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Article: Reassessing

New Faces - New Sounds

by C. Michael Bailey
May 8, 2020

The jazz name Wynton Kelly is typically associated with other artists' endeavors, such as John Coltrane's Giant Steps (Atlantic, 1959), Miles Davis' Kind of Blue (Columbia, 1959) or Wes Montgomery's Smokin' at the Half Note (Verve, 1965), just to mention three landmark recordings. While he always seemed best cast in supporting roles, Kelly did have a ...

Article: Reassessing

For Those Who Chant

by Peter J. Hoetjes
April 24, 2020

Luis Gasca was one of the hottest trumpet players in California during the 1970s, recording a handful of albums fueled by the drugs, the culture, and the excitement of that time and place. Though they all featured large ensembles, only one of them allowed some of the era's most legendary musicians to blur the lines separating ...

Article: Reassessing

Spodie's Back

by Jim Trageser
April 20, 2020

Still a teenager when signed to Quincy Jones' Warner Bros. subsidiary, Qwest, trumpeter Derrick Shezbie was nonetheless a veteran on this debut as leader--having been playing in the traditionalist Rebirth Brass Band for several years already. Produced by fellow Crescent City native Delfeayo Marsalis, “Spodie's Back" is a much more modernistic outing than anything ...

Article: Reassessing

In The Moment

by David A. Orthmann
February 9, 2020

The trail of splendid hard bop influenced recordings extends well beyond the genre's heyday of the 1950s and '60s. A case in point is trumpeter John Swana's appropriately titled In The Moment. The 1996 release on the Criss Cross Jazz imprint merits the exalted status of its celebrated predecessors. Captured in a one-day studio session, despite ...

Article: Multiple Reviews

Music Matters: SRX Vinyl

by Greg Simmons
January 10, 2019

Music Matters, the vinyl reissue house known for it's long string of high-quality all-analog pressings of classic Blue Note records, has released a dozen additional titles just a year or so after completing what was supposed to have been their final offerings. The new records include some that Music Matters had released in earlier series, as ...

Article: Reassessing

Full House

by C. Michael Bailey
January 12, 2018

Wes Montgomery's recording of his June 25, 1962 live performance at the Tsubo Jazz Club in Berkeley, California intersects significantly with two recent Resonance releases. One intersection involves the Wynton Kelly trio, comprised of pianist Kelly, bassist Paul Chambers, and drummer Jimmy Cobb. It was with this same trio that Montgomery would record his essential Wynton ...

Article: Reassessing

Of Things Not Seen

by C. Michael Bailey
January 8, 2018

How Jeff Baker avoided full coverage at All About Jazz is beyond me, but now is a fine time to write this wrong. In 2009, Baker took a professional and stylistic chance in producing a jazz treatment of songs from the American Christian Songbook, Of Things Not Seen. He had worked up to this bold statement ...

Article: Reassessing

Shorty Rogers: Short Stops

by Richard J Salvucci
May 22, 2017

In the 1980s, trumpeter and Kenton alum Mike Vax put together a Supersax-type group called TRPTS. It released an album of harmonized trumpet classics, one of which was “Short Stop." There are lots of great tunes including “Night in Tunisia," “Trumpet Blues and Cantabile," and “Heckler's Hop." Oh yeah, one I never heard, Shorty Rogers' Short ...

Article: Reassessing

Oscar Peterson & Stephane Grappelli: Skol

by C. Michael Bailey
October 10, 2013

Oscar Peterson and Stephane Grappelli Skol OJC 1979/2013 Music impresario Norman Granz (1918-2001) was a cagey so-and-so. When he inaugurated Pablo Records in 1973, he already had a catalog of recordings and an immediate pool of exceptional performers who also happened to be under his management (often making his acquaintance ...

Article: Reassessing

Dizzy Gillespie: Dizzy’s Big 4

by C. Michael Bailey
September 26, 2013

Dizzy Gillespie Dizzy's Big 4 OJC 1975/2013 Concord Music Group kicked off their Pablo Records 40th anniversary celebration with the releases of John Coltrane: Afro Blue Impressions (Pablo, 1963/2013) and Sarah Vaughan: Sophisticated Lady: The Duke Ellington Songbook (Pablo,2013) both supplemented by improved programming. These releases have been followed by ...