Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Beaver Harris was born William Godvin Harris on April 20, 1936 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Coming from an athletic family, he played baseball as a teenager for the Kansas City Monarchs, which was part of the Negro American League, and was scouted by the Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Giants.
After his Army service, Beaver began playing drums. Moving in 1963 to New York City and was encouraged to pursue a musical career by Max Roach. The city did him quite well as he worked and/or toured with Marion Brown, Dexter Gordon, Albert Ayler, Joe Henderson, Freddie Hubbard, Clifford Jordan, Howard Johnson, Sheila Jordan, Lee Konitz, Thelonious Monk, Roswell Rudd, Sonny Rollins, McCoy Tyner, Sonny Stitt, Clark Terry, Chet Baker, Doc Cheatham and Larry Coryell among other musicians.
Harris founded a world music band calling it the 360 Degree Music Experience. The band included Buster Williams, Hamiet Bluiett, Don Pullen, Jimmy Garrison, Ron Carter, Ricky Ford, and many others.
Drummer Beaver Harris, who worked extensively with Archie Shepp, died of prostate cancer in New York City at the age of 55 on December 22, 1991.
More Posts: bandleader,drums,history,instrumental,jazz,music
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Piers Lawrence was born on April 19th in Manhattan, New York and raised in Palo Alto, California and Switzerland. He attended the Conservatoire de Musique de Lausanne. After finishing his studies he made San Diego, California his new home and established himself as a solo guitarist, band leader and session musician.
An alum of the Harlem-based Jazz-Mobile Orchestra he studied with Barry Galbraith and Ted Dunbar. Piers has played Broadway shows including Guys and Dolls, Dancin’, Eubie, and Your Arms Too Short to Box With God. He has toured and recorded with Wilson Picket, The Main Ingredient, Esther Phillips, Phyllis Hyman, The Caribbean All-Stars and Merl Saunders and the Rainforest Band.
He is the lead guitarist for the San Diego based Soul Jazz AllStars and the Piers Lawrence Quartet. He established a record label, JazzNet Media, which produces independent projects and Ambient Music for film and television.
Guitarist and songwriter Piers Lawrence continues to grace the stages of venues and festivals across the nation, service his corporate clients, and perform and record with Narada Michael Walden, Sammy Figueroa, Jerry Garcia and Tommy Flanagan, to name a few of the many.
More Posts: bandleader,guitar,history,instrumental,jazz,music,songwriter
The Jazz Voyager
In the air once more leaving Philadelphia on my way back to the Emerald City on the West Coast to see a Philly born bassist I have seen perform since the Seventies. It will take place in a little spot called Dimitriou’s Jazz Alley in downtown Seattle, Washington at the corner of 6th and Lenora. The intimate atmosphere sets everyone no more than fifty feet from the stage and I’m looking forward to some calamari and gelato.
So one of my favorite bassists is NEA Jazz Master, four-time Grammy winner and living legend Stanley Clarke will be on stage tonight. He is a virtuoso on both acoustic and electric bass and the first jazz-fusion bassist ever to headline tours. Co-founder of the seminal fusion group Return to Forever with Chick Corea and Lenny White, in 2012 Return to Forever won a Grammy Award and Latin Grammy for Best Jazz Instrumental Album, Forever.
The downtown location is at 2033 6th Avenue, 98121. Reservations are recommended. For more information go to https://notoriousjazz.com/event/stanley-clarke.
More Posts: adventure,bass,club,genius,jazz,music,preserving,travel
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Mika Mimura was born in Osaka, Japan on April 18, 1978. She began to play marimba when she was 6 years old. She studied classical music at Osaka College of Music and finished her Master’s degree at the college. Inspired by pianist Makoto Ozone, she began her study of jazz vibraphone after graduation. She entered Berklee College of Music in 2004 and studied with Dave Samuels, Ed Saindon, Tiger Okoshi, and Ed Tomassi , among others.
Mika became a regular member of Phil Wilson’s Rainbow Big Band and Rainbow All Stars. In 2007 she performed with Greg Osby in 2007. She joined The BandA ecLectics, whose leader, Petros Sakelliou, had won the first prize at Thelonious Monk Institute Composition Competition. Together they played the Kodak Theatre in Los Angeles, California. She has performed many times in concert throughout the Boston, Massachusetts and New York City areas.
Vibraphonist Mika Mimura, who is currently a part of the New York City jazz scene, continues to energetically perform, compose and arrange in jazz or classical.
More Posts: bandleader,history,instrumental,jazz,marimba,music,perccussion,piano,vibraphone
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Jan Hammer was born in Prague, Czechoslovakia on April 17, 1948 to a mother who was a well-known Czech singer, and his doctor father who worked his way through school playing vibraphone and bass guitar. He began playing the piano at the age of four with formal instruction starting two years later. He aspired to follow his father into medicine until a family friend convinced him to develop his musical talents instead.
Forming a jazz trio in high school, he performed and recorded throughout Eastern Europe at the age of fourteen. Upon entrance to the Prague Academy of Musical Arts, he completed many compulsory classes including harmony, counterpoint, music history, and classical composition. He moved to the United States and resolved to become a citizen after receiving a scholarship at Berklee School of Music in Boston, Massachusetts. Upon completion of his studies, Jan spent a year touring with Sarah Vaughan, recorded with Elvin Jones and Jeremy Steig, then moved to New York City in 1971 and joined the original lineup of the Mahavishnu Orchestra.
Though he previously recorded as a leader and sideman, his debut solo album, The First Seven Days, dropped in 1975. He formed the Jan Hammer Group in 1976 to support the album tour, which received good reviews from both jazz and rock critics. During the mid 70s to early 80s he recorded and played with Joni Mitchell, Billy Cobham, Santana, Tommy Bolin, Harvey Mason and Stanley Clarke.
Returning to solo work he recorded an album in 1978, formed a new band, known as Hammer, and wrote theme song for a British television series. He formed Schon & Hammer, played benefit concerts, and has received three Grammys and an Emmy nomination. By the Nineties and well into the new millennium, he continued to score and compose for film and television. In 2018 he released his first album of new material in over 10 years: Seasons – Part 1.
Keyboardist, drummer, composer, and record producer Jan Hammer continues to produce and perform.
More Posts: bandleader,composer,drums,history,instrumental,jazz,keyboard,music,producer,synthesizer