Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Louisa West was born in Thomasville, Georgia on June 14, 1979 and began playing flute at the age of ten. She went on to receive a Bachelor of Music Performance from the University of Georgia and while studying there she performed in numerous ensembles including an orchestra conducted by Sammy Nestico. She studied privately with classical flutists Angela Jones-Reus, William Bennett, Mary Karen Clardy, and Mimi Stillman, as well as jazz flutists Nestor Torres and Holly Hofmann.
A winner of numerous competitions, after graduating from college in 2001, she relocated to southern California where she has been performing in the musical genres of world music, jazz, Latin jazz, and classical music. Playing extensively in the U.S, Canada and Mexico, Louisa has appeared onstage with touring acts such as Persian pop star Shakila, flutist Nestor Torres, and Brazilian singer Diogo Nogueira.
West recently attended California Brazil Camp, where she delved into the history and music of Brazil through workshops and performances by Brazilian jazz artists. This experience inspired her 2010 debut release with Jimmy Patton titled Sambarina.
Flutist Louisa West continues to perform, tour and record.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Eddie Parker May 28, 1959 in Liverpool, England. A founding member of and composer for the British jazz band Loose Tubes in the 1980s. He has toured and performed with several noted bands and performers including Bheki Mseleku, Marvin Smith and John Parricelli. He has toured with the band Mister Vertigo, of which Parricelli is also a member, and conducts jazz workshops and performances involving young musicians. He was a lecturer in jazz at Middlesex University, where his students included Led Bib.
As a leader he has recorded three albums, a half doen with Loose Tubes and as a sideman he has recorded eight with Django Bates, A Man Called Adam, Keziah Jones, Oumou Sangare, Trevor Walters, and Mseleku.
Flutist and composer Eddie Parker continues to play keyboards during workshops and live performances.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Andrea Ventriglia was born in Capua, Italy on April 29, 1953 and studied the saxophone with the masters Franco Florio in Salerno and Eraclio Sallustio at the GB Martini Conservatory in Bologna, Italy. He later studied the flute with Aldo Ferrantini.
His professional career began while he was still a music student around the end of the 1960s, following the rhythm & blues and soul of James Brown, Wilson Pickett, Aretha Franklin, Ray Charles and Joe Cocker in fashion at that time and still today. At a very young age he was part of the best and
As a soldier Andrea was part of the National Band of the Italian Army. He moved to Verona, Italy in the mid 1970s and began playing in small bands in night clubs. He was invited to join the Big Band Citta’ di Verona directed by Maestro Mario Pezzotta, in the first tenor saxophone. At the same time he performed in Fernando Brusco’s small orchestra as an arranger and saxophonist.
Moving to the United States he initially played in small bands that performed on cruise ships where he met among others Count Basie, Mercer Ellington, Sarah Vaughan, Harry James and Bob Crosby. Settling first in San Francisco, then in Los Angeles, California he played on the road with small bands collaborating with Harry James and Bob Crosby in the latter city.
Back in Italy he gained membership into Franco Rosselli’s orchestra and did the night club circuit in Florence, San Remo and Riviera Romagnola. Leaving Roselli he toured with Bobby Solo throughout Italy. His passion for jazz and big band led him to the Luciano Fineschi Orchestra, again sitting in the first tenor saxophone and flute chair.
After the orchestra disbanded Ventriglia went on to play in other big bands, duos, artistic partnerships, and guest appearances. For a decade he was a professor of saxophone at the Giuseppe Martucci Music High School in his hometown. He trained musicians currently working with famous artists or with their own groups and some of whom practice the profession of musician in the USA.
By the Eighties the public became more sensitive towards jazz, so Andrea led quartets performing in various Italian jazz clubs. that sprung up a bit everywhere in Italy. During his career and for professional reasons, saxophonist and flutist Andrea Ventriglia has performed on nearly every continent and continues to perform, tour and record.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Robert Philip Militello a.k.a. Bobby M. was born on March 25, 1950 in Buffalo, New York. He was groomed by the legendary Sam Scamacca at Buffalo’s iconic Lafayette High School in the 1960s.
During the Seventies, Militello went on tour with Maynard Ferguson and returned to Buffalo in the early 1980s to work as a freelance musician.
Moving to Los Angeles, California he spent the rest of the 1980s and early 1990s as a member of orchestras led by Bill Holman and Bob Florence. He toured and recorded with Dave Brubeck from 1982 to 2012.
Saxophonist and flautist Bobby Militello leads a quartet that performs concerts dedicated to Brubeck.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Eddie Wasserman was born on March 5, 1923 in Smackover, Arkansas. Growing up he had played the saxophone with many black kids in the neighborhood. After his father died, he moved with his mother to Tyler, Texas and it’s where he fell in love with jazz. His first paid job was in a dance band at age 14.
At the onset of World War II in 1941, Wasserman attended New York’s Juilliard School for a couple of years but he was soon drafted and wasn’t discharged until 1946. He returned to Juilliard to complete his studies and graduated in 1948, and that’s when he started playing with Benny Goodman. In addition to playing with Goodman, he was in big-band live and studio recordings led by Artie Shaw, Manny Albam, Stan Kenton, Louie Bellson and Chico O’Farrell, with whom he co-led a big band in 1953.
By 1955, big band work was beginning to dry up on the East Coast was starting to dry up. On the request of an agent O’Farrell and Wasserman formed a small group to play Latin music in Miami Beach, Florida. Not a good experience but Eddie’s late-1950s quartet recordings with Gene Krupa were great recordings.
Given that the youth-culture explosion in 1966 was changing the face of music, jazz was no longer an ideal way for him to earn a living. So giving up the road and having a degree in education, he became an assistant director of the concert band at Clifton High School in New Jersey. He continued to play club dates and find work in Broadway pit bands.
Saxophonist, clarinetist and flutist Eddie Wasserman died after suffering a heart attack on May 27, 1992. He was 69.
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