Results for "Memphis"

Julius Hemphill: Marty Ehrlich and Tim Berne Remember a Musical Visionary

by Dave Kaufman
September 20, 2026

Julius Hemphill, a brilliant alto saxophonist and extraordinary composer, was a towering figure in avant-garde jazz and creative music. Yet his body of work remains surprisingly little known, even among aficionados of this sort of adventurous music. Hemphill's music demonstrated a deep feeling for the blues and other African American traditions. His creative vision extended well ...

In Circuses and Carnivals, Sideshows Brought Black Music To The Heartland

by Arthur R George
May 30, 2026

Black musicians in circus and carnival sideshow bands from the late 1800s well into the Twentieth Century brought ragtime and what would become jazz and rhythm and blues to white audiences deep into Midwest agricultural regions. Trumpeter Lester Bowie, later known for the avant-garde Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM), ...

Art Edmaiston

Born: June 22, 1972

Arthur Glenn Edmaiston, Jnr. / Bhakti Lam-Mu

Memphis TN based saxophonist, improviser, composer and arranger

Arthur Edmaiston grew up in a very small town in NW TN and moved to Memphis to study music and learn from elders who still roamed the streets and recording studios of that famous music mecca.  After spending a few years playing Blues, Soul, Rock-n-Roll and R&B on Beale Street and in various clubs around town, Edmaiston got on the tour bus in the late 90's with Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Vocalist Bobby "Blue" Bland which began a 20-plus year ride across the globe.

Fate Marable’s Mississippi River Conservatory

by Karl Ackermann
November 24, 2025

In 2020, I published A Map of Jazz: Crossroads of Music and Human Rights (WS Publishing), a book that looks at the culture of jazz on a timeline with cultures of the world. At more than 500 pages, the book is incomplete by necessity; there is no well-marked path, and the history is sometimes nebulous. However, ...

The Black Entrepreneurs of Early Jazz

by Karl Ackermann
September 30, 2025

Preamble: In 2020, I published A Map of Jazz: Crossroads of Music and Human Rights (WS Publishing), a book that looks at the culture of jazz on a timeline with cultures of the world. At more than 500 pages, the book is incomplete by necessity; there is no well-marked path, and the history is sometimes nebulous. ...

Bob Sunda

    Bob Sunda was an incredible jazz musician and teacher. He was an upright bass player, piano player, and band leader whose music took him all the way to Tokyo. Born in Ohio, he played in Asia, New Orleans, Alaska, and eventually Memphis. He was a highly charismatic individual who made a positive impact on society. He especially made a positive impact on his students' lives when he began a teaching career in Memphis at Rhodes College.

    Bob was born in (..) to a family of (..)?. He began playing the bass at (..?) years old, and by (..) age he had accomplished (..?). He attended the Interlochen Academy of Arts at (..) age, and then moved to (..).

Ahmad Jamal: In his Own Sense of Time and Place

by Josef Woodard
April 20, 2023

This interview first appeared in the Santa Barbara News-Press on October 2005. The introduction has been updated. For the late, great and uniquely poetic pianist Ahmad Jamal, who passed on at age 92 on April 16, 2023, easy descriptors never sufficed in capturing his particular magic. He was a classicist, a modernist, a minimalist ...

2022: The Year in Jazz

by Ken Franckling
December 29, 2022

Current events impacted the jazz world in significant ways throughout 2022. In its third year, the coronavirus pandemic continued to lurk in some settings, while others recovered in robust fashion. Russia's war on Ukraine was felt by musicians and triggered an outpouring of support for its victims. Initiatives to ensure greater equity in jazz advanced. The ...

Richard Wilson

Richard Wilson is a soulful bossanova and jazz artist living and performing in Memphis. He writes smooth melodic songs with a bossanova and jazz feel.

His sound has been influenced by a wide range of music : basically everything from Dean Martin to Sergio Mendes and Brasil 66.

Performing live every week around Memphis in hotels and restaurants- he has become recognized as a familiar face on the music scene as a smooth vocalist and guitarist.

He has worked with Grammy winning producer Boo Mitchell at the legendary Royal Studios as well as Scott Bomar at Sam Phillips Recording in Memphis.

Cotton Pickin' Blues

by Martin McFie
March 28, 2020

Blues began with enslaved African peoples' work songs in the cotton fields of the Deep South of America. The Slave Narrative of Mr. Sam Polite, given at 93 years of age, chronicles that life. It was written on St. Helena, a cotton producing Sea Island in the Carolinas, where Mr. Polite was born into slavery. The ...