Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Johnny Mbizo Dyani was born on November 30, 1945 in Duncan Village, a township of the South African city of East London. He started playing the piano and singing in a traditional choir at an early age. At 13, he switched to bass, but would use both voice and piano later on.
In the early 1960s, Dyani was a member of South Africa’s first integrated jazz band, “The Blue Notes”; however, in 1964 the band fled South Africa to seek musical and political freedom, rebelling against the apartheid regime that inhibited whites and blacks playing together.
In 1966, Dyani toured Argentina with Steve Lacy’s quartet and recorded. The Forest and the Zoo. He would later move to Denmark and Sweden, recording many albums under his own name. He recorded with Dollar Brand a.k.a. Abdullah Ibrahim, Don Cherry, Steve Lacy, David Murray, Mal Waldron, Don Moye and Brotherhood of Breath among many others.
In the 70s he formed the group “Earthquake Power” and then became very active on the European scene. His Witchdoctor’s Son band recorded for Steeplechase Records and he also recorded with Swedish and Brazilian musicians. Dyani’s main focus of playing entered around African jazz, avant-garde jazz and world fusion.
Double bassist and pianist Johnny Dyani passed away suddenly after a concert in Berlin on October 24, 1986 at age 40. After his death, the remaining members of The Blue Notes reunited to record a moving tribute album, titled Blue Notes For Johnny.
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Chuck Mangione was born Charles Frank Mangione on November 29, 1940 in Rochester, New York. He attended the Eastman School of Music from 1958 to 1963, afterwards joining Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers, for which he filled the trumpet seat.
In the late 1960s, Mangione was a member of the band The National Gallery, then served as director of the Eastman jazz ensemble from 1968 to 1972, and during this time returned to recording with the album Friends and Love, with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra.
Mangione’s quartet with saxophonist Gerry Niewood recorded “Bellavia” that won him a Grammy for Best Instrumental Composition. His music has been used during two Olympics, performed at the closing ceremonies, and composed the soundtrack for The Children of Sanchez starring Anthony Quinn, winning his second Grammy Award.
Chuck composed and performed the theme for The Cannonball Run among other films. Proficient on both trumpet and flugelhorn, he has performed with a 70-piece orchestra, recorded his hit album Feels So Good, and has worked with Dizzy Gillespie, Steve Gadd, and Chick Corea among other jazz luminaries.
Mangione, along with his brother Gap worked as the Jazz Brothers, recording three albums with Riverside Records. Later worked in one another’s band and orchestra. He has a recurring voice-acting role on the animated King of the Hill, and continues to perform and record with his current band.
More Posts: flugelhorn,french horn,piano,trumpet
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Gato Barbieri was born Leandro Barbieri on November 28, 1932 in Rosario, Santa Fe Province, Argentina into a family of musicians. He began playing music after hearing Charlie Parker’s “Now’s the Time”, first playing the clarinet and later the alto saxophone while performing with his fellow countryman pianist Lalo Schifrin in the late 1950s.
By the early 1960s in Europe he worked with Don Cherry, became influenced by John Coltrane’s later recordings as well as free jazz saxophonists Albert Ayler and Pharoah Sanders. He developed a warm and gritty sound that became Gato’s trademark and by the late Sixties began fusing music from South America and contributed to Charlie Haden’s Liberation Music Orchestra and Carla Bley’s Escalator Over The Hill.
Barbieri earned a Grammy for the score of Last Tango In Paris, which led to a recording deal with Impulse Records. By the mid-70s, he was recording for A&M Records and moved his music towards soul-jazz and jazz-pop with albums like “Caliente!” and “Ruby Ruby”. As a leader he has recorded some thirty albums and as a sideman has played and recorded another nine with Dollar Brand, Gary Burton, the Jazz Composers Orchestra among others. The saxophonist has received the UNICEF Award and continued to compose, perform and record until his passing on April 2, 2016 in New York City.
More Posts: saxophone
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Jacky Terrasson was born Jacques-Laurent Terrasson on November 27, 1966 in Berlin, Germany to French and American parents, but grew up in Paris, France. He started learning piano at 5 years old and after studying classical piano in school, he studied jazz, in particular with Jeff Gardner. His encounter with Francis Paudras played an important role his initiation into jazz.
He studied at Berklee College of Music before playing in Chicago and New York clubs. He gained increased attention on winning the 1993 Thelonious Monk Piano Competition and began touring with Betty Carter. A year later he was named by the New York Times Magazine one of the 30 under 30 to change American culture in the next 30 years.
He has recorded for Blue Note, Venus, EMI, Concord and Universal France amassing a total of 15 records. He has worked with Dee Dee Bridgewater, Michael Brecker, Dianne Reeves, Jimmy Scott, Charles Aznavor, Cassandra Wilson, Ry Cooder, and his trios with Leon Parker and Ugonna Okegwo or Eric Harland, Ben Williams, Jamire Williams and Justin Faulkner.
Pianist Jacky Terrasson plays festivals all over the world and works regularly in Japan, South Korea and in China, as well as in Europe and the United States. He mingles and melts the colors and the inventions of the great pianists of yesterday and today creating his own style.
More Posts: piano
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Art Themen was born Arthur Edward George Themen on November 26, 1939 in Manchester, England. In 1958 he began his medical studies at the University of Cambridge, going on in 1961 to complete his studies at St. Mary’s Hospital Medical School in London, qualifying in 1964. He specialized in orthopedic medicine and eventually became a consultant.
Themen started playing saxophone with the Cambridge University Jazz Group, and then in London playing with blues musicians Jack Bruce and Alexis Korner. In 1965 he played with the Peter Stuyvesant Jazz Orchestra in Zurich, going on to play with such English luminaries as Michael Garrick and Graham Collier’s Music.
In 1974 Art entered into what was to be one of his central musical relationships when he started playing with Stan Tracey that took him throughout the United Kingdom and all over the world. He has also played and toured with musicians such as Nat Adderley, Ian Carr, George Coleman and Al Haig. In 1995 he formed a quartet with pianist John Critchinson.
Themen’s style originally owed much to the influence of Dexter Gordon and Sonny Rollins, but later influences included such disparate saxophonists Coleman Hawkins, Evan Parker and John Coltrane.
More Posts: saxophone