Results for "JazzWax by Marc Myers"

JazzDoc: Django Reinhardt

July 10, 2013

Django Reinhardt's guitar yearned for a time that never really existed. Like all nostalgia acts, Reinhardt was able to seduce listeners weary of  modernity and convinced that a better, simpler time existed long ago—before industrialization marginalized nature, space and leisure. In truth, of course, such times never really existed except in the imaginations of believers. But ...

The Future of Music

July 9, 2013

Over the weekend, the Wall Street Journal/Europe ran my interviews with John Cale, Robert Glasper, Joan as Police Woman and Ari Picker on the future of music. Since the Europe edition is unavailable in North America and my interviews needed to be shortened to fit, I thought I'd make them available here in their entirety... Robert ...

Bill Charlap: West Coast Jazz

July 8, 2013

West Coast jazz has many definitions, depending on your perspective. To some, this 1950s jazz style conjures up images of the Gerry Mulligan Quartet playing contrapuntal lines at the Haig in Los Angeles. To others, West Coast jazz means Hampton Hawes, Curtis Counce and Harold Land swinging hard at Shelly's Manne Hole. On Thursday July 18, ...

Paul Smith (1922-2013)

July 5, 2013

In the late 1940s and 1950s, few pianists moved as effortlessly and deftly between jazz and pop as pianist Paul Smith—who died June 29 at age 91. Instrumental pop, as a genre, came into its own after 1948, with the advent of the 10-inch LP. Pop back then still had plenty of swing but was really ...

10 Transistor Radio Hits

July 4, 2013

When I was a kid growing up in New York in the 1960s, July 4th meant playground sprinklers, visits to Palisades Amusement Park, nok-hockey, stickball, fathers wearing plaid shirts and shorts with black socks and shoes, and the brown radio in my bedroom. Listening to that radio, day and night, in July and August, I came ...

JazzVid: Woody Shaw

July 3, 2013

Between Woody Shaw's Muse albums in the '70s and '80s, he recorded for Columbia. One of his albums for the label was Stepping Stones, recorded live at the Village Vanguard in August 1978. On there was a song called Seventh Avenue, that captured the sounds of frantic traffic, harried pedestrians and a decaying city that was ...

JazzDoc: Oscar Petereson

July 1, 2013

Woody Shaw: Muse Box

July 1, 2013

Woody Shaw was the last of the statement trumpeters. Deeply influenced by Freddie Hubbard's blistering attack on the instrument, Shaw began his recording career in 1963 during a highly charged and transitional period in this country. His compositions, arrangements and playing style were highly personal and mirrored the frustration that many jazz artists felt given the ...

Interview: Phil Everly

June 28, 2013

The Everly Brothers were among the most influential vocal groups of the late 1950s and early '60s. Starting with By e Bye Love in '57, the duo transformed the way rock and folk sounded through 1967 after their string of hits crossed over from country to the pop charts. What's especially remarkable about their widespread impact ...

Dinah Washington on Video

June 27, 2013

Of all the many female jazz singers, Dinah Washington remains the most contemporary. Her voice was always cocked and loaded, her phrasing was akin to the sound of a getaway car, and her attitude told you she was not only charge but that you didn't really have a say. Washington was the embodiment of the crossover ...