Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Jeff Lorber was born November 4, 1952 into a Jewish family in Cheltenham, Pennsylvania. He started to play the piano when he was four years old and after playing in a number of R&B bands as a teen, he attended Berklee College of Music, where he developed his love for jazz. There he met and played alongside guitarist John Scofield and for several years he studied chemistry at Boston University.

Moving to Vancouver, Washington in 1972, his first group, The Jeff Lorber Fusion, released their self-titled debut album in 1977 on Inner City Records. Recording five albums under his name, these early sessions showcased a funky jazz fusion sound, and his 1980 album, Wizard Island, introduced saxophonist Kenny G. In 1982, Lorber recorded his first solo album, It’s a Fact, which explored his R&B roots with a smoother, more synthesizer-heavy sound along with vocals.

Many of his songs have appeared on The Weather Channel segments as well as their compilation albums. He has had six Grammy Award nominations and his Prototype album won for Best Contemporary Instrumental Album in 2018. Keyboardist, composer and record producer Jeff Lorber continues to produce, compose and perform.

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The Quarantined Jazz Voyager

As we approach November 3, VOTING in this very important election is this Quarantined Jazz Voyager’s top priority and I hope it is yours. Having received my absentee ballot, I will be delivering it this coming week. In the meantime, while remaining secluded and social distancing I’m pulling out an 2011 album by Pee Wee Ellis titled Tenoration.

It is a twelve-track jazz and funk double album by that is an all-instrumental album. Its subtitle, From Jazz to Funk and Back reflects Ellis’ affection to both jazz and funk music. On this production, he uses two different rhythm sections. CD1 emphasizes funk, and on CD 2 he’s bringing jazz.

The album was recorded in November 2010 and released the following year in April on the Art Of Groove label. The producer on the session was Joachim Becker.

1. Slanky P (Pee Wee “Alfred” Ellis / Jim Payne) ~ 7:15
2. Gittin’ A Little Hipper (James Brown /(Pee Wee “Alfred” Ellis / Bud Hobgood) ~ 3:01
3. Bon Bonn ((Pee Wee “Alfred” Ellis) ~ 7:00
4. Sticks (Cannonball Adderley) ~ 10:42
5. Zig Zag (Pee Wee “Alfred” Ellis / Paul Rusky / Jim Schneider) ~ 7:01
6. At Last (Mack Gordon / Harry Warren) ~ 6:04 #Out Of The Blue (Wright, Terry) ~ 2:15

1. You’ve Changed (Bill Carey / Carl Fischer) ~ 4:30
2. Sticks (Cannonball Adderley) ~ 4:11
3. Parlayin’ (Pee Wee “Alfred” Ellis) ~ 4:30
4. Sonnymoon For Two (Sonny Rollins) ~ 8:37
5. Now Go On (Pee Wee “Alfred” Ellis) ~ 6:01
6. Freedom Jazz Dance (Eddie Harris) ~ 4:47

• Guitar: Tony Remy (1-6)
• Keyboards: Dan Moore (1-6)
• Piano: Gareth Williams (7-12)
• Bass: Patrick Scales (1-6)
• Bass: Laurence Cottle (7-12)
• Drums: Guido May

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Phillip Sanford Wilson was born on September 8, 1941 in St. Louis, Missouri and was a third-generation musician. His grandfather, Ira Kimball, was a riverboat percussionist on the Mississippi to New Orleans.

His recording debut was with Sam Lazar, noted for having one of the first interracial bands in the St. Louis area. After moving to Chicago, Illinois he became a member of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) and performed with the Art Ensemble of Chicago.

He joined up with the Paul Butterfield Blues Band in 1967 at a time when the band membership changed greatly, including an added horn section. He recorded three albums with the group. Wilson’s song Love March, written with Gene Dinwiddie, was performed at Woodstock and released in 1970 on the live album from the festival.

Wilson, along with Dinwiddie and fellow former Butterfield Band member Buzz Feiten, formed the jazz-rock band Full Moon in the early 1970s. They recorded a self-titled album which is considered one of the finest early examples of jazz fusion. He was part of the loft jazz scene in 1970s New York City, worked as a session musician for Stax Records in Memphis, Tennessee and with Jimi Hendrix at the Cafe Au Go Go and Generation Club in 1968. They recorded with The Last Poets, Fontella Bass, Olu Dara, David Murray, Anthony Braxton, and Carla Bley. He worked extensively with Lester Bowie. In 1985,  along with Bill Laswell co-produced the album Down by Law under the group name Deadline.

He recorded four albums as a leader and as a sideman recorded twenty-one albums with Hamiet Bluiett, Lester Bowie, Anthony Braxton, Paul Butterfield, Julius Hemphill, Sam Lazar, Frank Lowe, Roscoe Mitchell, and David Murray.

Drummer Phillip Wilson, while pursuing his musical career, was stalked and murdered in New York City on March 25, 1992. As a result of America’s Most Wanted television program, Marvin Slater was convicted for premeditated murder in 1997 and sentenced to 33 1/3 years in state prison. The reason for his murder has never been revealed.

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Perry Morris Robinson was born on September 17, 1938, the son of composer Earl Robinson. He grew up in New York City and attended the Lenox School of Jazz in Massachusetts in the summer of 1959. After serving in a U.S. military band in the early 1960s, his first record, Funk Dumpling with Kenny Barron, Henry Grimes, and Paul Motian was recorded by Savoy in 1962.

He would go on to record with Grimes on The Call in 1965, in which two of the album’s six songs are credited to Robinson, including the title track. From 1973, he worked with Jeanne Lee and Gunter Hampel’s Galaxie Dream Band. He contributed to Dave Brubeck’ s Two Generations of Brubeck and played with Burton Greene’ s Dutch klezmer band Klezmokum. He was the featured clarinetist on Archie Shepp’s LP Mama Too Tight on the Impulse! label.

Perry led his own groups in performances and on record, with albums on the Chiaroscuro, WestWind, and Timescraper labels. More recently, he worked with William Parker and Walter Perkins on Bob’s Pink Cadillac and several other discs on the CIMP label.

From 1975 until 1977, Robinson was a member of the Clarinet Contrast group, then recorded with Lou Grassi, Wayne Lopes, and Luke Faust in The Jug Jam, an improvisational jug band. He regularly plays and records in a free jazz and world music trio; played with Darius Brubeck and Muruga Booker in the MBR jazz trio, and played an integral part in the formation of the improvisational Cosmic Legends. In 2005 he was featured on his cousin Jeffrey Lewis’ album City and Eastern Songs on Rough Trade Records, A later release was OrthoFunkOlogy in 2008 with the band Free Funk. Clarinetist and composer Perry Robinson, whose autobiography, Perry Robinson: The Traveler was published in 2002, passed away on December 2, 2008.

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Roberto Magris was born June 19, 1959 in Trieste, Italy. By the 1980s he was leading the jazz trio Gruppo Jazz Marca with whom he recorded three albums, Comunicazione Sonora, Aria di Città and Mitteleuropa. In 1987 he put together an Italian quartet that stayed together for nearly 20 years, touring Europe, Asia, Australia, and South America and recording two albums, Life in Israel and Maliblues.

In the 1990s he founded the acid-jazz groups DMA Urban Jazz Funk and Alfabeats Nu Jazz, performing in Europe and in America. In 1998 Magris formed the Europlane Orchestra that included several jazz musicians from various European countries. With the Europlane Orchestra he recorded three albums Live At Zooest, Plays Kurt Weill, and Current Views.

2005 saw Magris partnering with Hungarian saxophonist Tony Lakatos on the album Check-In in 2005 he went on to collaborate with bassist Art Davis and drummer Jimmy “Junebug” Jackson on the album Kansas City Outbound issued by JMood. That same year, he hooked up with alto saxophonist Herb Geller on the album Il Bello del Jazz and some years later, JMood released another album with Herb Geller titled An Evening with Herb Geller & The Roberto Magris Trio – Live in Europe 2009.

During his time in the United States, Magris has become the musical director of JMood and has also recorded two albums in tribute to the trumpeter Lee Morgan, two trio albums with Elisa Pruett and Albert “Tootie” Heath devoted to the music of pianist Elmo Hope, and another to the legacy of alto saxophonist Julian “Cannonball” Adderley.

While in Los Angeles, California he recorded with Idris Muhammad and saxmen Paul Carr and Michael O’Neill, one album with Sam Reed, a double CD set in tribute to the bebop era, three albums with his trio from Kansas City and performed with his sextet that included trumpeter Brian Lynch at the WDNA Jazz Gallery in Miami, Florida. In Chicago, Illinois he recorded with a group including trumpeter Eric Jacobson and tenor saxophonist Mark Colby.

His influences have been Wynton Kelly, Tommy Flanagan, Bill Evans, Kenny Drew, Jaki Byard, Randy Weston, McCoy Tyner, Andrew Hill, Paul Bley, Don Pullen, and Steve Kuhn. He has recorded nearly three dozen albums as a leader or as a member of groups he has founded. Pianist, composer and arranger Roberto Magris continues to perform, record and tour.

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