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Buddy Rich: In a Zone of His Own
by Jack Bowers
One of the channels that came with my Dish Network package is Classic Arts Showcase, which is a treasure trove of film clips documenting classical, ballet, folk, pop and other forms of music that one is unlikely to see anywhere else (although some footage is presumably available on YouTube, which more and more seems to encompass ...
Bob Brookmeyer: Jack of All Trades, Master of Valves
by Jack Bowers
Bob Brookmeyer, a Renaissance man among jazz musicians who died December 15, 2011, four days before his eighty-second birthday, will be remembered as many things: composer, arranger, musician, educator, outspoken arbiter who brooked no nonsense and wasn't shy about letting others know when he believed they were not giving the music he loved the best they ...
Stan Kenton-NOVA Jazz Orchestra / Baker's Dozen Big Band / Danny D'Imperio and the Bloviators
by Jack Bowers
Stan Kenton Orchestra / NOVA Jazz OrchestraDouble Feature, Vol. 2Tantara Productions2012 One of the more difficult aspects of reviewing Tantara's series of impressive salutes to Stan Kenton and his music is knowing where to begin. As on Volume 1 of the label's Double Feature (with Volume 3 ...
Ryan Truesdell: The Gil Evans Project
by Victor L. Schermer
Imagine the commotion when previously unknown manuscripts of Beethoven or Bach were discovered. In the jazz world, the equivalent of such an event might occur with regard to the music of innovators like Duke Ellington or Gil Evans. Indeed, that is exactly what composer-arranger-conductor-producer Ryan Truesdell has uncovered with Evans' music. He researched and found a ...
Ray Charles: Rare Genius
by Chris May
Concord's reissue of vocalist and keyboardist Ray Charles' albums for ABC-Paramount, the label he moved to from Atlantic in 1959, is a mixed bag. It includes two winners, The Genius Hits The Road (1960) and Modern Sounds In Country Music Vols. 1 & 2 (1962), a so-so concept album, A Message From The People (1973)--and, in ...
Al Cohn: Four Classic Albums Plus
by David Rickert
Saxophonist/clarinetist Al Cohn could have spent his life as either an arranger or a player, but fortunately he chose to do both, creating a series of records that weren't classics, but nevertheless reached the sublime and poetic elements of jazz. In this collection of four sessions, one is an orchestral session from the fifties, with charts ...
These Are a Few of My Favorite....Charts
by Jack Bowers
Whenever the topic of desert islands arises among jazz fans, the focus is invariably on which albums (discs) one would choose to cram into a suitcase if one were ever stranded on an otherwise barren island. While the consideration of particular arrangements seldom governs the debate, I really think it should. After all, few albums, however ...
Ray Charles: Original Album Series
by Chris May
Ray Charles Original Album Series Warner/Rhino 2010 (1957-61) Singer and pianist Ray Charles' period with Atlantic Records, from 1953 to 1960, which is the subject of Warner/Rhino's Original Album Series, was the most exciting in Charles' long and well documented career. Preceding the country music years which began ...
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 ...