is a jazz masterwork. Now, SteepleChase Records in Denmark has released Dizzy Gillespie Quintet: Gillespiana in Concert, recorded in Copenhagen on November 20, 1961. Gillespiana was a work originally written by Lalo for Gillespie's 16-piece orchestra. It ...
Fats Navarro: Nostalgia, 1946-'47
One of jazz's greatest losses due to drug addiction was the death of Fats Navarro in 1950 at age 26. The trumpeter's promise was extraordinary and only partly expressed and fulfilled. After Dizzy Gillespie, Navarro was probably a close second in terms of sheer sound, technique, improvisation prowess and the ability to navigate bebop from its ...
New Video: Sonny Rollins at Ronnie Scott's, 1974
On July 17, 1974, Sonny Rollins appeared at Ronnie Scott's jazz club in London, two years after his 1972 comeback after a lengthy sabbatical. At the time, a film was shot, then shelved and now, for the first time, it's up online. Sonny's band at Ronnie Scott's featured Sonny Rollins (ts), Rufus Harley (ss,bagpies), Yoshiaki Masuo ...
Sérgio Mendes (1941-2024)
Sérgio Mendes, a Brazilian jazz and hard-bossa pianist-arranger who relocated to the U.S. in 1964 and launched his Brasil '65 and '66 pop groups, died in Los Angeles on September 5 of complications from long Covid. He was 83. Mendes first performed in the U.S. at the famed Bossa Nova at Carnegie Hall concert in late ...
Dan Morgenstern (1929-2024)
Dan Morgenstern, an eight-time Grammy winner for his album liner notes, the former director of Rutgers University's Institute of Jazz Studies, author and a “jazz advocate," as he liked to be called, died on September 7. He was 94. Despite all of those titles, Dan was the music's most well-regarded historian and paternal figure among writers ...
Backgrounder: Brown & Roach - At Basin Street
Tenor saxophonist Sonny Rollins recorded several live club albums with Clifford Brown and Max Roach, but only two were done in the studio—At Basin Street and Sonny Rollins Plus Four. Though the former LP's title (for EmArcy) infers they recorded live at New York's Basin Street (not Basin Street East, which wouldn't open until 1959), they ...
Perfection: Herbie Mann - Manteca
Herbie Mann was a fascinating artist. Not only was he a masterful jazz flutist but he also crossed over to Latin, funk, soul, bossa nova and rock and pioneered world music. His curiosity and ability to adapt to various styles was almost unrivaled during the 1960s and '70s. One of his most popular Latin-jazz albums was ...
