GA Russell

Miller’s ECM debut has an international feel: the Latin influence of his heritage strong in such pieces as “Baden”, an early 20th-century Parisian air on “Le Pont” and the evocation of Celtic tunes on “Valium”. Miller has long been known as Sting’s right-hand man on guitar and a hushed instrumental take on “Fields of Gold” appears here. Miller has also worked with the likes of The Chieftains, Plácido Domingo and Paul Simon who points out Miller’s “beautiful touch” in the album’s liner note. © 2017 ECM | ECM Records USA | 1755 Broadway, 3rd floor | New York NY 10011

Absolutely! Sievers had played for Bill Veeck in St. Louis, and he wanted him in Chicago. As I recall, the Senators also received $150,000. cash. Mincher may have been the only player for both the original Senators and the expansion Senators. I'm sure he played for both, but I'm not sure he was the only one to do so.

He'll always be Big Drag to me! RIP. I liked him a lot, but I always thought that Jack E. Leonard was just a little bit better.

RIP Roy Sievers! I remember well the shock of Griffith trading him to the White Sox for Don Mincher and Earl Battey.

Was Lockjaw's sabbatical before his recordings for RCA?

Here is another 50-second sample. https://artpepper.bandcamp.com/track/50-seconds-a-minor-blues-in-f

I'm enjoying this one a lot. Pedicin is one of my favorite artists currently recording.

Happy Birthday 2017 Allen!

Happy Birthday 2017 jazzkrow!

CHICK COREA AND CHARLES LLOYD LEAD AWARD-WINNING LINE-UP FOR 2018 SAILING OF BLUE NOTE AT SEA Leslie Odom, Jr. (Hamilton) Also Joins the Line-up of Grammy and Tony Award Winning Artists and NEA Jazz Masters 2017 marked the initial sailing of Blue Note at Sea, a nautical musical collaboration between Blue Note Records, Blue Note Jazz Clubs and Entertainment Cruise Productions. Don Was, president of Blue Note Records and a three time Grammy winning producer has called this three-way production team "the dream team of jazz at sea." With his expertise and direction, the production and programming savvy offered by Steven Bensusan and his team at Blue Note Jazz Clubs and the 17 years of jazz cruises produced by Entertainment Cruise Productions, Was' description seems apt. The 2018 cruise roster is nearly finalized and includes winners of 48 Grammys and 2 Tony Awards. The cruise also features 4 NEA Jazz Masters (the highest award in jazz), all of whom are sailing on Blue Note at Sea for the first time. These four illustrious performers are among the most celebrated jazz artists of our time: 22-time Grammy winner and NEA Jazz Master Chick Corea, NEA Jazz Master Charles Lloyd, triple Grammy-winner and Dee Dee Bridgewater, and Dr. Lonnie Smith. Legendary saxophonist (and Blue Note recording artist) Charles Lloyd will join the cruise in St. Thomas with his band The Marvels - Bill Frisell, Greg Leisz, Reuben Rogers and Eric Harland. Bridgewater, who, in addition to her three Grammys, has earned a Tony award, will be backed by her own band as well. Smith, a Hammond B-3 guru, has been featured on over seventy albums, and has recorded and performed with a virtual "Who's Who" of the greatest jazz, blues and R&B giants in the industry. Both Bridgewater and Smith will be joining the ranks of NEA Jazz Masters in 2017. Bridgewater is not the only Tony Award-winner who will be performing for audiences on the Celebrity Summit next February. Leslie Odom, Jr., best known for his role as Aaron Burr in the Broadway smash hit Hamilton, for which he took home both a Tony (for Best Actor in a Musical) and a Grammy (for Best Musical Theater Album), is set to bring his jazz chops to the forefront when he performs with his band on the cruise. The New York Times describes Odom's style as "tender jazz vocals with flashes of adult-contemporary R&B." Blue Note at Sea '18 will again be hosted by multi-Grammy winning bassist Marcus Miller. Other Grammy-winning artists who will be returning are Robert Glasper, Lalah Hathaway and David Sanborn. While Glasper and Sanborn will perform in the same configurations as they did on Blue Note at Sea's inaugural sailing, five time Grammy winner Hathaway will bring her own band on board this time out. The three bands feature 11 top jazz musicians, all of whom will be performing in other configurations and groups during the cruise. The multi-Grammy winning pianist Robert Glasper will also be appearing with the Blue Note All Stars, an incredible sextet of young visionaries who first formed in 2014 to celebrate Blue Note's 75th Anniversary. The band features Glasper along with his label-mates Ambrose Akinmusire, Lionel Loueke, Marcus Strickland, Derrick Hodge and Kendrick Scott. Both Don Was and Steven Bensusan will also participate on the cruise. Was will emcee several events and will interview many of the performers, as he did on the 2017 sailing. Bensusan will host the Blue Note Jazz Club at Sea, a gorgeous late night venue that offers cabaret style seating in the tradition of his many Blue Note Jazz Clubs. Featuring the most highly respected and renowned contemporary jazz performers in the world, Blue Note At Sea is a collaboration among Blue Note Jazz Clubs, Blue Note Records, and Entertainment Cruise Productions. From stunning main shows to their signature Night Music events to Late, Late Night shows and jam sessions, Blue Note at Sea defines what is new and hip in the world of jazz while also retaining and respecting those aspects of the genre that have made jazz one of the true enduring musical styles around the world. Blue Note at Sea will sail on Celebrity Summit from February 3 - 10, 2018, departing from Ft. Lauderdale, with ports of call in San Juan, St. Thomas, Coco Cay (Bahamas) and Labadee (Haiti). For more information about the cruise program, go to www.bluenoteatsea.com.

DOT TIME RECORDS releases CALL IT MAGIC A SOULFUL NEW ALBUM FROM VOCALIST TYPHANIE MONIQUE CD AND DIGITAL FORMATS AVAILABLE IN STORES AND ONLINE NOW! Typhanie Monique Vocals Ben Lewis Piano Josh Ramos Bass Dana Hall Drums (tracks 1, 3, 4, 6) Greg Arty Drums (tracks 2, 8, 9, 10) and more... SPECIAL GUESTS Ken Peplowski Clarinet Victor Goines Clarinet Tony Monaco Organ Joel Frahm Tenor Saxophone Produced by Jeff Levenson Click to Watch Chicago, April 4, 2017- Call It Magic is the fourth album from Chicago vocalist and educator Typhanie Monique. It is a long-awaited project that finds her channeling the passions, frustrations and complexities of love into a work of shimmering beauty. It is her most ambitious recording to date. It features her current quartet - pianist Ben Lewis, bassist Josh Ramos, drummers Dana Hall and Greg Arty - with special guests, clarinetists Ken Peplowski and Victor Goines, organist Tony Monaco and tenor saxophonist Joel Frahm. Call It Magic was produced by Jeff Levenson. And though Monique surveys standards familiar to lovers of the Great American Songbook, Call It Magic contains quite a few surprises - including originals and tunes from the pop music playlists of Coldplay, Don Henley and Dinah Washington. It is a 10-act master class on the art of pure singing, and she endows it with deep-seated poignancy. Downbeat's Frank Alkyer says, "This is an album that's been years - heck, decades - in the making. It's where the road has taken her and it's a beautiful spot to take in the view. It's music made with great thought, even more care and, yes, a little magic. That's the artistry of Typhanie Monique." Well known in Midwest jazz circles, Monique has studied with legendary vocalists Bobby McFerrin, Sheila Jordan and the late Mark Murphy. She has shared stages with foundational colleagues Joe Lovano, Chris Potter, Mavis Staples and The Manhattan Transfer. All have made inspiring music that resides within her. Which helps explain the richness of Typhanie Monique and the soulfulness of Call It Magic - an album that travels straight to the heart. www.typhaniemonique.com TRACKS 1. Magic (5:25) 2. Just Friends (4:24) 3. This Bitter Earth (5:28) 4. What Is This Thing Called Love/This Thing (3:31) 5. Heart Of The Matter (5:05) 6. Where Is Love/Love Is (6:11) 7. Called Love (6:11) 8. Sister/Miss Celies Blues (6:41) 9. Letting My Love Go (4:52) 10. Don't Get Around Much Anymore (3:03) "Monique has never lacked for stage presence or vocal audacity...One of these days the rest of the world is going to discover her." - Howard Reich, Chicago Tribune

© 2017 ECM | ECM Records USA | 1755 Broadway, 3rd floor | New York NY 10011

Sarah Partridge Expands Jazz Vocal Repertoire On "Brights Lights & Pomises: Redefining Janis Ian," Set for Release April 21 By Origin Records Partridge's 5th Album & 2nd for Origin Pays Homage to the Legendary Folk Singer With a Baker's Dozen of Ian's Songs, Two Co-Written with Partridge, Arranged in Jazz Settings CD Release Shows at The Bitter End, NYC, May 11 Trumpets, Montclair, NJ, May 20 March 31, 2017 Vocalist Sarah Partridge introduced an impressive body of original compositions on her 2015 Origin Records release I'd Never Thought I'd Be Here, but for her new project, she wanted to celebrate a singer/songwriter outside of her own genre and beyond the Great American Songbook. On Bright Lights & Promises: Redefining Janis Ian, her 5th album and 2nd for Origin Records, Partridge reimagines 11 well- and lesser-known works from the legendary singer/songwriter's discography, and also co-wrote two with Ian. The new CD will be released April 21. "To pay tribute to a folk artist like Janis was extremely interesting to me," says Partridge. "In her case, her very early songwriting seemed influenced by jazz, and I saw real possibilities for a reimagining of some of that work. We connected with each other last year through the Recording Academy and when I mentioned that I was thinking of doing an album of her songs, she lit up. She said she'd like to be helpful to me, and there it began. I don't think I've ever met a more generous artist." Ian exploded on the pop music scene in 1967's Summer of Love as a precociously talented singer/songwriter confronting the dark side of American life. She was just 14 when, in 1965, she wrote and recorded "Society's Child (Baby I've Been Thinking)," her single about a young interracial couple ripped apart by prejudice. Championed by Leonard Bernstein two years later on his CBS-TV special Inside Pop: The Rock Revolution, the single went gold and established Ian as one of the era's most promising young performers. She recorded several critically praised albums for Verve over the next few years but didn't break through again until 1975's chart-topping Between the Lines, featuring the Grammy-winning single "At Seventeen," a song she performed that year on the debut broadcast of Saturday Night Live (and which is included on Bright Lights & Promises). As with her previous Origin outing, Partridge is joined on Bright Lights & Promises by her stellar working band of pianist Allen Farnham, bassist Bill Moring, and drummer Tim Horner. Trombonist Ben Williams, reed virtuoso Scott Robinson, and guitarist Paul Meyers are also back in the fold. Farnham, who produced the album, arranged 11 of the songs; two were arranged by Horner. Janis Ianherself provides vocals on the wry and briskly swinging opening track "A Quarter Past Heartache," which the women co-wrote. Raised in Boston and Birmingham, AL, Sarah Partridge grew up listening to her father's albums of Ella Fitzgerald, Dakota Staton, Irene Kral, and Sarah Vaughan. But she was drawn to acting and ended up majoring in theater at Northwestern University. After graduating in 1982,she worked around Chicago, and in 1983 landed her first feature role in Tom Cruise's breakout hit Risky Business. Relocating to L.A. in 1984, she worked steadily in film and television, carving out a niche doing voice-overs. Out with friends one night at the Improv, she accepted their dare to take a turn at karaoke and delivered a stunning rendition of "Summertime." The impromptu performance caught the ear of a booker, who promptly hired her to sing in a concert with the top tier of L.A. jazz musicians. It was a successful gig that rekindled a long-buried dream. Partridge spent years honing her technique in L.A. and New York City, where she moved in 1994, and instantly bonded with legendary trumpeter Doc Cheatham, "the first musician I played with in New York." Attending one of his regular Sunday brunch performances at Sweet Basil, Partridge's husband convinced pianist Chuck Folds to let her sit in. Her version of "Every Day I Have the Blues" went over well and Cheatham told her "You can come anytime you want." "After that, I sat in regularly and we did some gigs together," Partridge recalls. "I learned so much from him, just seeing the obsessive dedication he had. He was a real inspiration." Partridge released her widely-acclaimed debut I'll Be Easy to Find in 1998 ("She's a pleasure to hear in any emotional guise, whether one of regret or exaltation" -- Billboard) featuring jazz greats Frank Wess, Bucky Pizzarelli, and Gene Bertoncini. She has grown exponentially with each successive recording: Blame It on My Youth, 2004; You Are There, Songs for My Father, 2006; Perspective, 2010; and I Never Thought I'd Be Here, 2015. With her rich, fine-textured sound and rhythmically acute phrasing, Sarah Partridge puts an irrepressible jazz stamp on everything she sings, and Bright Lights & Promises: Redefining Janis Ian presents a portrait of an artist fully in command of her craft. Partridge and her band will be performing two CD release shows in May: 5/11 at New York's Bitter End (where Janis Ian performed nearly 50 years ago), and 5/20 at Trumpets in Montclair, NJ. Photography: Chris Drukker Sarah Partridge with Janis Ian: "A Quarter Past Heartache" Web Site: sarahpartridge.com

Chris Potter: tenor and soprano saxophones, bass clarinet David Virelles: piano, keyboards | Joe Martin: double bass Marcus Gilmore: drums, percussion For his third ECM release as a leader, Chris Potter presents a new, stellar acoustic quartet that naturally blends melodic rhapsody with rhythmic muscle. Potter is an artist who “employs his considerable technique in service of music rather than spectacle,” says The New Yorker, and his composing develops in texture and atmosphere with every album. ON TOUR May 6 Cambridge, MA (Sanders Theatre) May 31 Minneapolis, St. Paul (The Dakota) June 1-4 Chicago, IL (Jazz Showcase) June 6 Indianapolis, IN (Jazz Kitchen) June 7 San Diego, CA (The Atheneum) June 8 Phoenix, AZ (Musical Instrument Museum) June 9 &10 Denver, CO (Dazzle’s) June 11 Half Moon Bay, CA (Bach Dancing Society) June 13 San Francisco, CA (SFJAZZ, Miner Auditorium) June 14 Los Angeles, CA (TBD) June 20-June 25 New York, NY (The Village Vanguard) June 26 & 27 Washington, DC (Blues Alley) © 2017 ECM | ECM Records USA | 1755 Broadway, 3rd floor | New York NY 10011

Happy Birthday Claude!

Jean-Luc Ponty - OAS - $14.99 prime https://www.amazon.com/Aurora-Cosmic-Messenger-Enigmatic-Imaginary/dp/B009PHRIKE

Martha Argerich - Complete Recordings on Deutsch Gramophone (48 CDs) - $21.63 prime https://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B011WEVWYA/

Ghost, do you think the Japanese jazz fans already had Blue Train before 1991, but not Cool Struttin'?

Laurie has released a fifty-second sample of an upcoming release on Omnivore of Art with Lee Konitz, Mike Lang, Bob Magnusson and John Dentz. https://artpepper.bandcamp.com/track/50-seconds-pepper-konitz-lang-mag-dentz

This is real jazz, as opposed to smooth jazz, but it is pretty light. I think that it would be a very good choice to put on when you have friends over for dinner (who have not told you their opinions regarding music). Except track #9, which is the sort of thing which would cause my mother to yell, "Turn that off!" LOL

Sony has released very inexpensive 3-CD boxes. Toots Thielmans - $5.53 + $3.99 https://www.amazon.com/Real-Toots-Thielemans-THIELEMANS-TOOTS/dp/B01MRANE12/ ***** Earth, Wind and Fire - $6.12 + $3.99 https://www.amazon.com/Real-Earth-Wind-Fire-EARTH/dp/B01N15M8H3/ ***** Carole King - $5.54 + $3.99 https://www.amazon.com/Real-Carole-King-KING-CAROLE/dp/B01N7WV2N6/ ***** John Barry - $4.28 + $3.99 https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01KYQWVKG/ref=od_aui_detailpages00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Happy Birthday 2017 jlh!

ECM Avishai Cohen Cross My Palm With Silver Avishai Cohen: trumpet Yonathan Avishai: piano Barak Mori: double bass Nasheet Waits: drums U.S. Release date: May 5, 2017 ECM 2548 CD UPC: 6025 572 9057 8 LP UPC: 6025 573 9780 2 A year after his impressionistic, critically-lauded ECM debut Into The Silence, Avishai Cohen’s Cross My Palm With Silver introduces a program of new pieces which put the focus on the ensemble, on teamwork, with an exceptional quartet. The adroit interplay among the musicians allows Avishai Cohen to soar, making it clear why the pure-toned trumpeter is one of the most talked-about jazz musicians on the contemporary scene. “All of these people together are my dream team”, says Cohen of fellow players Yonathan Avishai, Barak Mori and Nasheet Waits, who share his sense for daring improvisation and his feeling for structure. “I feel we’re in a perfect place with the balance. It’s open and there’s so much room for the improvisation to take the music any place we can. At the same time the composition is very specific and the vibe is very direct and thought about.” Cohen praises drummer Nasheet Waits, a musical partner for more than a decade, for “allowing the music to grow in an amazing way. I’ve never heard him play the same thing twice. A groove or beat never sounds the same. Spending time on the road with him is always inspiring. For me, he is a real link to the tradition and to the masters.” The arrival of bassist Barak Mori, a friend since high school days, has “tied the band together,” says Cohen: “His swing feel is incredible. Every little note he plays is so clear and so pretty.” Pianist Yonathan Avishai is Cohen’s “musical brother – a big part of my musical journey” ­– they started out together in Tel Aviv, aged 12, and through formative years “played everything from Ornette Coleman music to standards, Gershwin and Duke, always trying to go deeper. Never taking things for granted, keeping the search active.” The quartet spent much of last year on the road and, shortly before the recording session in September 2016, Cohen began to ease the material he had been writing since Into The Silence into the live set. Into The Silence had been a very personal statement, written soon after the death of Cohen’s father. Its reflections on mortality were conveyed with an expressive grace and yearning lyricism that struck a responsive chord with many listeners. This time there was no over-arching thematic concept: “But I still used the same rules I’d given myself for the first album,” Cohen says. “Which were: to stay attuned to the current situation in my life and not go back to any older material of mine.” Avishai Cohen wrote the music in Israel, the political climate in the Middle East and elsewhere inducing a familiar sense of helplessness. Like Mingus or Max Roach before him, Cohen uses his song titles to point to injustices at home and abroad as a small gesture of dissent. Meanwhile the beauty of the music makes its own argument. “I’m affected by what happens in my country and in the world…And by how politics divides us as people. At least to me, this music raises some question about what it is we are here to do. There’s a beautiful phrase in Judaism: if you save one soul it’s as if you saved the whole world. Change should start from there. Each of us should do whatever we can to be compassionate. I don’t know how much the music represents that, but that’s what I was feeling when I was writing it.” As with Into The Silence, Cross My Palm With Silver was produced by Manfred Eicher at Studios La Buissonne in the south of France and is issued on the eve of a major European tour. Touring in the US is planned for September 2017. ECM Louis Sclavis / Dominique Pifarély / Vincent Courtois Asian Fields Variations Louis Sclavis: clarinets Dominique Pifarély: violin Vincent Courtois: violoncello U.S. Release date: May 5, 2017 ECM 2504 B0026545-02 UPC: 6025 573 2668 0 Asian Fields Variations marks the first time that clarinettist Louis Sclavis, violinist Dominique Pifarély and cellist Vincent Courtois, long-time colleagues, have recorded as a trio. Sclavis summoned the project into existence, but emphasizes that this is a democratic group of creative equals: “I proposed that we make a real collective, and each of us composes for the program.” All three are major figures in contemporary French creative music: this is a new group with a lot of history. Sclavis and Pifarély have played together in diverse contexts for 35 years, Sclavis and Courtois for 20 years. As one can hear on the recording, they have retained the capacity to surprise each other – and their listeners – as improvisers. Alertness and freshness are key qualities here. “We’re always drawing also on a lot of different playing experiences. And those experiences are reflected in what we write, and what we play. We’re continually bringing new things to the project, and we keep going deeper.” If the instrumentation – clarinet, violin, cello – implies a chamber music orientation, Sclavis suggests this is only part of the story. “What I am doing, as I’ve often done in the past, is just writing for the musicians. So I ask myself simple questions: What does Dominique play best? What does he like to play? And Vincent? And how about me? What do I love to play? And these considerations are the starting points.” Each of the players has his own compositional signature, however, with Dominique Pifarély’s pieces being perhaps the most rigorously “written” here. The balance of composition and improvisation, Sclavis notes, was also readjusted in the course of the recording session, produced by Manfred Eicher, at Studios La Buissone in Pernes-les-Fontaines in the South of France in September 2016. * Sclavis (born 1953 in Lyon) originally encountered Pifarély (born 1957 in Bègles) in the group of bassist Didier Levallet. “It was immediately a very good feeling to play with Dominique and I invited him to join my group for the recording Chine [IDA records, 1987].” This was promptly followed by the Sclavis/Pifarély Acoustic Quartet album on ECM. “Altogether I must have played in around fifteen different formations and projects with Dominique.” These include Les violences de Rameau, recorded in 1995 and 1996, featuring some flamboyant playing inspired by baroque composer Jean-Philippe Rameau. Vincent Courtois (born 1968 in Paris) was first asked by Sclavis to participate in a theatre music project in the late 1990s. “I found Vincent’s playing very touching, and we had a strong musical connection.” Courtois arrived in Sclavis’s band in time to participate in the recording of L’affrontement des prétendants in 1999, and can also be heard on the 2002 recording Napoli’s Walls. The 2000 recording Dans la nuit, featuring Sclavis’s music for the silent movie by Charles Vanel, marked the first occasion that Louis, Dominique and Vincent had appeared together on disc (in an ensemble completed by Jean-Louis Matinier and François Merville). They toured widely with the project: “In some ways it was the opposite of what we are doing now, because we had to match the music to images and we were trying to play exactly the same every night. But for developing a sound together and for precision and discipline, it was very good for us.” The first trio performances – “fifteen or sixteen years ago” – found Sclavis, Pifarély and Courtois on the road in Africa and South America. After crossing each other’s paths repeatedly in the following years (Pifarély and Courtois, in and out of Sclavis’s projects, have often played duo concerts, and Sclavis has also guested with Courtois’ groups) all three came together again in 2013 for a project with Japanese pianist Aki Takase, which underlined the special musical understanding these players share. The trio was officially re-launched in March 2015 with a new program of compositions premiered at the A Vaulx Jazz Festival, near Lyon. Now, in Spring 2017, they undertake a French regional tour with concerts in Bessé sur Braye (March 17), La Ferté-Bernard (March 22), La Flèche (March 28), Saint Saturnin (March 29), La Roche sur Yon (March 30), Flers (April 1), Voiron (April 2), Parigné- L'Evêque (April 4), Saint Berthevin (April 5 and 6), Strasbourg (April 7), Saint Florent le Vieil (April 9), and Poitiers (May 30). International summer festival dates are currently being finalized. * Louis Sclavis, Dominique Pifarély and Vincent Courtois have between them a rich, multifaceted discography on ECM. In addition to his recordings as leader, Sclavis can be heard on the recently issued Ida Lupino with Giovanni Guidi, Gianluca Petrella and Gerald Cleaver; this quartet is also currently touring. Dominique Pifarély has had two ECM albums released in the last two years, the solo violin recital Time Before And Time After and the quartet album Tracé Provisoire, with pianist Antonin Rayon, bassist Bruno Chevillon and drummer François Merville. He also appears on Poros with François Couturier and recordings with Stefano Battaglia (Raccolto and Re:Pasolini, the latter also featuring Vincent Courtois). Courtois can furthermore be heard on In Touch with trombonist Yves Robert.

oldies.com is again having a 99 cents sale.

Linda Ronstadt - Just One Look/Very Best of (2 CDs, 30 songs) - $4.99 add on https://www.amazon.com/Just-One-Look-Linda-Ronstadt/dp/B010B797R8