Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Sil Austin was born September 17, 1929 in Dunnellon, Florida. He taught himself to play saxophone when he was 12, won the Ted Mack Amateur Hour in St. Petersburg, Florida in 1945 playing Danny Boy and his performance got him a contract with Mercury Records. He moved to New York City and studied for a time at the Juilliard School of Music.
Austin briefly played with Roy Eldridge in 1949, with Cootie Williams in 1951-52 and Tiny Bradshaw from 1952-54, before setting up his own successful touring group. He recorded over thirty albums for Mercury, and had a number of Top 40 hits with popular tunes like Danny Boy, that became his signature song, My Mother’s Eyes and Slow Walk, the latter hitting #17 on the charts.
After leaving Mercury in the 1960s, he recorded with a few other labels, including SSS, owned by Shelby Singleton, and recorded a few albums in Japan in the 1970s. Saxophonist Sil Austin, who regarded Coleman Hawkins, Lester Young and Sonny Stitt as his major influences, passed away of prostate cancer on September 1, 2001.
Give A Gift Of Jazz – Share
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Graham Haynes was born September 16, 1960 in Brooklyn, New York the son of drummer Roy Haynes. With aspirations to push jazz beyond its traditional boundaries, his first foray into electronic music came in 1979 with meeting alto saxophonist Steve Coleman. Together, they formed a band called Five Elements, which launched the influential group of improvisers called M-Base Collective.
With the formation of his own ensemble, Graham Haynes and No Image and subsequent release of What Time It Be?, he spent much of the Eighties studying a wide range of African, Arabic and South Asian Music. Then in 1990 a move to France incorporated these far-off influences into his next two releases, Nocturne Parisian and The Griot’s Footsteps.
Haynes returned to New York City in 1993, took advantage of the flourishing Hip-Hop scene and released the sample heavy album Transition. He recorded another hybridized album in 1996, Tones For The 21st Century, then discovered drum ‘n’ bass and began working with some of the genres finest DJs and producers in London and the U.S. This manifested in the 2000 release of BPM, a fusion of drum n’ bass beats with the classical music of Richard Wagner.
Over the years, Haynes has kept busy with several critically acclaimed multimedia projects, composing scores for films Flag Wars and The Promise, and as a lecturer at New York University. He received two nominations for the Alpert Award For The Arts.
He has collaborated with his father, Cassandra Wilson, Jaki Byard, Uri Caine, Vernon Reid, Me’Shell Ndegeocello, The Roots, David Murray, George Adams, Ed Blackwell, Bill Laswell, Steve Williamson and Bill Dixon to name a few. With ten albums under his belt, cornetist, trumpeter and composer Graham Haynes continues to push the envelope in his performance, recording and composing.
Inspire A Young Mind
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Carla Ruth White was born on September 15, 1951 in Oakland, California but was raised in Bellport, New York. She grew up studying jazz dance and singing her way through her parents’ classical and pop records, from Stravinsky to Sinatra. At 13, she discovered jazz and responded with a passion that became a lifelong commitment to her singing. While in high school she took up acting and singing, then studied at the Webbe-Douglas Academy of Dramatic Art in London from 1969 to 1971. She then traveled throughout Europe and North Africa for nearly a year singing on the street, living in a cave and exploring other cultures.
Returning to New York City in the early 70’s White began studies with jazz pianist and teacher Lennie Tristano, building her jazz vocabulary and learning hundreds of songs by ear singing along with Lester Young, Clifford Brown, Charlie Parker, Billie Holiday and many others. Next she studied with saxophonist Warne Marsh and concentrated on wordless improvising, or “scat” singing. This led to her first band, a bebop quintet with trumpeter Manny Duran.
Late in the 1970s Carla and Manny co-led the band and in 1984 they released the album Andruline for Stash Records. In 1985 she launched her critically acclaimed career as a solo artist and two years later she produced her first album for Milestone Records, Orient Express, named one of the best albums of the year by JAZZIZ magazine. She has been recognized in Downbeat Magazine’s 37th Annual International Critics Poll as Talent Deserving Wider Recognition.
She released Listen Here in 1995 on the Evidence Music label and then recorded Carla White Live at Vartan Jazz, followed by Carla White In Mexico. She has performed in a wide variety of venues from clubs to concerts, festivals to television, nationally and internationally. As an educator she has conducted seminars, workshops and master classes for The New School, Vermont Jazz Center, University of Northern Colorado and at the Music Conservatory of Ghent while on tour in Belgium and The Netherlands.
Carla also has an active career as a voice-over artist, has several commercials on TV and radio and provided the vocals to the ending-theme Can’t Say Goodbye To Yesterday for the video game Metal Gear Solid @: Sons of Liberty. Vocalist Carla White, noted for her scat singing, passed away on May 9, 2007 after a long battle with cancer.
Dose A Day – Blues Away
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Jeffery Smith was born on September 14, 1955 in Queens, New York. He began honing his voice at a very early age, under the influence of his mother, Ramona, who was a classical singer. At the age of 18, he moved to Los Angeles, California for a decade and found work as a singer, actor and artist, landing several bit parts in television and film while performing in the local clubs.
In 1980 he starred in the bi-coastal production of Hollywood & Highland, produced by Lee Strasberg and Robert Greenhut. For his work on the show he was awarded the 1981 Drama Critic’s Award, from Drama Logue Magazine. Smith returned to New York in 1985, co-starred on stage in productions of Jesus Christ Superstar, Hair and Capitol Cakewalk in between performing in the city’s major clubs through 1991.
In the fall of 1991, what originally began as a Paris vacation for Jeffery, ended up being a 7-year stay and within 7 months, he met and was signed by Claude Bolling as the voice of his big band. Over the six years he recorded four albums, performed two world tours with Bolling’s Big Band throughout Europe and Asia and was the voice of numerous jingles for French commercials.
In the summer of 1995, Smith signed a 3-album contract with Universal/Verve and all three albums garnered international critical acclaim. His debut album he dedicated and titled Ramona, which was produced and accompanied by the legendary pianist Shirley Horn for the Gitanes/Verve label. His debut was followed by his sophomore project A Little Sweeter was praised in TIME Magazine as being “the most vital album of the year, and culminating with his 1999 Down Here Below.
He starred in and narrated the recording of Duke Ellington’s A Drum is a Woman in Paris, co-starred with Dee Dee Bridgewater in Cabaret and in her Peace & Love music video, as well as 3 sold out concerts at the Paris Olympia, establishing him as one of the most revered male jazz vocalists in the industry.
Jeffery has performed with Wynton Marsalis and Jazz At Lincoln Center, Regina Carter, Kenny Barron, Ray Drummond, Ben Riley, Dianne Reeves, Joe Lovano, TK Blue, Ernie Watts, Pete Levin, Winard Harper, and Chanda Rule among others.
While still performing internationally Jeffery headed his Non-Profit Production Company Tri-Loxodonta, Inc., the Portuguese translated means 3 Modern African Elephants. Ernie Watts, Pete Levin, Winard Harper, and Chanda Rule. Baritone vocalist Jeffery Smith whose distinctive style set him apart from the cadre of male singers, passed away on July 5, 2012
Take A Dose On The Road
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NEW FALL SEASON ALBUMS & PERFORMANCES / NYC
SEPTEMBER ALBUM DROPS & PERFORMANCES
ORRIN EVANS The pianist Orrin Evans has lately been on a hot streak, advancing a pugnacious and exploratory brand of post-bop. “The Evolution of Oneself” deepens this agenda, featuring a trio with two smart, groove-literate peers: the drummer Karriem Riggins and the bassist Christian McBride. (Mr. Evans will celebrate the album’s September release, with different partners, Sept. 10 through Sept. 20 at Smoke Jazz Club; smokejazz.com.) Smoke Sessions. (Nate Chinen)
THE ROYAL BOPSTERS PROJECT In this multigenerational jazz vocal summit, renowned old-timers like Jon Hendricks, Annie Ross, Sheila Jordan, Andy Bey and Bob Dorough harmonize with the quartet London, Meader, Pramuk and Ross, younger keepers of the tradition. Birdland, Sept. 15 through Sept. 19, birdlandjazz.com. (S.H.)
KARRIN ALLYSON The album “Many a New Day: Karrin Allyson Sings Rodgers & Hammerstein” (Sept. 18) tells you the main thing you need to know about Ms. Allyson’s new album, her first nonholiday release in four years. You should know at least a couple of more things: first, that she aces the tightrope walk of songbook reverence and jazz-vocal breeziness that often proves elusive on such an album; and second, that her sterling accompanists are the bassist John Patitucci and the pianist Kenny Barron.
JOHN ELLIS & DOUBLE-WIDE A saxophonist and clarinetist fond of blending modern-jazz erudition with street-level grooves, John Ellis has long had a strong outlet in Double-Wide, featuring the New Orleans drummer Jason Marsalis along with Matt Perrine on sousaphone and Alan Ferber on trombone. “Charm” (Sept. 18), the group’s new album, also greatly benefits from the work of Gary Versace, on organ, accordion and piano. Parade Light. (N.C.)
PÉREZ PATITUCCI BLADE Since roughly the turn of this century, the pianist Danilo Pérez, the bassist John Patitucci and the drummer Brian Blade have been refining a sleek, ecstatic bond within the Wayne Shorter Quartet. They recently began working as a stand-alone trio, bringing an open-ended spirit of inquiry and deep reserves of collective intuition; “Children of the Light” is their debut album (Sept. 18).
LUCIANA SOUZA The Brazilian jazz vocalist Luciana Souza has carved a special niche out of lilting duologue, working one by one with a small stable of revered acoustic guitarists. But on “Speaking in Tongues” (Sept. 18) she’s at the center of a changeable and frisky band; its guitarist is Lionel Loueke, who has a taste for polyrhythmic density, and its star soloist is the harmonica whiz Grégoire Maret. The album’s title partly refers to all the nonverbal felicity in Ms. Souza’s tunes, though she also presents new musical settings for a pair of Leonard Cohen poems.
JOHN SCOFIELD “Past Present” (Sept. 25) is an album title with more than one connotation for the guitarist John Scofield. For one thing, it’s a welcome reunion of his quartet of the early-to-mid 1990s, an elastic, swinging group with Joe Lovano on tenor saxophone and Bill Stewart on drums. (Larry Grenadier is the bassist for this go-round.) The deeper meaning, mostly implicit, is an elegy for Mr. Scofield’s son, who died of cancer two years ago — and whose outlook can apparently be credited for this music’s resolute lightness of spirit.
CHRISTIAN SCOTT ATUNDE ADJUAH “Stretch Music” (Sept. 18) is the new album by this firebrand trumpeter from New Orleans, who now resides in Harlem. It’s also a set of aesthetic principles — at heart, involving the elasticity of genres, including the one most of us know as jazz.
JOHN MCLAUGHLIN AND THE 4TH DIMENSION Mr. McLaughlin, the English guitar virtuoso and jazz-fusion godhead, has an effervescent outlet in the 4th Dimension, the band with which he released his most recent album a few years ago. “Black Light” (Sept. 18) consists of all-new compositions for the band, including one piece Mr. McLaughlin wrote for a fallen brother in arms, the flamenco guitar legend Paco de Lucía. Abstract Logix. (N.C.)
CARLOS HENRIQUEZ Mr. Henriquez, the bassist in the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, hails from a Puerto Rican family in the Bronx, and his background deeply informs his work. “The Bronx Pyramid,” Mr. Henriquez’s debut album, is due out on Blue Engine Records on Sept. 18. (N.C.)
KENDRICK SCOTT ORACLE “We Are the Drum” is the fourth album (and first for Blue Note) as bandleader by Mr. Scott, a drummer with Terence Blanchard, Herbie Hancock and others, and a composer making jazz that’s as central to contemporary practice as it comes: rhythmic and interactive, complex and precise and empathetic. Blue Note. Sept. 25. (The band performs at Jazz Standard Sept. 22-23.) (B.R.)
CHICK COREA AND BÉLA FLECK Jazz is to Mr. Corea, the celebrated pianist, as bluegrass is to Mr. Fleck, the estimable banjoist: a formative discipline and a continuing fascination, but hardly the whole picture. Their new double album, “Two,” (out Sept. 11) is a document culled from extensive touring over the eight years since their first duo album. Concord Jazz. They’ll perform on Sept. 27 at Town Hall. (N.C.)
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