Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Herb Harris was born in Washington D.C. on July 8, 1968. He began his musical journey on clarinet at age 12. Upon entering high school, he switched to alto saxophone, playing the instrument in the marching band, and then switched to tenor saxophone at age 17.
His interest in jazz peaked when he heard a recording of John Coltrane’s Giant Steps. Early on, he admired the sound and style of Dexter Gordon, followed by Sonny Rollins, Sonny Stitt and Charlie Parker.
Upon graduating high school, Harris spent several years of study at Florida A&M University. It was while attending the university that Harris met and jammed with Marcus Roberts, eventually playing with Roberts, touring the States and Europe and recording with him on Deep in The Shed.
Harris also spent a short period in the Nineties with the Wynton Marsalis Septet with whom he toured the States, Europe, and South America. He has appeared on the soundtrack “Tune In Tomorrow”, was featured in the group of saxophonists dubbed the “Tough Young Tenors” on the album “Alone Together”, was a member of the second edition of the Jazz Futures, and saxophonist Herb Harris embarked on his first tour as a leader in the spring of 2002. He continues to perform, tour, compose and record.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Eje Thelin was born Eilert Ove Thelin on June 9, 1938 in Jönköping, Sweden. He started his own quintet in 1961 and from 1969 to 1972 he was on the faculty of the Music Academy in Graz, Austria. For the rest of the 1970s, he led his own Eje Thelin Group in Sweden.
By the 1980s he expanded into composition, writing commissioned works for large European orchestras, sometimes featuring himself as soloist. In spite of the attention given to the obvious technical side of his playing, Thelin was also known for his warm approach to traditional ballads, a somewhat retro-romanticism that comes through in his later playing.
An innovator, Eje was widely admired among fellow trombonists for his facile technique, rhythmic intensity and was, perhaps, the first jazz trombonist to translate that technique into the so-called “Sheets of Sound” style that characterized much of the music of tenor saxophonist John Coltrane and, in general, free jazz of the late 1960s and 1970s. He would play with Joachim Kuhn and Don Cherry while leading his own groups.
Trombonist Eje Thelin, one of the strongest trombone voices of modal and free jazz to emerge in the European 60s, passed away on May 18, 1990.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Bill Watrous was born William Russell Watrous III on June 8, 1939 in Middletown, Connecticut. Introduced to the jazz trombone at an early age by his trombonist father, it was while serving in the Navy that he studied with jazz pianist and composer Herbie Nichols. His first professional performances were in Billy Butterfield’s band.
Bill’s career blossomed in the 1960s, playing and recording with many Maynard Ferguson, Woody Herman, Quincy Jones, Johnny Richards and fellow trombonist Kai Winding. From 1965 – 68 he was a member of the house band on the Merv Griffin Show.
In the Seventies he played with the jazz-fusion group Ten Wheel Drive, formed his own band – The Manhattan Wildlife Refugee Big Band, recorded two albums for Columbia, and relocated to southern California.
He worked actively since the 1980s as a bandleader, studio musician, and performing at various jazz clubs. He is most known for his rendition of Johnny Mandel’s “A Time For Love”. Bill Watrous continued to perform and record as a solo artist, bandleader and in various small ensembles for a number of different labels until his passing on July 2, 2018 at age 79. He published an instructional manual Trombonisms and was on the faculty of the University of Southern California Thornton School of Music.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Paulinho da Costa was born Paulo Roberto da Costa on May 31, 1948 in Rio de Janiero, Brazil. Learning to play percussion as a child of five by exploring the different sounds of everything he could get his hands on. While still in his early teens, he joined several musical groups, traveling extensively throughout the world. Upon arriving in the United States, the multi-versed percussionist carved a sizable niche in the music community,
Over the course of five decades Paulinho has participated in thousands of recording sessions, performed on the soundtracks of nearly two hundred films and television shows, recorded seven albums as a leader for A&M, Concord and Pablo record labels, and has been a part of several Grammy winning albums.
He playing has crossed over to work in a variety of music genres including Brazilian, blues, Christian, country, disco, gospel, hip hop, jazz, Latin, pop, R & B, rock, soul and world.
He has performed, collaborated and recorded with an impressive list of musicians and vocalists from A to Z not limited to Bill Cunliffe, Chico Freeman, Chicago, Miles Davis, Earth Wind and Fire, Ricky Martin, Eliane Elias, Toots Thielemans, Sammy Nestico, Dizzy Gillespie, Cher, The Gap Band, Bobby McFerrin, Michael Jackson, Ramsey Lewis, Chet Atkins, Sadao Watanabe, Tori Amos, Stix Hooper and Quincy Jones to name just a few.
Percussionist Paulinho Da Costa is currently proficient on more than two hundred percussion instruments and is considered one of the most recorded musicians of modern times.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Darrell Grant was born on May 30, 1962 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania but his family moved to Denver, Colorado while still a young child. He started piano lessons before his teens and was considered enough of a prodigy to join and tour for two years with the Boulder-based Pearl Street Jazz Band, from the age of fifteen.
At 17 Grant won a scholarship to the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York and while at Eastman focused on performance studies over theory, which he covered in his graduate studies in jazz theory and composition at the University of Miami.
Relocating to New York in the mid-’80s, Grant concentrated on a series of low-profile sideman gigs with the likes of Betty Carter, Chico Freeman and Greg Osby before finally stepping out as a bandleader for the first time. His 1994 Black Art was well received and reviewed and sold respectably, and his sophomore project The New Bop was an even bigger critical success.
He has recorded for 32 Jazz, Criss Cross, Monarch, Lair Hill and Origin record labels, has relocated to the Pacific Northwest and has added teaching credits to his resume of performance, composition and bandleader and sideman in Tony Williams’ quintet as he continues in the tradition of bop and post-bop jazz.
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