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Rifftides

Doug Ramsey on Jazz and other matters...

CD

January 26, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

John Gross, Dave Frishberg, Charlie Doggett, Strange Feeling (Diatic Records). Gross, the outside tenor saxophonist; Frishberg, the inside pianist; and Doggett, the adaptable young drummer, meet on the common ground of a brilliantly assembled repertoire. The pieces are by Ellington, Strayhorn, Monk, … [Read more...]

CD

January 26, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

Fats Waller, If you Got to Ask, You Ain't Got It (Bluebird/Legacy). This is not a comprehensive Waller set, but a well chosen three-disc survey of the stride pianist whose song writing, singing and irrepressible personality made him an American favorite son in the 1930s and early '40s. Even … [Read more...]

CD

January 26, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

Paul Carlon Octet, Other Tongues (Deep Tone). From Red Norvo to James Moody, Ray Charles, Rod Levitt, Gil Evans, Lee Konitz and Bill Kirchner, I'm a sucker for medium-sized ensembles supported by resourceful writing. To the list add this octet of New Yorkers led by saxophonist and flutist Carlon. … [Read more...]

DVD

January 26, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

Amalia Rodrigues: The Spirit of Fado (MVD World Music Talents). Rodrigues was the leading interpreter of fado, the moody music that expresses Portugal's national preoccupation with fate. In fado at its best there is a commonality with jazz in the give-and-take among the perfomer and the guitar … [Read more...]

Book

January 26, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

Louis Armstrong, Satchmo: My Life In New Orleans (Da Capo). A friend asked me recently, "What's the best book about Louis Armstrong?" It may turn out to be the one Terry Teachout is writing, I said. I told him about Armstrong biographies by Gary Giddins, Laurence Bergreen, James Lincoln Collier, Max … [Read more...]

Comment: On Floyd Standifer

January 25, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

Bill Crow writes from New York: So sorry to hear of Floyd's passing. When I returned to the Seattle area after 3 years in the Army, I met Floyd and Quincy and Gerald Brashear and Buddy Catlett and Kenny Kimball and Ray Charles. We played a lot together in the music annex of the University of … [Read more...]

Floyd Standifer

January 24, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

From Seattle comes news that Floyd Standifer died Monday night. The trumpeter, saxophonist and vocalist went into the hospital in late December for treatment of a shoulder problem. Doctors discovered that his shoulder pain came from cancer that had spread to his lungs and liver, and that his … [Read more...]

…and…Feitlebaum

January 23, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

A little research discloses that the man who did that brilliant dual-personality lip-synch performance to Charlie Parker's and Dizzy Gillespie's "Leap Frog" is named Jeremiah McDonald. He has other clips on YouTube, none of them based in jazz. Still, jazz listeners who dig Spike Jones (there are … [Read more...]

Compatible Quotes

January 22, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

After I left Texas and went to California, I had a hard time getting anyone to play anything that I was writing, so I had to end up playing them myself. And that's how I ended up just being a saxophone player. --Ornette Coleman I am an improviser...I improvise music. Whatever you want to call it … [Read more...]

A George Cables Moment

January 19, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

George Cables played a concert at The Seasons performance hall the other night. It was the kind of evening his listeners have come to expect, flowing with the inventiveness, technical skill and joy that Cables has demonstrated in a four-decade career with Art Pepper, Dexter Gordon, Sonny Rollins, … [Read more...]

Tom Talbert Query And Answer

January 19, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

If you follow the links at the ends of Rifftides items, you'll know that the distinguished Toronto broadcaster Ted O'Reilly commented on the recent Rod Levitt item. In his restrained way, O'Reilly wrote, in part: Wow, yeah! Rod Levitt. In the '60s RCA Canada did not release those LPs in Canada, … [Read more...]

More on Brecker

January 18, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

Tenor saxophonist Mark Turner offers a heartfelt, forthright evaluation of Michael Brecker, including this: I saw him put his horn on at clinics and soundchecks and--cold, without warming up--instantly play the most f------- incredible sh--, stuff that most saxophonists simply cannot deal … [Read more...]

Michael Brecker Remembered

January 17, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

Trumpeter Randy Sandke knew Michael Brecker for nearly forty years, since both were college freshmen. Thought by many to be the most influential saxophonist since John Coltrane, Brecker died on Saturday, January 13, of leukemia brought on by myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS), a rare cancer of the … [Read more...]

The Worth Of Jazz: A Debate

January 17, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

The lead story on the ArtsJournal.com main page concerns jazz education's role in music and culture at large. Here's the AJ tease, quoted from NewMusicBox.com: "How is it that jazz has become the vehicle for the resurgence of robust music programs in the schools while classical music, and its … [Read more...]

Jazz And Blues Report From Chicago

January 16, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

Jazz gets relatively little attention on commercial television, but one of the newscasts on WBBM-TV, the CBS-TV affiliate in Chicago, made an exception recently. It profiled Bob Koester and his Delmark Records label. The story focuses more on Chicago blues than on Delmark's jazz artists, but … [Read more...]

Sad News: Michael Brecker, Alice Coltrane

January 15, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

On Saturday, Michael Brecker succumbed to leukemia brought on by MDS (myelodysplastic syndrome), the bone marrow disorder that put him on the sidelines of music until recently. He was fifty-seven years old. The most admired of the legion of saxophonists that arose in the wake of John Coltrane, … [Read more...]

Rod Levitt

January 15, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

Rifftides reader Russell Chase writes: Last night, my wife and I watched the 1933 movie 42nd Street on TV. I promised myself that I would listen to Rod Levitt's LP with the same title today. I wound up playing all of the four Levitt LPs that I have. They have always rated very highly among my … [Read more...]

Jazzed For Blogging

January 12, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

That is the headline on a newspaper article about arts web logs. Rifftides is the focus of the piece by Kim Nowacki, arts editor of the Yakima Herald-Republic. She also interviews Brooke Cresswell, conductor of the Yakima Symphony Orchestra; Dan Peters, proprietor of the Blue Begonia poetry blog; … [Read more...]

Cookin’ In Bonn

January 12, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

More than a year ago, we reported on the alliance between Václav Klaus, the president of the Czech Republic and the pianist Emil Viklický. Klaus established a series of jazz concerts at Prague Castle, the Czech equivalent of the White House, and chose Viklický to launch it. To read about that … [Read more...]

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Doug Ramsey

Doug is a recipient of the lifetime achievement award of the Jazz Journalists Association. He lives in the Pacific Northwest, where he settled following a career in print and broadcast journalism in cities including New York, New Orleans, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, Portland, San Antonio, … [MORE]

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