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John Bunch
by Laurel Gross
Pianist John Bunch has a lot of fantastic memories playing with such jazz luminaries as Benny Goodman, Woody Herman, Eddie Condon, Maynard Ferguson, Buddy Rich, Gene Krupa and as accompanist, musical director and conductor of major orchestras for Tony Bennett, but he recalls another “unforgettable" moment that wasn't so great.Even at 86 and still ...
Rahsaan Roland Kirk: Classic Black Classical Musician
by Tom Greenland
As the thirtieth anniversary of his passing (Dec. 5th, 1977) approaches, Rahsaan Roland Kirk remains a palpable presence and pervading influence, musically and personally. A complex man of seemingly paradoxical traits, he was a childlike prankster with old-soul wisdom, a self-touting egoist who humbly honored his musical forefathers, a tradition-bound futuristic pioneer, a highly combative man ...
Pat Martino: Consciousness
by Andrey Henkin
“I've always had an individualistic relationship to the instrument, almost to a degree of isolation with it. This is a heady statement from guitarist Pat Martino and it seems obvious, coming from a player with such a discernable voice. But, on the other hand, Martino has been often assigned roles and cut facets that are at ...
Fred Anderson: Customizing Conviction
by Lyn Horton
Carrying on tradition brings history through time without imitation. Not all musicians make it their job to ensure that the music of the past, while changeable as a result of the passage of cultural time, stays intact. It's all about new tunes and improvisation: the creation of music that upholds the tradition, with those to whom ...
Freddy Cole: Cole and Laid Back
by Ernest Barteldes
For Music Maestro Please (High Note, 2007), his seventeenth releases since I'm Not My Brother, I'm Me (High Note, 1990), singer/pianist Freddy Cole teamed with pianist Bill Charlap and his trio, featuring bassist Peter Washington and drummer Kenny Washington. The album features songs that, for the most part, the Georgia Music Hall of Famer (he was ...
Irene Schweizer: Ramifications
by Clifford Allen
One of the leading exponents of free piano playing in Europe from the late 1960s onward, Swiss-born Irène Schweizer occupied a somewhat lonely place in the high-energy FMP canon as she worked with Peter Kowald, Evan Parker, Manfred Schoof, the Wuppertal reedman Rüdiger Carl and others in European free improvisation's heyday. Renowned as a soloist and ...
Martial Solal: Solal Seul
by George Kanzler
Lorraine Gordon has been trying to persuade pianist Martial Solal to return to the Village Vanguard ever since his unfortunately timed debut there, with a trio, in September of 2001, shortly after the 9/11 attacks. Solal, claiming he was too lazy at his age to travel to New York (he was 80 this August, 2007), kept ...
Ralph Burns's "Summer Sequence": An Appreciation
by Reuben Jackson
It's no secret that the much heralded (and sometimes over romanticized) Big Band Era produced more than a few notable players and ensemble leaders. But it is also clear that for every, say, Duke Ellington and Claude Thornhill, these bands were also driven by the hard (and often undersung) work of arrangers, the best of whom ...
Joe Morello
by Andrew Velez
It was actually as a violinist that drums meister Joe Morello began his musical life at age five in his hometown, Springfield, Mass. A musician's musician, Morello (79), who now teaches and conducts jazz clinics in the US and Canada, has appeared on over 200 recordings. Still, it's safe to say his place in jazz history ...
Bill Frisell: Pursuing Beauty
by Nenad Georgievski
There are people in this world who are blessed with the gift of constant searching for the beautiful in a world that has gone terribly wrong somewhere. Bill Frisell is someone that is evidently on a quest such as that one. Clearly one of the most original and most proficient guitarists now playing, he is acknowledged ...
