Yusef Komunyakaa and Billy Bang: A Concert and Conversation Part I
New York
"Jazz Careers in New York": Dave Liebman
Jazz Studies Online: You're from New York. What kept you here when you decided to pursue a career as a jazz musician? What features did the city offer then that others did not? Given that you stayed in New York (or nearby) have your motivations for being here changed?
"Jazz Careers in New York": Dave Gibson
Jazz Studies Online: You're not from New York originally. What lured you here? What features did the city offer then that others did not? If you've stayed here, have your motivations for being here changed?
"Jazz Careers in New York": Dado Moroni
Jazz Studies Online: You're not from New York originally. What lured you here? What features did the city offer then that others did not? Given that you still make a point of visiting here regularly, have your motivations for coming here changed at all?
Olu Dara Performs at Studio Museum in Harlem
Blues, Up and Down: From the Mississippi Mud to the Avant-Garde. Olu Dara performs at the Studio Museum in Harlem, April 24, 2007.
William Lowe Interviews Olu Dara
William Lowe interviews Olu Dara at the Studio Museum in Harlem, April 24, 2007.
How the Creole Band Came to Be
This essay explores the way New Orleans jazz was disseminated throughout the country, taking the Creole Band as a case study. This group included legendary jazz musicians Freddy Keppard and George Bacquet, was a popular vaudeville act, and traveled earlier and more widely than its New Orleans peers. Yet the Creole Band has had far less historical documentation and discussion. The authors address this gap by examining notice of the Creole Band in the white theatrical press.
URL:
Rudy Van Gelder in Hackensack: Defining the Jazz Sound in the 1950s
Recording engineer Rudy Van Gelder has been active since the 1940s. Skea notes that that the quality of Van Gelder's output rests not necessarily on technical innovation but on determination to master successive waves of state-of-the-art technology available to him and a legendary degree of perfectionism.
O For A Thousand Tongues To Sing: Anthony Braxton’s Speculative Music
In this article, composer and educator Mike Heffley analyzes the libretto and score of a Braxton's magnum opus, the opera Trillium R (Shala Fears for the Poor) of 1991. With the term "speculative music," Heffley designates music as a "speculum," or a mirror of the natural world or cosmic order. Heffley considers the opera's libretto in the context of the entire corpus of Braxton's writings, particularly his Tri-Axium Writings of 1985. Heffley argues that Braxton's use of language is "a driving force behind, first, his music, and, further, his body of work as a whole . . ."
Sonny Rollins and the Challenge of Thematic Improvisation
In this essay, often cited and reprinted, Schuller argues that a jazz solo's thematic structure should be considered on a par with its swing, melodic interest, and originality. He presents Sonny Rollins' "Blue Seven" solo as one possessing all of these qualities and analyzes it bar by bar to show the elements of formal thematic coherence within it.
Pages
