Daily Dose Of Jazz..
Jay Clayton was born on October 28, 1941, in Youngstown, Ohio as Judith Colantone and after studying at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio she ventured to New York City and took lessons from Steve Lacy. Together with her husband, percussionist Frank Clayton, she presented Jazz at the Loft in their home around 1967. Among the featured musicians Sam Rivers, Cecil McBee, Joanne Brackeen, Dave Liebman, Larry Karush, Pete Yellin, Hal Galper, Jeanne Lee, Bob Moses, Junie Booth, John Gilmore, and Jane Getz.
Earning her own reputation as an avant-garde singer, Jay developed her personal wordless vocabulary. Her pioneering vocal explorations placed her at the forefront of the free jazz movement and loft scene in the 1970s, where she counted among the first singers to incorporate poetry and electronics into her improvisations. She performed and recorded with Muhal Richard Abrams, John Fischer’s Interface, Byron Morris’s Unity and for a long time she was a member of the Steve Reich ensemble. She was one of the first singers to record composer John Cage’s vocal music.
Clayton’s own performance dates appear under the heading the Jay Clayton Project, while she titles her work with other esteemed vocalists Different Voices. She co-leads a trio, Outskirts, with drummer Jerry Granelli and saxophonist Jane Ira Bloom. She has more than 40 recordings to her credit, Clayton has appeared alongside Bud Shank, Charlie Haden, Kirk Nurock, Stanley Cowell, Lee Konitz, Julian Priester, George Cables, Gary Bartz, Gary Peacock, Fred Hersch, Jeanne Lee, Lauren Newton, Urszula Dudziak, and Bobby McFerrin.
As an educator, in 1971 Jay began leading her own workshops, partly together with Michelle Berne and Jeanne Lee. By 1981 onwards she taught at Cornish College of the Arts in Seattle, Washington for 20 years. In addition to that tenure, she taught for several semesters at New York’s City College, at Graz in Austria, Berlin, Cologne and Munich. She developed the vocal program for the Banff Center in Canada, which she co-taught with fellow vocalist Sheila Jordan. The two are also teaching together at Vermont Jazz Workshop and at Jazz in July at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She has taught masterclasses to the Manhattan School of Music and the Peabody Conservatory.
In 2001 her book, Sing Your Story: A Practical Guide for Learning and Teaching the Art of Jazz Singing, was published. She was the first artistic director for the first ever Women in Jazz Festival, served as a consultant for ABC Cable’s Women in Jazz, and has received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, Meet the Composer, and Chamber Music America. Vocalist Jay Clayton continues to perform, record and tour.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Philip Catherine was born on October 27, 1942 in London, England to English/Belgian parents and a grandfather who was first violinist in the London Symphony Orchestra. Having an ear for music early on, he picked up the guitar after hearing George Brassens and began listening to jazz.
He soon got the opportunity to play with some of those musicians when performing in Belgium, where he was residing at the time. In the 1960s he was a member of the Jean-Luc Ponty Quintet and during this period he was at the forefront on the European jazz scene performing and recording with Lou Bennett, Billy Brooks, Edgar Bateman, John Lee, Gerry Brown, Larry Coryell, Alphonse Mouzon, Charlie Mariano, Kenny Drew and Tom Harrell, among others.
Recording his debut solo album Stream in 1971 for Warner Bros. Records, the following year Philip collaborated with John Scofield, Ran Blake, George Benson and other musicians in Boston, Massachusetts. By early 1976 he replaced Jan Akkerman in the Dutch rock group Focus, recording on one album Focus con Proby, featuring American singer P. J. Proby.
The 1980s Catherine played extensively with the Chet Baker Trio and is featured on several of Baker’s albums. He went on to play with Charles Mingus, who dubbed him “Young Django”, as well as collaborations with Dexter Gordon, Richard Galliano, Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen, Stéphane Grappelli, Toots Thielemans, Robert Wyatt, Klaus Doldinger, Buddy Guy, Karin Krog, Carla Bley, Mike Mantler and Joachim Kühn as well as others too numerous to list.
He won the first Belgian Golden Django in 1995 and is considered the grandfather of Belgian jazz for his approach, sound, emotional lyricism and expression that is both important and influential. Guitarist Philip Catherine continues to perform on the now very active Belgian jazz scene as well as record and tour worldwide.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Ernest James Watts was born October 23, 1945 in Norfolk, Virginia. He began playing saxophone at thirteen. After a brief period at West Chester University, he attended Berklee College of Music on a Downbeat scholarship. He toured with Buddy Rich in the mid-1960s, occupying one of the alto saxophone chairs, with Lou Marini sitting the other.
He traveled to Africa on a US State Department tour with Oliver Nelson’s group and played tenor saxophone with The Tonight Show Band under Doc Severinsen for 20 years. During the Seventies he was a featured soloist on many of Marvin Gaye’s Motown albums, as well as on countless other pop and R&B sessions during 25 years as a first-call musician in the studios of Los Angeles, California.
In the mid-1980s Watts decided to rededicate himself to jazz, recording and touring with German guitarist and composer Torsten de Winkel, drummer Steve Smith and keyboardist Tom Coster. He joined bassist Charlie Haden’s Quartet West, played the saxophone on the Grease soundtrack, clarinet on The Color Purple soundtrack and performed on the opening theme song of the popular 80s sitcom Night Court.
Ernie founded Flying Dolphin Records and in early 2008, his Analog Man won the award in the 7th Annual Independent Music Awards for Best Jazz Album, worked with vocalist Kurt Elling, won a Grammy in 2010 for Best Jazz Vocal Album. He tours Europe twice a year with his own Ernie Watts Quartet, as well as Asia and summer jazz festivals the world over.
He has toured with the Rolling Stones, played the mystery horn on Frank Zappa’s album The Grand Wazoo, and has performed and recorded with Richard Groove Holmes, Alphonse Mouzon, Billy Alessi, Bobby Alessi, Gene Ammons, Paul Anka, Eric Martin, Willie Bobo, Brass Fever, Kenny Burrell, Lee Ritenour, David Axelrod, Donald Byrd, Stanley Clarke, Billy Cobham, Gino Vannelli, Randy Crawford, Kurt Elling, Torsten de Winkel, Hellmut Hattler, Dizzy Gillespie, Bobby Hutcherson, Milt Jackson, J. J. Johnson, Carole King, Charles Kynard, John Mayall, Carmen McRae, Blue Mitchell, Helen Reddy, New Stories, Moacir Santos, Lalo Schifrin, Bud Shank, Gábor Szabó, Gerald Wilson, Ndugu Chancler, Alphonso Johnson, Patrice Rushen, Joe Louis Walker, Barry Goldberg, Paul Jones, Chubby Tavares, T. Bone Walker, Big Joe Turner and Otis Span among others.
Tenor, alto and soprano saxophonist and flautist Ernie Watts has won two Grammy Awards as an instrumentalist and continues to perform, record and tour.
Inspire A Young Mind
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Carli Muñoz was born Carlos C. Muñoz, on October 16, 1948 in Puerto Rico. A self-taught pianist, his music of choice was jazz, European avant-garde and American pop music. Among his early influences were ragtime, early American ballads, boogie woogie and classical music, especially that of Erik Satie and Edgard Varèse.
When Carli turned 16 he headed to New York City with a rock band he co-founded with Jorge Calderon called The Living End, AKA: Space, and for 18 months was the house band at a New York club. He later moved to Los Angeles, California where he worked with Charles Lloyd, George Benson, Wilson Pickett, Jan and Dean, The Association, Chico Hamilton, Wayne Henderson, Les McCann, Peter Cetera and Evie Sands.
From 1970 through 1981, Muñoz toured with the Beach Boys, playing Hammond B3 and piano. Following this period in his career in 1985 he returned to Puerto Rico and stayed out of the spotlight. 1998 saw him opening a restaurant, Carli Cafe Concierto.
His most recent releases include a solo piano project Love Tales, Both Sides Now, with bassist Eddie Gómez, drummer Joe Chambers and flautist Jeremy Steig, Live at Carli’s Vol. 1, Live at Carli’s Vol 2 and Live at Carli’s Vol 3, recorded live at Carli Cafe Concierto, and Maverick with Eddie Gómez, drummer Jack DeJohnette, Don Byron on clarinet and tenor saxophonist David Sánchez, and a tribute album In My Soul, in memory of both Carl and Dennis Wilson.
Pianist Carli Muñoz, sometimes spelled Munoz, continues to perform jazz in his restaurant and often returns to the mainland to perform and record.
Put A Dose In Your Pocket
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Patti Cathcart was born on October 4, 1949 in San Francisco, California. She is one half of the jazz duo Tuck & Patti. She grew up singing and was performing with The Brides of Funkenstein when she met guitarist Tuck Andress at an audition in Las Vegas in 1980.
After relocating to Patti’s hometown of San Francisco, the two worked as members of a Bay Area rock-cover band. Needing to make some real money they learn some songs as a duo, put together a band, started performing as a duo, and catching on. Their fame as Tuck & Patti around the Bay Area grew and finding themselves declining recording offers to focus on polishing their unique sound.
In 1987 they signed with Windham Hill Records, recorded their breakout album Tears of Joy and received airplay on both jazz and pop radio stations around the U.S. They recorded several more albums for the label before signing with Epic Records for an album in 1995. They followed this with more releases on the Windham Hill and 33rd Street Records labels. Ultimately they established their own label, T&P Records, which licenses their recordings for worldwide distribution.
Married since 1983, Patti and her husband Tuck Andress, who hails from Tulsa, Oklahoma, plays a 1953 Gibson L-5 guitar because it was the model played by his idol Wes Montgomery. The duo continues to record and perform at concerts and festivals around the world. In between gigs the two are educators, holding vocal and guitar workshops and teach privately.
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