March 9, 2010

Happy Birthday Ornette Coleman, roots avant-gardist

Composer, conceptualist and multi-instrumentalist Ornette Coleman, b. March 9 1930, is widely known for "free jazz" -- which is routinely depicted as the most abstract and daunting music to emerge from the U.S. But this overlooks Ornette's deep roots in blues from the Southwest and his fealty to the freedom of expression, mobility and individuality that has made the U.S. great.
Continue reading Happy Birthday Ornette Coleman, roots avant-gardist .
March 9, 2010 12:23 PM | | Comments (2)
March 4, 2010

Anti-jazz, the still-new thing
International House Philadelphia hosts a series way beyond old jazz conventions, with roots in the wild stuff fav' son John Coltrane blew in 1961. I delve into the 50-year controversy for PMP  online magazine of the Philadelphia Music Project here, before the Art Ensemble of Chicago plays what it's come to on Saturday, March 6.
Continue reading Anti-jazz, the still-new thing.
March 4, 2010 11:53 PM | | Comments (0)
March 3, 2010

Breadth-of-jazz radio WKCR fetes Ornette, Bix
Next week WKCR-FM 89.9 www.wkcr.org, promises all-day music of Ornette Coleman and Bix Beiderbecke, linking the "free jazz" iconoclast (turning 80 Mar 9) to the Roaring '20s jazz-mad kid cornetist/pianist (who would be 107 on March 10, if he hadn't drunk himself to death at age 28 in 1931). Mark your calendars now! 
Continue reading Breadth-of-jazz radio WKCR fetes Ornette, Bix.
March 3, 2010 11:17 AM | | Comments (3)
February 27, 2010

Piano love, NYC edition
Under-sung, mid-career jazz pianists of innovative distinction in New York City -- the topic of my new column in City Arts - New York's Review of Culture -- considerations prompted by David Hajdu's NYT magazine feature on Fred Hersch. Who'd I leave out?
Continue reading Piano love, NYC edition.
February 27, 2010 4:29 PM | | Comments (3)
February 24, 2010

Threadgill talks, Zooid photo'd
Composer-saxophonist Henry Threadgill performed his quicksilver music with quintet Zooid at the Jazz Gallery a few days back: here are the photos. He talked at Jazz at Lincoln Center, also: a brief synopsis.
Continue reading Threadgill talks, Zooid photo'd.
February 24, 2010 4:23 PM | | Comments (0)
February 20, 2010

What if B.B. King and Buddy Guy played NYC and nobody came?
B.B. King, 84 yr old #1 living blues icon of the world, and Buddy Guy, 73 yr old 1st runner-up, concertized in New York City last weekend, but there's been a near-total news blackout. Here's a review from the Financial Times of London. Meanwhile, Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton, British blues pretenders (as in pretenders to the throne) rated a three-column photo and full front page New York Times arts section review,
Continue reading What if B.B. King and Buddy Guy played NYC and nobody came?.
February 20, 2010 4:04 PM | | Comments (3)
February 12, 2010

NYC blues extra: Grammy winner Honeyboy Edwards @ BB King's
City Arts, for space reasons, left off the last graph I'd submitted: True blue fans will flock to hear David "Honeyboy" Edwards, running buddy of legendary Robert Johnson and recipient of a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, at B.B. King's March 11. Edwards is 95, a lifetime achievement for any blues musician, and according to this report from two years ago, he can still play. Continuing with the strength that it has for more than 100 years is an achievement for the blues itself, and American culture, too.


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February 12, 2010 12:53 PM | | Comments (2)
The blues in NYC
My column  http://tinyurl.com/NYCblues in City Arts - New York's Review of Culture, focuses on America's deep, dark musical strain as it is today in a blues-challenged city. It doesn't mention that Wynton Marsalis is the world's greatest blues trumpeter, as he proved last night playing "bread and butter" from the Count Basie songbook with the Jazz at Lincoln Center orchestra, a show repeated tonight (2/12) and Saturday.
Continue reading The blues in NYC.
February 12, 2010 7:03 AM | | Comments (2)
February 11, 2010

Robert Dick's big bad flute
Flutists drawn to the instrument's floating high pitch also want to get down, according to Robert Dick, world master of the contrabass flute and extended flute techniques. He demonstrated this truism Monday at Dixon Place (NYC) with an improv titled "Fumarole," after the undersea vents for volcanic gasses that support unique ecosystems and lifeforms. It sounded like little else I've ever heard.
Continue reading Robert Dick's big bad flute.
February 11, 2010 10:40 AM | | Comments (0)
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Jazz Beyond Jazz

What if there's more to jazz than you suppose? What if jazz demolishes suppositions and breaks all bounds? What if jazz - and the jazz beyond, behind, under and around jazz - could enrich your life?

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Howard Mandel HM2.for%20web.jpg I'm a Chicago-born and New York-based writer, editor, author, arts producer for National Public Radio -- for more than 30 years, a freelance arts journalist working on newspapers, magazines and websites, appearing on tv and radio, teaching at New York University and elsewhere. I'm president of the Jazz Journalists Association. more

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Interviews & Articles

Rashied Ali (1935 - 2009), multi-directional drummer, speaks 

A 1990 interview with drummer Rashied Ali, about his relationship with John Coltrane.

On The Corner program notes, Merkin Hall concert 5/25/09 

Miles Davis intended On The Corner to be a personal statement, an esthetic breakthrough and a social provocation upon its release in fall of 1972. He could hardly have been more successful: the album was all that, though it has taken decades for its full impact to be understood.

Joe Zawinul at 65, The Wire 

Interview with Joe Zawinul, The Wire, 1996

Jazz Festivals 

....good for cities, musicians, audiences. Hear it on NPR audio_icon.gif

The Makers of Jazz Beyond Jazz 
Over the course of three decades, I've been privileged to get behind the scenes and meet heroic creators of jazz as well as up-and-comers, innovators and exemplars of many other genres. Please enjoy these archival interviews and articles.

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