Archives for 2012

The following item ran on Rifftides more than five years ago, with a link to video that later disappeared from the web. The clip has been restored. In light of recent discussions about the blues theme that frequently appeared when the two men played together, even after the Brubeck Quartet dissolved … [Read more...]

After rounds of research and interviews, I am finally in the writing phase of a Dizzy Gillespie project whose nature I will disclose to you one of these days. For now, suffice it to say that it involves Gillespie club performances most of which have never been released. In the course of listening to … [Read more...]

Rifftides reader Svetlana Ilicheva (pictured) responded from Moscow to yesterday's post with an account of a later Brubeck Brothers Quartet concert during the band's visit to Russia. In addition to what Chris Brubeck wrote about his first concert at the Igor Butman club in Moscow and his panegyric … [Read more...]

Chris Brubeck reports from Moscow about the Brubeck Brothers Quartet’s Russian tour. He last played there a quarter of a century ago as a member of his father Dave’s quartet, when the country was the Soviet Union. Chris writes on his blog that at the BBQ’s first concert of the current trip, … [Read more...]

Here’s another shot from the visit to smoky central Washington State, where the wildfires are intensifying today. Now, firefighters are coming down from Canada to help in the battle to contain the blazes. The landmark in the hazy distance is Saddle Rock. You may recognize it as the skyline … [Read more...]

Heading for a reunion and coming into the picturesque valley that holds Wenatchee, we saw little of the hundreds of acres of apple trees that have made the area famous. Clouds and walls of smoke obscured them. For days, dry hills in Eastern Washington State have been under attack by wildfires. A … [Read more...]

In the wake of Ornette Coleman and the post-“Giant Steps” developments pioneered by John Coltrane, many listeners to free jazz heard anger and unrest. Through the tumult, though he was in the heat and hurly-burly of the movement, Marion Brown (1931-2010) managed lyricism, logic and quiet beauty. … [Read more...]

Paul Desmond had political convictions. He occasionally indicated but rarely went on at length about them. Iola Brubeck knows that and called our attention to an opinion piece by Chan Lowe, and his accompanying editorial cartoon, in today’s Florida Sun Sentinel. Here’s one line: If the … [Read more...]

Things are popping around here on several fronts, sending the development of blog posts to the back burner. The good news is that the Rifftides staff has come across film of Hampton Hawes in action with three of his peers. The quality of the new print outshines that of a previous web version. In … [Read more...]

By the time Hampton Hawes’ third trio album appeared, his piano playing had me in thrall. I was so taken with the LP’s cover that I traced its portrait of an alligator transported by music, inked in the outline, colored the gator with an Asparagus green Crayola and framed the copy. I have been … [Read more...]

Grégoire Maret (e-one) Grégoire Maret divides his time between his mother’s native United States and Europe, where he was born in the land of his Swiss father 37-years ago. For more than a decade, Maret has been in demand for his harmonica playing by performers who occupy distinctly different … [Read more...]

At the Ystad Jazz Festival in Sweden last month, scheduling caused me to miss a concert by the young Swedish singer Hannah Svensson and her guitarist father Ewan. Someone who did not miss it took along a camera and posted videos on YouTube. Svensson père, if that is an appropriate designation in … [Read more...]

Iola Brubeck, whom Paul Desmond described as "the incomparable, regal Iola," sent a comment about the Rifftides 2012 Crop Forecast. She included the words of a choral piece by her husband, whose name is Dave. To see her comment, Mr. Brubeck's lyric, photographs of ripening fruit, and to listen to … [Read more...]

The massive Detroit Jazz Festival happens over Labor Day weekend. Because it collects an astonishing array of major musicians and presents them in outdoor performances at no charge, it is a festival I have long meant to attend some day. Rifftides reader Larry Peterson has gone several times. He sent … [Read more...]

Thomas Cunniffe's Jazz History Online essay, the basis for “Desmond And The Canadians” two items below, contains this paragraph: Pure Desmond isn’t a “pure” example of the Canadian group, but the recording clearly echoes the style that Desmond and the Toronto musicians had worked … [Read more...]

In the United States this is Labor Day, since 1894 a national holiday that celebrates working peoples’ contributions to the nation. Although the calendar says that summer doesn’t end until September 21 this year, many Americans consider that Labor Day marks the close of the season. This … [Read more...]

No sooner had I added Thomas Cunniffe’s website Jazz History Online to the Rifftides blogroll (bottom of the right column) than Tom posted an essay about the last period of Paul Desmond’s musical life. That was the era, all too brief, of Desmond’s Canadian quartet. The piece did not come as a … [Read more...]

Most jazz listeners know Hall Overton (1920-1972) for his orchestrations of Thelonious Monk piano solos. Those arrangements are a major factor in the success of Monk’s concert with a 10-piece band at New York’s Town Hall in 1959, preserved in this essential album. Musicians familiar with … [Read more...]

The tip comes from Jim Wilke in Seattle, a suburb of Port Townsend. Sunday, September 2nd on Jazz Northwest from 88.5 KPLU, the Benny Green Trio with special guest Gary Smulyan on baritone saxophone is heard in concert at Centrum’s Jazz Port Townsend. The concert was recorded in McCurdy … [Read more...]