Results for "Oscar Pettiford"

Oscar Pettiford

Oscar Pettiford born in Okmulgee, Oklahoma, was a double bassist, cellist and composer known particularly for his pioneering work in bebop. Pettiford's mother was Choctaw and his father was half Cherokee and half African American. Like many African Americans with Native American ancestry, his Native heritage was not generally known except to a few close friends (which included David Amram). In 1942 he joined the Charlie Barnet band and in 1943 gained wider public attention after recording with Coleman Hawkins on his "The Man I Love." He also recorded with Earl Hines and Ben Webster around this time

Charlie Parker: Ten High Flying Albums Of Paradigm Shifting Genius

By CHRIS MAY

Born in Kansas City, Kansas in 1920, and brought up across the state line in anything-goes, jazz-friendly Kansas City, Missouri, controlled from the mid 1920s to the late 1930s by the spectacularly corrupt politician Tom Prendergast, alto saxophonist Charlie Parker lived fast and hard and passed in 1955, aged only 34 years. A founding father of ...

Blue Note Records: Lost In Space: 20 Overlooked Classic Albums

By CHRIS MAY

For anyone with a passion for Blue Note, it is hard to conceive of an album that has been “overlooked," let alone twenty of them. For connoisseurs of the most influential label in jazz history, the passion can be all consuming: if a dedicated collector does not have all the albums (yet), he or she will ...

George DeLancey: Paradise

By MARK CORROTO

Is it acceptable to label a musical recording as “delicious"? If so, it describes bassist George DeLancey's sophomore release Paradise. He presents eight compositions, half from his pen and the remaining from Oscar Pettiford, John Lewis, Thelonious Monk, and Jerome Kern/Oscar Hammerstein. The eight tracks, none of which tops five minutes, are well balanced with solos ...

Prestige Records: An Alternative Top 20 Albums

By CHRIS MAY

Along with Alfred Lion's Blue Note and Orrin Keepnews' Riverside, Bob Weinstock's Prestige was at the top table of independent New York City-based jazz labels from the early 1950s until the mid 1960s. Like those other two labels, Prestige built up a profuse catalogue packed with enduring treasures. Originally a record retailer, Weinstock ...

Riverside Records: An Alternative Top Ten

By CHRIS MAY

From 1953, when it was set up, to 1964, when it was acquired by ABC, Riverside Records rivalled Blue Note and Prestige as one of the leading independent jazz labels based in New York City. The founders of all three labels were jazz fans who operated on slim margins and became producers partly because they enjoyed ...

Dial "S" for Sonny

By C. MICHAEL BAILEY

Pianist Sonny Clark was culturally marginalized in much the same way as his contemporary Elmo Hope—both heroin-addicted jazz musicians in the 1950s: at the time, and romantically, a cliche. Both pianists have been sorely lumped into the “Bud Powell school of bop piano" which superficially may seem accurate until one considers the evolutionary continuum of jazz ...

Hard Bop: An Alternative Top Ten

By CHRIS MAY

Hard bop was the jazz centre of the world from the mid 1950s to the mid 1960s, producing many hundreds of immortal albums. Trying to whittle these down to a definitive Top Ten is fun—but it is a subjective and ultimately impossible exercise. In an attempt to dodge those hurdles, the list which ...

Manfred Eicher: ECM 50 at Centre Culturel Flagey, Brussels

By MARIO CALVITTI

This article first appeared at italia.allaboutjazz.com. ECM 50Centre Culturel FlageyBrussels, BelgiumNovember 21-24, 2019 During the year marking the 50th anniversary of the foundation of the German record company ECM, there have been numerous music festivals in Europe and America dedicated to the official celebration of the event. One of ...

Chuck Redd With the Kevin Bales Trio At The Jazz Corner

By MARTIN MCFIE

Chuck Redd with the Kevin Bales Trio The Jazz Corner Hilton Head Island, SC January 3-4, 2020 Masterful musicians make excellence look easy. It's not always immediately obvious, the quality becomes evident through its sustained presence, like a spreading smile. The band opened with “Tricotism" written by early bebop ...