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Ornette Coleman (1930-2015)
Ornette Coleman, whose highly expressive approach to jazz jolted listeners and deeply influenced jazz, rock and funk musicians in the 1960s and beyond, died Thursday morning in Manhattan. He was 85. At about 10 a.m. yesterday, one of my Wall Street Journal editors emailed asking if I could turn around an appreciation for Speakeasy, the paper's ...
Ornette Coleman, Who Widened Jazz and Changed Its Course, Dies at 85
Ornette Coleman, the alto saxophonist and composer who was one of the most powerful and contentious innovators in the history of jazz, died on Thursday morning in Manhattan. He was 85. The cause was cardiac arrest, a representative of the family said. Mr. Coleman widened the options in jazz and helped change its course. Partly through ...
Paul Bacon (1923-2015)
Paul Bacon, one of the most highly regarded and imaginative book and jazz-album cover designers of the 1950s and beyond who is probably best known for his covers of Catch 22, One Flew Over the Cuckoo Nest and Portnoy's Complaint as well as art-directed jackets for early Blue Note releases and then Riverside LPs, died on ...
Famed Detroit jazz trumpeter Marcus Belgrave dies at 78
By Associated Press Marcus Belgrave, a jazz trumpeter who graced stages and studios with Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin, Dizzy Gillespie, Joe Cocker and Motown artists galore, died Sunday. He was 78. Belgrave died at an Ann Arbor care facility and the cause of death was heart failure, said Hazelette Crosby-Robinson, a cousin of Belgrave's wife Joan. ...
John T. "Bunky" deVecchis, 78, photographed jazz musicians
Bunky deVecchis would go into a dimly lit nightclub with a camera without a flash and capture jazz musicians in full cry in whatever light was available. He didn't like flash photography, and his subjects were appreciative. Nothing like working to nurse notes out of your instrument with a flash going off in your face. Ambient ...
Ron Crotty, Bassist, 1929-2015
Following yesterday’s post about recently deceased musicians, a Rifftides reader who identifies himself only as Derrick sent a message: I just heard that Ron Crotty, the original bassist of The Dave Brubeck Quartet, died just a few days ago, too, but I have not seen anything written about it. Which leads me to ask, has Ron ...
Bruce Lundvall, Longtime Blue Note President, Dies At 79
It's with great sadness that we announce the passing of beloved music man & longtime President of Blue Note Records, Bruce Lundvall. He was 79 years old. The cause was complications from a prolonged battle with Parkinson’s disease. Born in Englewood, New Jersey in 1935, Bruce was a lifelong jazz lover whose passion for the music ...
Bruce Lundvall, Blue Note Records Veteran, Beloved Jazz Executive, Dead at 79
Among his Grammy-winning signings: Norah Jones, Herbie Hancock and Bobby McFerrin. Bruce Lundvall, the former CEO of Blue Note Records and a key figure in jazz music, has died. He was 79 years old. Lundvall had been living in a senior assisted living center in New Jersey for complications related to his battle with Parkinson's, according ...
B.B. King (1925-2015)
It was bitter cold in 2011 as I waited for B.B. King's two tour buses to arrive at the Independence Events Center just outside of Kansas City. It was early January and one of those florescent late afternoons where everything seems to be in black and white and the sun takes a slide at 3:30. When ...
Marty Napoleon (1921-2015)
Marty Napoleon, a stride pianist who was as at home playing New Orleans and Chicago jazz as he was swing and who played with numerous bands and ensembles from the 1940s on, most notably Louis Armstrong and the All Stars, died on April 27. He was 93. [Photo above of Marty Napoleon and his late wife, ...
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