Prior to 1920, the jazz development was taking place in many parts of the United States. However, as the new decade began, for a few years the main center in which the music moved forward became the lakeside city of Chicago. About fifty thousand African Americans from the Southern states arrived in Chicago in the [...]
We only called the music “jazz” after someone in the audience one night in Chicago kept holdering at us to “Jazz it up”! and it seemed to fit for the music. No, I never heard the word in New Orleans. I found out later it was a fould word in Chicago, but I guess we [...]
New Orleans seems to have used music to observe and celebrate a larger number of high days and holidays than any other American city. In the last decades of the nineteenth century it was hard to avoid music in the city of New Orleans for too long. Sounds hung in the air, whether in the begin cool of winter or the hot humidity of summer, mingling with the sights and sounds of this fascinating cosmopolitan city.
According to Brian Kelly, “The new album is brighter, more energetic and vibrant”. I’m giving fuller expression to the jazz elements present on my first album, while still offering space for beauty and quiet eloquence.
About Count Basie b. William Basie was born on August 21 1904 in Red Bank, New Jersey USA and died on April 26 1984. As a bandleader and pianist, Count Basie grew up in Red Bank, just across the Hudson River from New York City. His mother gave him his first lessons at the piano, [...]
The greatest jazz pianists: Oscar Peterson – Erroll Garner – Art Tatum Oscar Peterson has displayed through his eclecticism, an acute awareness of the history of jazz piano, ranging from stride to bop, from James P. Johnson to Bill Evans, but always with Art Tatum as an abiding influence. Nicknamed “The Elf“, Erroll Garner was [...]