Eugene Earl Bostic – who dropped the first name as a performer – was an alto saxophone player who lived from 1913 to 1965. He does not have a very high profile...
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I started out aiming to do a post on Fats Navarro, and sort of made it. This is “52nd Street Theme,” which Wikipedia says was written by Thelonious...
This is the beginning of the profile of the great tenor saxophone player Theodore Walter “Sonny” Rollins from his website: Theodore Walter Rollins...
Dexter Gordon’s website sums up his importance in one line. He was, it says, “the first musician to translate the language of Bebop to the tenor...
This morning, the site featured the great Big Joe Turner. One of the clips featured Jay McShann along with Turner. Here is more McShann. Kansas City has a...
This clip, from the television program Jazz Party, is more than eight minutes long — but the climax is cut off. No matter, it’s great. The start is...
Leonard Bernstein’s performance of George Gershwin’s piece, which premiered on February 12, 1924, is in two sections. The continuation is here...
Reading Music
The stories of the great bands and musicians are fascinating. Musicians as a group are brilliant, but often troubled. The combination of creativity and drama makes for great reading.
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Here are some books to check out.
Duke Ellington brought class, sophistication and style to jazz which, until that point, was proudly unpolished and raucous. His story is profound. The author, Terry Teachout, also wrote "Pops," the acclaimed bio of Louis Armstrong. Click here or on the image.
What else is there to say? Here is the story behind every song written by The Beatles. Click here or on the image.
The Grateful Dead don't get enough credit for the profound nature of its lyrics. Many of the band's songs are driven by a deep and literate Americana ("I'm Uncle Sam/That's who I am/Been hidin' out/In a rock and roll band" and "Majordomo Billy Bojangles/Sit down and have a drink with me/What's this about Alabama/Keeps comin' back to me?").
David Dodd's exhaustive study tells the story, song by song. Click here or on the image.