TITO PUENTE JR.

Son of the legendary American salsa and Latin jazz musician Tito Puente, he has big shoes to fill and he does! He returns for another night of exhilarating Latin rhythms that will get your feet moving. Always honoring his father’s legacy, Tito Puente, Jr. has also made a name for himself as one of the most exciting Latin musicians touring today. Puente, Jr. has performed in over 300 shows in a variety of venues across the country, from jazz festival stages to grand symphony halls. This time it’s Mambo!!!

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

John Russell Parnell was born on August 6, 1923 in Paddington, London, England and raised in Wembley. The only son of vaudevillians, his father a ventriloquist, his mother, a gifted classical pianist, worked as her husband’s accompanist. He toured with his parents as a very young child and standing in the wings enthralled by the big bands that were often top of the bill in the late 1920s. He started piano lessons as a four-year-old and could pick up tunes easily. Sent away to boarding school from the age of six, he began to take an interest in drums, and this soon became a consuming passion.

Not much interested in academic study, Parnell bought all the jazz records he could, starting with Duke Ellington and moving on to the more informal Chicago school epitomised by trumpeter Muggsy Spanier. Armed with a Premier drum kit purchased by his mother from the window-cleaner for £15 and following six lessons from Max Abrams, at 15 he ventured north to Scarborough to start his professional career playing for the summer season at the town’s theatre.

During his military service in the 1940s he became a member of Buddy Featherstonhaugh’s Radio Rhythm Club Sextet and played drums with Vic Lewis and other servicemen who were keen on jazz. From 1944 to 1946 he recorded with the Lewis-Parnell Jazzmen’s version of Ugly Child.

During the 1940s and 1950s, Parnell was voted best drummer in the Melody Maker poll for seven years in succession. He composed many television themes, including Love Story, Father Brown, The Golden Shot and Family Fortunes. He was a regular judge on the ATV talent show New Faces and the musical director for The Benny Hill Show.

He was appointed as the musical director for ATV in 1956, a post he held until 1981, and was the conductor for The Muppet Show orchestra for the series’ entire run. Jack composed the score theme for ITC Entertainment. Throughout the 1960s, Parnell directed the pit orchestra for Sunday Night at the London Palladium.

In the 1970s, he co-founded the group The Best of British Jazz with Kenny Baker, Don Lusher, Betty Smith, Tony Lee, and Tony Archer, which performed until 1985. From 1991 on Parnell was part of the Norfolk-based Mike Capocci Trio who backed saxophonists Johnny Griffin, Ronnie Ross, and Kathy Stobart. In 1994, he took over as the leader of the London Big Band.

Drummer and musical director Jack Parnell, whose uncle was the theatrical impresario Val Parnell, transitioned from the effects of cancer at 87 on August 8, 2010 in Southwold, Suffolk, England.

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Hamid Drake was born Henry Lawrence Drake on August 3, 1955 in Monroe, Louisiana but his family moved to Evanston, Illinois, when he was a child. There he started playing with local rock and R&B bands, which eventually brought him to the attention of Fred Anderson, an older saxophonist who had also moved to Evanston from Monroe as a child decades before. Drake worked with Anderson from 1974 to 2010 including on his 1979 The Missing Link.

At Anderson’s workshops, he met Douglas Ewart, George E. Lewis and other members of Chicago’s Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM). Percussionist Ed Blackwell had a great influence on Drake, during this period. His flowing rhythmic expressions and interest in the roots of the music drew like-minded musicians together into a performance and educational collective named the Mandingo Griot Society, which combined traditional African music and narrative with distinctly American influences.

During the Seventies he met Don Cherry and with Adam Rudolph toured Europe and worked extensively with him from 1978 until Cherry’s death in 1995. It was during this period where they explored the interior landscape of percussion and shared deeply in Mr. Cherry’s grasp of music’s spiritually infinite transformational possibilities.

By the close of the 1990s, Hamid was widely regarded as one of the best percussionists in jazz and improvised music. Incorporating Afro-Cuban, Indian, and African percussion instruments and influence, in addition to using the standard trap set, Drake has collaborated extensively with top free jazz improvisers, performed world music and reggae during his career.

Drummer and percussionist Hamid Drake, who also plays the tabla, continues to perform.

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Danny Barcelona was born on July 23, 1929 in Waipahu, a community of Honolulu, Hawaii. A self taught percussionist, by the age of 18 in his final year in high school, he was already playing music with trombonist, singer, and bandleader Trummy Young, joining his Hawaii All-Stars in the early Fifties. When Young left to join Louis Armstrong’s combo in 1952, he assumed leadership of the band, a sextet known as the Hawaiian Dixieland All-Stars. They would tour the Hawaiian Islands, Japan and the rest of the Far East.

Danny was introduced to Louis Armstrong by Young in 1956 and upon his recommendation, in 1958 at the age of 27 became Armstrong’s drummer for 15 years. As a Filipino-American, Armstrong would frequently introduce him to audiences as The Little Filipino Boy, then follow up by calling himself the Little Arabian Boy.

He appears on more than 130 of Armstrong’s recordings including Hello, Dolly! and What a Wonderful World. He toured with Armstrong and Young around the world until illness took Armstrong and he returned to Hawaii. There he became a longtime performer at the Hilton Hawaiian Village Hotel, and worked for many years at Harry’s Music Store and the Easy Music Center.

In 1979, he returned to the mainland and settled with his family in Monterey Park, California. Drummer Danny Barcelona transitioned in Monterey Park on April 1, 2007, due to complications from cancer at the age of 77.

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Bobby Previte was born July 16, 1951 in Niagara Falls, New York. He started playing early but went on to earn a degree in economics from the University at Buffalo, New York where he also studied percussion.

Moving to New York City in 1979 he began professional relationships with John Zorn, Wayne Horvitz, and Elliott Sharp. While Previte is a talented drummer he has also received critical acclaim for his exceptional abilities as a composer and orchestrator. His compositions are often tightly arranged, although they leave room for significant amounts of improvisation. Additionally, Previte often uses unusual instrumentation and also draws on many non-jazz musics for his compositions.

As a performer much of his work is also improvisational. He has recorded three dozen albums as a leader or co-leader and as a sideman played on 85 recording sessions across numerous genres of music. Drummer, composer and orchestrator Bobby Previte, who has delved into the jazz, avant~garde and rock genres as a leader, continues to expand his career.

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