Results for "Joe Zawinul"

Joe Zawinul

It may be a word overused but there isn't truly a more appropriate way to describe keyboardist/composer Joe Zawinul.

Austrian born, Joe Zawinul emigrated to the US in 1959 where he played with Maynard Ferguson and the great Dinah Washington before joining alto saxophonist great Cannonball Adderley in 1961 for nine years. With Adderley, Zawinul wrote several important songs, primarily the slow and funky hit "Mercy, Mercy, Mercy" which reached the top on the Billboard magazine Pop Charts in 1967.

Zawinul then moved on to a brief but fateful encounter and collaboration with Miles Davis, just at the time Miles was moving into the electric arena. It was Zawinul’s tune "In a Silent Way", in fact, which served as the title track of Miles’ first electric foray, and Zawinul had a potent impact on Bitches Brew, as well.

Jazz-Rock-Fusion, Early Days: 1967-1971

By LEN DAVIS

We look at the early days of jazz-rock -fusion with music from 1967-1971 by Joe Zawinul Miles Davis John McLaughlin and Soft Machine. Playlist John McLaughlin “Extrapolation" from Extrapolation (Polydor) 00:00 Tony Williams Lifetime “Via The Spectrum Road" from Emergency (Verve) 07:14 Joe Zawinul “A Soul Of A Village" from The Rise And Fall ...

Roy McCurdy: From Cannonball to the Rochester Music Hall of Fame

By SCOTT GUDELL

When we placed a call from New York to Los Angeles in the early part of 2021, the articulate and vibrant drummer Roy McCurdy answered and quickly connected us back to the 1950s. He told us about his hometown of jny: Rochester, New York, his early days performing with Chuck Mangione and Gap Mangione and how ...

Chick Corea: The Passing Of A Giant

By DOUG HALL

The passing of a giant in all categories of jazz. Chick Corea, NEA Jazz Master, 22-time Grammy Award winner, keyboard virtuoso as pianist, composer and arranger has earned, by contribution and breadth of musicianship, all the accolades, awards and recognition. If ever the title applied: a legendary figure in jazz. Beyond Corea's range of solo compositions ...

Eshed Korten Biolcati Kim: A Way Out

By FRIEDRICH KUNZMANN

One of the more exciting scenarios in jazz unfolds when a group of players comes together, not to realize one individual's specific vision, but just for the sake of making music together and to develop a chemistry which, ideally, was there from the beginning. The group effort here presents the fruits of such an occasion. A ...

Chris Nordman Trio: High Wire

By JACK BOWERS

Time was when people retired to Florida to bask in the sunshine, play some golf and tend their backyard gardens. That was then; this is now. Pianist and organist Chris Nordman, who has roamed the world for more than half a century as a working musician and now calls Florida home, has no plans to rest ...

Yusef Lateef: An Alternative Top Ten Albums Blowing Cultural Nationalism Out Of The Water

By CHRIS MAY

A pioneer of global and modal jazz, the multi-instrumentalist and composer Yusef Lateef is only beginning to have his importance in the history of the music properly acknowledged. After languishing off-catalogue for decades, much of his output is being made available once more. A treasure trove of great jazz is out there waiting to be rediscovered. ...

Rez Abbasi: On balancing picture with music and shifting into Django mode

By FRIEDRICH KUNZMANN

To really distinguish oneself in today's vast universe of guitarists, even within the confines of jazz, more and more resembles a Sisyphus task. When so much has been said and done, a specific tone or distinctive vocabulary alone no longer suffice to set an artist apart from the crowd. It is only through the sum of ...

Rez Abbasi: Django-shift

By FRIEDRICH KUNZMANN

Talking about shifting. American guitarist Rez Abbasi seems capable of shifting shape and changing form from one project to the next like a creature from a J.R.R. Tolkien adventure—almost beyond recognition. If it weren't for the guitarist's inspired fret fingerings and rushed scale runs giving him his utterly unique spark. Between much praised quintet ...

Samuel Hällkvist: Epik Didaktik Pastoral

By CHRIS MAY

Swedish guitarist Samuel Hällkvist's rifftastic electric trio plays an exhilarating mixture of jazz, prog rock and minimalist music. Riffs aside, the key ingredients are cross rhythms, rhythmic displacement and lavish servings of MIDI-enabled keyboards and tuned percussion. The result is heavy on the tension and light on the release. A close comparator is Swiss keyboard player ...