Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Eumir Deodato was born Eumir Deodato de Almeida on June 22, 1943 in Rio de Janiero of Italian and Portuguese parents. He began his musical training at twelve on the accordion but rapidly learned instrumental and orchestral skills that gave him his first recording session at 17.
Originally working as pianist and arranger in the Rio bossa nova scene, he rapidly outgrew this and, along with many other Brazilian musicians during the military dictatorshipin their country, moved to New York and began working with composer Luis Bonfa and later with producer Creed Taylor as an arranger. Additionally, he became keyboardist in Taylor’s expanding group of CTI backing artists.
His first U.S. album “Prelude” released in 1973 for CTI was a big band Latin jazz project that immediately attracted a wide audience. His funky version of Also Sprach Zarathustra won him the 1974 Grammy for Best Pop Instrumental Performance and hitting #2 on the charts.
Deodato has been in demand as a producer and arranger since the 1960s. In all, he has worked on more than 500 albums, fifteen of which have reached platinum. His skills as an arranger provided entree to the American recording industry, writing charts for Wes Montgomery, Astrud Gilberto, Frank Sinatra, Bjork, k.d. lang and Kool and the Gang among others.
He has scored several films over his career and recorded a live album in Rio in 2007. He continues to produce and arrange.
More Posts: piano
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Eric Reed was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on June 21, 1970 and began playing piano at age two, transitioning into his minister father’s church at five and at seven began formal study at the Philadelphia Settlement Music School. By the time he was 11 his family was moving to Los Angeles where he studied at the Colburn School of Arts.
In 1986 his encounter with Wynton Marsalis would greatly aid his career beginning with him joining his septet in 1990 and over the next five years he would work with Wynton along with Joe Henderson and Freddie Hubbard. In 1996 he joined the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra and towards the end of the decade he was venturing out to lead his own group, Black Note, that released several albums during the 1990s.
Eric has worked with jazz luminaries such as Irvin Mayfield, Cassandra Wilson, Mary Stallings, Clark Terry, Dianne Reeves, Elvin Jones, Ron Carter, Paula West and Benny Carter.
Eric has also worked as a composer, scoring music for independent and mainstream films, including the comedy ‘Life’, featuring Eddie Murphy and Martin Lawrence. With nearly two dozen albums under his belt, he most recently recorded his Monk project, having already released The Dancing Monk in 2011 and The Baddest Monk in 2012 with an audience anticipation of the final recording as he continues to perform, tour and record.
More Posts: piano
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Eric Allan Dolphy was born on June 20, 1928 in Los Angeles, California and received his musical education at Los Angeles City College. Performing locally in the big bands of Gerald Wilson and Roy Porter, he played soprano clarinet, baritone saxophone and his main instrument, the alto, on early recordings. But his big break came when he joined Chico Hamilton’s quintet, gaining wider audience recognition.
By 1959 Dolphy had moved to New York City and his early association with then established John Coltrane brought him acclaim amongst jazz lovers. During this period, Dolphy also played in a number of challenging settings, notably in key recordings by Ornette Coleman’s Free Jazz: A Collective Improvisation; Oliver Nelson’s The Blues and the Abstract Truth; and George Russell’s Ezz-thetics. He also worked with Max Roach, Gunther Schuller, Ron Carter, Ken McIntyre and Abbey Lincoln among others.
His first two albums as leader produced Outward Bound and Out There that were deeply rooted in hard bop with trumpeter Freddie Hubbard. This was followed with Far Cry with Booker Little, with whom he would record a series of legendary sets at the Five Spot before Little’s death at 23. In 1964, Dolphy signed with Blue Note and recorded Out To Lunch! with Hubbard, Bobby Hutcherson, Richard Davis and Tony Williams. This record was rooted in the avant-garde, his solos unpredictable and is considered his magnum opus.
Eric Dolphy died in Berlin while touring with Charles Mingus on June 29, 1964. The circumstances are sketchy as to where he died and the cause, though he was a diabetic. Whatever the cause, the jazz world lost an alto saxophonist, flautist, clarinetist who contributed profusely to the genre of jazz during his short-lived 36 years.
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Jazz drummer Billy Drummond was born Willis Robert Drummond, Jr. on June 19, 1959 in Newport News, Virginia. From an early age he learned jazz from his father, who was also a drummer and a jazz enthusiast and whose record collection included many recordings of Miles Davis, Art Blakey, Max Roach, Buddy Rich and Elvin Jones, among others.
Billy played in bands from age eight and studied at Shenandoah Conservatory. At the behest of Al Foster he moved to New York in 1986 and shortly thereafter joined the Blue Note band, Out of the Blue (OTB) with whom he recorded their last CD. He subsequently joined the Horace Silver sextet and toured extensively.
Drummond has played and recorded with Nat Adderley, Ralph Moore, Buster Williams, Charles Tolliver, Lew Tabackin and Toshiko Akiyoshi, Hank Jones, James Moody, Sonny Rollins, Andy LaVerne, Lee Konitz, Larry Willis, Toots Thielemans and Freddie Hubbard among others greats.
Billy’s influences include a long list besides Tony Williams, Max Roach, Philly Joe Jones, Al Foster, Jack DeJohnette and Billy Hart. His discography includes three albums as a leader, another five as a co-leader, fifteen as a band member with Carla Bley and Steve Kuhn, and sixty-six as a sideman.
He is currently a long-time member of Carla Bley’s Lost Chords Quartet, leads the New York-based band “Freedom of Ideas” in addition to touring, and is Professor of Jazz Drums at the Juilliard School of Music and New York University in New York.
More Posts: drums
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Sue Raney was born on June 18, 1940 in McPherson, Kansas. The proverbial fruit did not fall far from the tree as her mother was a singer and a great, great aunt had been a performer in German opera. She started singing at age four and a year later was performing in public. Due to her young age no voice teacher could be engaged, mother took voice lessons herself and then passed down what she learned to Sue.
A professional before she was a teenager, Raney worked steadily in New Mexico when her family relocated and took several trips out to Los Angeles during a couple of summer vacations. She joined the Jack Carson radio show in 1954 in L.A. when she was barely 14. By age 17 was signed by Capitol Records to record her debut album, the Nelson Riddle-produced When Your Lover Has Gone, released in 1958.
Sue then appeared on Ray Anthony’s television program and became his band’s main vocalist. At 18 she started working as a single. She had already recorded for Phillips and then signed with Capitol, recording several middle-of-the-road jazz-influenced pop dates including her 1958 Nelson riddle-produced debut album “When Your Love Has Gone”.
In the 1960’s Raney often appeared on television variety shows, led her own group and became very active in the studios where her impressive voice helped sell products. After a hiatus in the 1970s, the jazz vocalist continued to record sporadically and by the early 1980’s, in addition to recording several jazz albums for Discovery Records, she began working as a voice teacher. Through the Nineties and into the new millennium she sang with the L.A. Voices, Supersax, the Bill Watrous Big Band and as a soloist, releasing “Heart’s Desire”, a 2006 tribute album to Doris Day and in 2011“Listen Here: Alone With Alan Broadbent”.
Over the course of fifty years vocalist Sue Raney has recorded twenty albums, performed music ranging from swinging jazz and ballads to cabaret, middle-of-the-road pop and jingles, and has remained active as a jazz educator and in the studios.
More Posts: vocal