Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Gilberto Passos Gil Moreira was born June 26, 1942 in Salvador do Bahia, Brazil though he spent much of his childhood in the countryside of Ituaca. The offspring of a doctor and a schoolteacher, he attended the Marist Brothers school until he was nine and then returned to Salvador for secondary school.
Gil’s interest in music began when he was two and grew up listening to the forro music and the street performers of Salvador. Early on, he began to play the drums and the trumpet, and then took up the accordion before attending music school. He first played classical music, but grew more interested in the folk and popular music of Brazil, influenced by accordionist Luiz Gonzaga. He discovered the samba music of Dorival Caymmi, American big band jazz and tango.
In 1950 while still in high school he joined his first band, Os Desafinados (The Out of Tunes), playing accordion and vibraphone and singing. Soon afterwards he settled on the guitar as his instrument after hearing Joao Gilberto and started playing bossa nova. Gil met guitarist and singer Caetano Veloso at the Universidade Federal da Bahia in 1963 and immediately they began collaborating and performing together, releasing a single and EP soon afterwards. Along with Maria Bethania, Gal Costa and Tom Ze, they opened the Vila Velha Theatre with a night of bossa nova and traditional Brazilian songs in 1964.
Gilberto would go on to become musical director of the theatre’s concert series, sold bananas, composed jingles for tv ads and work for Unilever before moving to Sao Paulo in in 1965. Though he had a hit single with Louvação that was later recorded by Elis Regina, his first solo hit was the 1969 song Aquele Abraco. Arrested with Veloso he spent seven months in jail and house arrest and then instructed to leave the country. After a concert in Salvador in ’69 they left for Portugal, Paris and London where he listened to Bob Marley, Jimmy Cliff and Burning Spear. He performed with Yes, Pink Floyd and the Incredible String Band. It was in London that he recorded Gilberto Gil Nega and attended Miles Davis and Sun Ra concerts.
Over the course of his career he participated in the Aids benefit album Red, Hot + Rio, win Grammy awards, receive the Legion d’honneur from France, and was the first Latin American recipient of the Polar Music Prize in Stockholm. In between performances he turned to politics becoming the Salvador Secretary of Culture, founded the environmental protection organization Onda Azul (Blue Wave), was a Good will Ambassador for the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, became Brazil’s Minister of Culture and then retired due to a vocal cord polyp.
Tenor, baritone and falsetto vocalist, guitarist, lyricist and composer Gilberto Gil who is one of the pioneers of tropicália, and became increasing interested in the welfare of Black culture and focused on Afro-Brazilian culture. He continues to transcend the eras of dance and music trends emerging on the other side with a blend of music styles that stay true to his traditional Bahian roots while engaging with commercial markets.
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Hollywood On 52nd Street
W.C. Handy composed St. Louis Blues used as the title track for the 1958 film of the same name. The movie had as its stars Nat King Cole portraying W.C. Handy and Ruby Dee as Elizabeth as well as a host of musicians and vocalists not limited to Eartha Kitt, Cab Calloway, Ella Fitzgerald, Mahalia Jackson, Barney Bigard, Red Callender and Pearl Bailey.
The Story: Will Handy grew up in Memphis with his preacher father and his Aunt Hagar. His father intends for him to use his musical gifts only in church, but he can’t stay away from the music of the streets and workers. After he writes a theme song for a local politician, Gogo, a speakeasy singer, convinces Will to be her accompanist. Will is estranged from his father for many years while he writes and publishes many blues songs. At last the family is reunited when Gogo brings them to New York to see Will’s music played by a symphony orchestra.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Della Griffin was born June 12, 1925 in Newberry, South Carolina but grew up in New York, the 19th of 20th children. She greatly admired and was influenced by Count Basie, Charlie Barnet, and most specifically Billie Holiday. She began singing when she was 12 and a few years after her graduation in 1943 from Jamaica High School in Queens, New York, she began singing professionally.
1950 found Griffin and Frances Kelley forming one of the first all female R&B singing group that played in small clubs whenever they could for about a year. In 1951, Della invited Jerry Blaine, the owner of Jubilee Records, to hear the group perform. So impressed by the group that he signed them the next day and in January 1952 Jubilee released “The Enchanters” first record, they began touring, dropped their second record and two members left the group.
Della and Kelley were determined to continue their careers and replaced the two members becoming the “Dell-Tones” after lead singer and drummer Della. They went on to record with Brunswick and Rainbow record labels, and toured with Jimmy Forrest. By 1957 the Dell-Tones slowly began to drift apart and Della left to perform on her own.
Over the years Griffin migrated towards jazz touring with and playing in support to many artists including Sonny Stitt, Benny Green, Illinois Jacquet, and Etta Jones. She began performing again in New York City clubs including the Blue Note and The Blue Book where she stayed for years.
In 1984, Della was hit by a car and took a break from singing. She came back as a featured singer that garnered her more attention than her drumming. Recording with Houston Person, she began performing overseas at age 88, she has since all but ceased her performances and appearances. While singing remained her passion, vocalist Della Griffin, who was also proficient on the drums, alto saxophone, and piano, transitioned in New York City on August 9, 2022, at the age of 100..
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Nanette Natal was born on June 10, 1945 in Brooklyn, New York. She started her professional career as a classical singer in 1960 and during this period she was a member of the Helen Hayes Young People’s Theater Guild. In the early ’60s, she performed numerous concerts in New York with that group. She then went on to work the Bitter End Coffee House Circuit, performing her own material, which developed into blues and rock, singing and playing guitar and performing at universities and concert halls throughout the country.
By the ’70s, she recorded for Vanguard and Evolution Records, worked with Mahalia Jackson, Odetta, Bonnie Raitt and Rick Nelson along with TV appearances, most notably with Barbara Walters on The Today Show. She was also active on the club circuit playing such venues as the Gaslight and the Au Go-Go.
Unhappy with the constrictions of the record companies, it was in the mid-Seventies that she dissolved her recording contracts and set herself upon a path to develop her musical expression and in 1977 she turned to jazz as that vehicle. Nanette’s defining moment in her mind to pursue a jazz career occurred during a demo recording session for Columbia Records. She was asked to record a pop record and she sang Duke “Sophisticated Lady”. Dramatically changing the phrasing she was subsequently told by the engineer that she was not a pop singer, but a jazz singer.
From 1977 to the mid-’80s, Natal became a strong influence on the downtown loft scene. It was at this time that she started to teach privately, setting up her production company and label, Benyo Music Productions, and releasing five albums from 1980 to 1995.
Nanette Natal, one of the more creative jazz singers continues to perform and teach in New York and work on such interesting and daring projects as a one-woman opera. She also writes a monthly column “Creative Fire-Singing as a Spiritual Practice” which expresses her views on the art and techniques of jazz vocalizing.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Emilie-Claire Barlow was born June 6, 1976 in Toronto, Canada to professional musician parents, so she grew up in recording studios. By age seven she had begun a career singing television and radio commercial
Encouraged by her parents to sing and study several instruments Emilie chose piano, cello, clarinet and violin. She went on to study voice at the Etobicoke School of Arts and music theory and arranging at Humber College. She lists Ella Fitzgerald, Tony Bennett and Stevie Wonder amongst her musical influences.
Barlow’s first album Sings was released in 1998. She has been named Female Vocalist of the Year at the 2008 National Jazz Awards, has been nominated five times for Canada’s Juno Awards and won Best Jazz Vocal Recording for her album Seule ce soir in 2013. The album also won Album of the Year – Jazz Interpretation at the 2013 ADISQ Awards. The same year she also picked up Best Jazz Vocalist of the Year from Sirius XM Independent Album of the Year.
Beyond music Emilie has also provided voices for many animated television series, including Sailor Venus and Sailor Mars in Sailor Moon, Bakugan Battle Brawlers and Courtney in Total Drama Island.
To date the jazz singer, arranger, record producer and voice actress has released 10 self produced jazz albums on her own label and has voiced dozens of characters for animated television series. She has performed and recorded with Melanie Doane, Peter Appleyard, Matt Dusk, Jay Oliver and Dave Weckl to name a few. Emilie-Claire Barlow continues to perform, record and tour.
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