Bruno Leicht writes from Germany, embedding a weekend viewing and listening present. Browsing YouTube can be an adventure. Never seen this film before. Louis Armstrong and the All Stars at Newport, 1958. -- Please listen and look closely. Miles was wrong; Pops was no Uncle Tom. This man WAS serious, … [Read more...]

In Los Angeles, The Jazz Bakery is losing its lease. The nonprofit performance hall's guiding spirit, Ruth Price, says that it will live on...somewhere. Today's Los Angeles Times has the story. … [Read more...]

George Avakian has produced recordings by Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Miles Davis, Erroll Garner, Sonny Rollins, Dave Brubeck and Paul Desmond, among others. With the 78 rpm albums of Armstrong's Hot Fives and Hot Sevens that he oversaw for Columbia Records in the 1940s, he invented the jazz … [Read more...]

Among the French impressionist composers who intrigued jazz musicians as early as the 1920s was Erik Satie. His Gymnopédies for piano were particular favorites. In later years, some jazz players, including Bill Evans and Herbie Mann, adopted them into their own repertoires. Satie's Gnossiennes may … [Read more...]

Spring is here and my Italian friend Vigorelli Bianchi took me for our first ride of 2009. It was blustery and the sun was only occasionally peering between cloud banks, but we had a great time. Stamina was okay. The legs need conditioning. I stopped to speak with a fellow cyclist who was repairing … [Read more...]

For his advanced composing and arranging students, saxophonist, composer, arranger and educator Bill Kirchner recently compiled a list of recommended big band CDs recorded since 1955. Kirchner teaches at The New School and Manhattan School of Music in New York City and New Jersey City University. … [Read more...]

As several Rifftides readers pointed out, in the initial posting of the item below, I renamed Senator Richard Lugar "Fred." There was a reason for that, but no excuse. The error is corrected, with apologies to the senator. … [Read more...]

I have written here from time to time about the harm the United States has done itself by failing in recent years to practice the cultural diplomacy that did it so much good for decades following World War II. After the Berlin Wall fell and European communist totalitarianism followed, the Clinton … [Read more...]

Charles Tolliver, Emperor March (Half Note). Tolliver received considerable attention for his part in the recent observance of the 50th anniversary of Thelonious Monk's Town Hall concert. Here, we have Tolliver's big band playing his own music. As in the 2007 With Love CD that announced the … [Read more...]

You may recall the Rifftides tip a year ago about a Michel Petrucciani documentary DVD. The film followed the pianist around the world and culminated in a memorable concert shortly before he died in 1999. If you didn't know about Petrucciani before you saw the film, it is unlikely that you forgot … [Read more...]

I am adding to Other Places in the right column a link to Mule Walk And Jazz Talk, a web log posted from Madrid by Agustín Pérez. The legend Sr. Pérez erects below the name of his blog leaves no doubt en el que viene de, as they say in downtown Madrid. Random thoughts, casual writings and … [Read more...]

The SF Jazz Collective rolls into town next week to play at the world class nonprofit performance hall we have here in an acoustically blessed former church. The local newspaper asked me to write an advancer. YAKIMA, Wash. -- For a few weeks each year, seven of the busiest musicians in jazz suspend … [Read more...]

The recession seems to be doing little to stem the flood of CDs. This posting and others to follow constitute one man's attempt to deal with the rising tide. The quick hits below are not full-fledged reviews, far from it. They are acknowledgements of a few releases worth investigating. Many of them, … [Read more...]

Rifftides reader Jim Eigo followed up on yesterday's Wall Street Journal piece about Denny Zeitlin by sending this photograph. He took it last night at Zeitlin's gig at Dizzy's Club Coca-Cola in New York. From left to right, Buster Williams, Zeitlin, drummer Matt Wilson, fully involved." Photo" "© … [Read more...]

In today's Wall Street Journal, I write about Denny Zeitlin. The piece is pegged to the simultaneous releases of his new trio CD on the Sunnyside label and a Mosaic box set with nearly all of Zeitlin's Columbia trio recordings. The article begins: In October 1963, a 25-year-old Johns Hopkins medical … [Read more...]

Music was probably born of the natural rhythms of life. So it shouldn't come as a surprise when people who dedicate themselves to life science release their creative energy in music. - Karen Schmidt in the journal Yale Medicine, 1998 ...music is my heritage, I cannot help it - Albert Schweitzer I … [Read more...]

Regarding Lou Levy's Lunarcy CD reviewed on March 5 (scroll down), a Rifftides reader who identifies himself as Fergus wrote: You might ask Universal why Lunarcy isn't available on iTunes in the US as it is elsewhere. The Rifftides staff passed that suggestion on to Universal publicist Regina … [Read more...]

Sam Stephenson of the Jazz Loft Project at Duke University shepherded the Thelonious Monk Town Hall 50th anniversary concerts at the end of February. See this post for a link to a review of the events. Mr. Stephenson sent a few post-concert anecdotes for our amusement. The Rifftides staff found them … [Read more...]

Dena De Rose and Marvin Stamm, The Nearness Of Two (Teatro Della Muse). On the heels of De Rose's splendid new trio CD comes the stealth release of the pianist and singer's impromptu partnership with Stamm. She and the trumpeter found themselves in the ancient town of Ancona on Italy's Adriatic … [Read more...]