In the 1950s, the New Orleans saxophonist Al Belletto had a surge of international success with his sextet. A contemporary of Al Hirt and Pete Fountain, Belletto grew up steeped in traditional jazz as a clarinetist. But like Ellis Marsalis, Alvin Batiste, Ed Blackwell and other young New Orleans … [Read more...]
Archives for November 2006
Quote
Excuse interruption of music festival, please, but would mind repeating excrutiating sound made with assistance of cat intestine? --Charlie Chan to son Tommy, who has been playing "jazz" violin. From the motion picture Docks of New Orleans, 1948 … [Read more...]
Correspondence: Remembering Anita O’Day
Saxophonist, arranger and leader Bill Kirchner writes: Anita O'Day's passing reminded me of a week I spent working with her in the summer of 1982 at the Blue Note in NYC. I was part of her backup quartet: Mike Abene, piano; Rick Laird, bass; her longtime partner John Poole, drums; and myself on … [Read more...]
Quotes
Anita O'Day was my hero because she used four-letter words. That was really neat. I didn't myself say them for a long time, but I loved hearing her say them.--Carla Bley All I know is that there are four beats to a bar and there are a million ways to phrase a tune.--Anita O'Day ( Down Beat, circa … [Read more...]
Anita O’Day And Walter Booker
Over the long weekend, we lost Anita O'Day, who died in Los Angeles on Thanksgiving day. She was eighty-seven. The stalwart bassist Walter Booker is also gone, dead in New York on Friday at the age of seventy-three. O'Day was the last of the great female jazz vocalists who emerged in the swing era. … [Read more...]
Desmond, “Emily”
November 25 would have been Paul Desmond's 81st birthday. Less than two years before he died, he made a featured appearance at the 1975 Monterey Jazz Festival. He played Johnny Mandel's "Emily" with an all-star rhythm section that included pianist John Lewis, bassist Richard Davis and guitarist … [Read more...]
Followup: Bennett’s Arrangements & Voice
In our review of the Tony Bennett TV special, a question arose about the absence of arranger credits. The New York Sun's Will Friedwald, reviewing Bennett's Duets CD, provides a substantial clue that the charts were a team effort: Mr. Bennett's musical director and pianist Lee Musiker, string … [Read more...]
Thanksgiving 2006
This is an important American national holiday. To those of the U.S. persuasion, the Rifftides staff sends wishes for a happy Thanksgiving. To readers around the world: we are thankful for your interest, attendance and comments. … [Read more...]
Tony Bennett
Our occasional Washington, DC, correspondent John Birchard sent a message that included the following observations about Tony Bennett, An American Classic, the special that ran on NBC Television last night. I thought The Old Man outclassed all the other performers. Bennett is in astonishingly good … [Read more...]
Jazz Foundation Of America
Nat Hentoff is a champion of the Jazz Foundation of America in its efforts to help aging musicians who lack the resources to provide for themselves. In his latest column in the Village Voice, Hentoff makes it clear that jazzmen and women who find themselves in want are not always those who failed to … [Read more...]
CD
One More: The Summary, Music of Thad Jones, Vol. 2 (IPO). To name the players is to indicate the quality of this project: Eddie Daniels, Richard Davis, Benny Golson, Hank Jones, James Moody, John Mosca, Jimmy Owens, Kenny Washington and Frank Wess. Assembling all-stars is no guarantee of success, … [Read more...]
A Tsunami Of Muck
Like many blogs, Rifftides is under seige by lurkers filling the Comments bin with messages having nothing to do with Rifftides. Some days there are hundreds. The strictest filters do little to stem the tide of these unsolicited links to hard porn sites. In an attempt to delete en masse a batch of … [Read more...]
CD
Ruth Naomi Floyd, Root to the Fruit (Contour). Ms. Floyd is a Philadelphia church singer whose jazz connections and finely tuned musicianship are as organic to her art as are her Christian convictions. In her fifth album, she leads ten musicians including saxophonist Gary Thomas, drummer Ralph … [Read more...]
CD
BED, Bedlam (Blue Swing). BED is the acronym for vocalist Becky Kilgore, guitarist Eddie Erickson and trombonist Dan Barrett. The group also includes bassist Joel Forbes, but the name BEDJ wouldn't make much sense. What does make sense is Ms. Kilgore's sunny, flawlessly in-tune singing and the way … [Read more...]
DVD
The Heath Brothers, Brotherly Jazz (DanSun). Part documentary, part concert, this engrossing film about the celebrated Philadelphia brothers was shot a year before elder brother Percy Heath died in 2005. Their life stories are varied--Percy the fighter pilot who became a major bassist--Jimmy, the … [Read more...]
Book
Debra DeSalvo, The Language of the Blues (Billboard Books). From "Alcorub" to "Zuzu," Ms. DeSalvo combines solid research with humor, insight and straightforward description to explain the often arcane terms that populate blues songs. You may have an idea about the various meanings of "easy rider," … [Read more...]
Quote
I never thought that the music called "jazz" was ever meant to reach just a small group of people, or become a museum thing locked under glass like all other dead things that were once considered artistic. Miles Davis … [Read more...]
Miles Davis: The Movie?
For years, there have been reports that there would be a feature film about Miles Davis. No film has appeared. Pat Broeske writes in Sunday's New York Times that two such motion pictures may actually be on the drawing board. One would have a screenplay by Quincy Troupe, who co-authored Davis's … [Read more...]
Jazzitude
The Rifftides staff has added Marshall Bowden's Jazzitude web site to Other Places in the right-hand column. Befitting its Louisiana origin, Jazzitude is a gumbo of a site. On the menu: news, reviews, features and history sections. If the free enterprise road to the internet future is advertising, … [Read more...]