The jazz world is anchored by people like guitarist Vic Juris, musicians possessing such talent they can be counted on to seamlessly lead or support sessions of all sorts. Throughout his career, Juris supported funky organists, boppish horn players and even the ultra-modern saxophonist David Liebman, who in a post-mortem tribute pronounced him “the hardest worker I have known.”
(Continued from September/October 2020 issue of Jersey Jazz Magazine)
The Uptown Jazz Tentet is a terrific example of the small big band, a bridge between the sound of a small group and a full big band. What’s Next (Irabbagast Records) is a 10-tune collection that mixes original material with some jazz standards. The band is co-led by trumpeter Brandon Lee and trombonists Willie Applewhite and James Burton III.
ALL THAT’S JAZZ, Editor’s Choice, Dan’s Den, Not Without You!, From the Crow’s Nest, Jazz Social, Remembering Vic Juris, Outside at Shanghai Jazz, Jazz on the Back Deck, Eric Reed Live at the Vanguard, Talking Jazz: Lucy Yeghiazaryn, Rising Star: Sarah Hanahan, WPU Summer Jazz Room Series, Big Band in the Sky, Central Jersey Jazz Festival, Musical Journey: Jerry Weldon, Other Views, At Home With Bill Mays, Book Review:Jazz Images, Swingin’ the Blues with Swingadelic
One of the first bands trumpeter Kenny Rampton joined after moving to New York in the late 1980s was Charli
At the New Jersey Jazz Society Jazzfest in 2000, one of the featured artists was jazz pianist Gene DiNovi. Although Brooklyn-born and bred, DiNovi had settled in Toronto in 1972, and his name had little resonance with jazz fans in New Jersey at that time.
On a Wednesday night in 1942, a teenager from Newark traveled to Harlem’s Apollo Theater to compete in an amateur
In the mid-1950s, vocalists Dave Lambert and Jon Hendricks worked together to lyricize several Count Basie tunes with the hope of recording them. They received some interest from a young producer, Creed Taylor, who was just starting out with ABC-Paramount Records, and Lambert and Hendricks auditioned 13 singers. Most of them, according to Hendricks, “couldn’t swing.” But, one of them could.
Live music returns to the Morris Museum with Jazz on the Back Deck, a four-concert series, beginning at 7:30 p.m.,
Like most people, I’ve been exceptionally bored at home and missing our frequent trips to Madison’s beloved Shanghai Jazz. In addition, I’ve worried whether the club would survive the prolonged lockdown and where the New Jersey Jazz Society would hold its socials if it didn’t. I’m happy to report that it has survived, adapted and recently reopened.
“If Johnny Mandel had just composed ‘The Shadow of Your Smile’”, tweeted Tony Bennett on June 30, “it would have
