Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Dara Tucker was born on November 8th in Tulsa, Oklahoma, the third of seven children to music minister and gospel recording artist, Doyle Tucker, and singer Lynda Tucker. Starting out singing harmony at the age of 4 with her brothers and sisters, she began playing the piano at age 8, and traveled the country singing with her family for most of her childhood. The family spent time in Spokane, Washington; Detroit, Michigan; Fayetteville, Arkansas; Pasadena, California; and Baltimore, Maryland. Along with her siblings, they were known as The Tuckers bringing forth their rich harmonies and seamless blend.
Receiving her degree in International Business and German Studies, after graduating, Tucker worked for a few years in the field of International Business. She then moved to Interlaken, Switzerland to study German while aupairing. It was while living in Switzerland in 2003 she began songwriting, and the next year moved to Nashville, Tennessee to pursue a career as a singer/songwriter.
She recorded her debut album All Right Now in 2009 featuring Great American Songbook standards. Two years later she dropped her second album Soul Said Yes blending r&b, jazz, and gospel and featured seven-string guitarist, Charlie Hunter.
A third release, The Sun Season in 2014 was recorded in Astoria, Queens, New York included ten originals penned by Dara. The session had guitarist Peter Bernstein, pianist Helen Sung, drummer Donald Edwards, John Ellis on saxophone, Alan Ferber on trombone, and bassist Greg Bryant. She would go on to record another studio album and live date.
Vocalist Dara Tucker, named Jazz Vocalist of the Year at the 2016 and 2017 Nashville Industry Music Awards, and cites her influences including her parents as Mel Tormé, James Taylor, Stevie Wonder, and Nancy Wilson, continues to compose, perform and record.
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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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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Johnny Richards was born Juan Manuel Cascales on November 2, 1911 in Querétaro, Mexico. His father immigrated to the United States into Laredo, Texas in 1919, the family settling first in Los Angeles, California and then in San Fernando, California where he attended and graduated from San Fernando High School. From there he went to Fullerton College in 1930.
Working in Los Angeles, California from the late 1930s to 1952 when he moved to New York City. He had been arranging for Stan Kenton since 1950 and continued to do so through the mid~Sixties while leading his own bands throughout his career. Additionally, he composed the music for the popular song Young at Heart in 1953, made famous by Frank Sinatra. He recorded nine albums as a leader and as a sideman/arranger working with Charlie Barnet, Harry James, Stan Kenton, and Hugo Lowenstern recorded another eight.
Arranger, composer, and bandleader Johnny Richards, who was a pivotal arranger for some of the more adventurous performances by Stan Kenton’s big band in the 1950s and early 1960, passed away from a brain tumor in New York, New York on October 7, 1968.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Edgar Melvin Sampson, born October 31, 1907 in New York City, he started playing violin at the age of six and picked up the saxophone in high school. He started his professional career in 1924 with a violin-piano duo with Joe Colman and through the rest of the 1920s and early ’30s, he played with many bands, including those of Charlie “Fess” Johnson, Duke Ellington, Rex Stewart and Fletcher Henderson.
1933 saw him joining Chick Webb’s band. It was during his tenure with Webb that he created his most enduring work as a composer, writing Stompin’ at the Savoy and “Don’t Be That Way“. Leaving the Webb band in 1936 with a reputation as a composer and arranger, he was able to freelance with Benny Goodman, Artie Shaw, Red Norvo, Teddy Hill, Teddy Wilson, and Chick Webb.
Becoming a student of the Schillinger System in the early 1940s, Edgar continued to play saxophone through the late ’40s and led his own band from 1949 to 1951. Through the Fifties, he worked as an arranger for Latin performers Marcelino Guerra, Tito Rodríguez and Tito Puente.
He recorded one album under his own name, Swing Softly Sweet Sampson, in 1956. Due to illness, he stopped working by the late 1960s. Saxophonist, violinist, composer, arranger Edgar Sampson passed away on January 16, 1973 at the age of 65 in Englewood, New Jersey.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Jacques Loussier was born on October 26, 1934 in Angers, France. Starting piano lessons there aged ten, the following year he heard a piece from the Notebook for Anna Magdalena Bach. He fell in love with the music and began adding his own notes and expanding the harmonies. By 13, he met the pianist Yves Nat in Paris, who regularly gave him projects for three months, after which he returned for another lesson.
While studying at the Conservatoire National Musique, Loussier began composing music, having moved by then to Paris, with Nat, from the age of 16. He played jazz in Paris bars to finance his studies, and fusing Bach and jazz was unique at the time. After six years of studies, he traveled to the Middle East and Latin America, where he was inspired by different sounds. He stayed in Cuba for a year.
Early in his career, he was an accompanist for the singers Frank Alamo, Charles Aznavour, Léo Ferré, and Catherine Sauvage, before forming a trio in 1959 with string bass player Pierre Michelot, a Reinhardt alum, and percussionist Christian Garros. The trio began with Decca Records then moved to Philips/Phonogram in 1973, selling over six million albums in 15 years.
By the mid-1970s, the trio dissolved and Jacques set up his own recording studio, Studio Miraval, where he composed for acoustic and electric instruments. He recorded with musicians such as Pink Floyd, Elton John, Sting, Chris Rea, and Sade. Reviving his trio in 1985, with the percussionist André Arpino and the bassist Vincent Charbonnier. As early as 1998 the trio recorded interpretations). Besides Bach, the trio recorded interpretations of classical compositions on the album Satie: Gymnopédies Gnossienne. His last albums, My Personal Favorites, and Beyond Bach, Other Composers I Adore, were released in 2014, on the occasion of his 80th birthday.
Suffering a stroke during a performance at the Klavier-Festival Ruhr on July 14, 2011 retired from the stage. Pianist Jacques Loussier, who performed in the classical, jazz, and third stream arenas, passed away on March 5, 2019 at the age of 84.
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