Search results for "Mel Lewis"

Thad Jones & Mel Lewis: Big Dipper (Rating: 91/100) posted in Music January 13, 08

This track is the first tune played on the first night of the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Big Band, a Monday night tradition...

This track review is included in: THE DOZENS: LIVE AT THE VILLAGE VANGUARD

Whenever I step inside the Village Vanguard, I am always struck by a déjà vu sense of the awe-inspiring amounts of ...

Joe Williams: Night Time is the Right Time (to be with the One You Love) (Rating: 96/100) posted in Music March 31, 09

Evaluating the relative merits of Joe Williams' recorded tracks with Count Basie in the '50's, as compared to those h...

Mel Tormé: All I Need is the Girl (Rating: 95/100) posted in Music October 30, 07

Ring-a-Ding singing doesn't get any better than Mel Tormé with the Marty Paich Dek-Tette. Blending the lightness of G...

This track review is included in: THE DOZENS: RING-A-DING-DINGS: TWELVE 1960S MALE VOCAL HIPSTERS

Sinatra named them, Sinatra claimed them. Frank's album Ring-a-Ding Ding! (1960) christened a boatload of actual and ...

Mel Tormé (with Marty Paich): The Carioca (Rating: 87/100) posted in Music January 21, 08

Whoever doubts Mel Tormé's skill as a jazz singer should listen to the first 25 seconds of this track, where he sings...

Mel Tormé (with Marty Paich): Lulu's Back in Town (Rating: 94/100) posted in Music August 21, 08

I've never much cared for "back in town" songs. Whether it's Thin Lizzy's "The Boys Are Back in Town" or just Matt D...

Mel Torme & The Marty Paich Dek-tette: Lullaby Of Birdland (Rating: 95/100) posted in Music August 06, 09

“Lullaby of Birdland” is an anomaly in the recordings of Mel Tormé and the Marty Paich Dek-tette. Although Mel’s scat...

This track review is included in: THE DOZENS: SCAT SINGING

Scat singing—improvised solos created by a vocalist using nonsense syllables for words—is one of the great parado...

Thad Jones / Mel Lewis Big Band: Little Pixie (Rating: 90/100) posted in Music October 30, 08

Sure, the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Big Band occasionally entered the electric/fusion world with funk-groove experiments: ...

This track review is included in: THE DOZENS: MODERN BIG BANDS

                    &...

Thad Jones & Mel Lewis: Tiptoe (Rating: 90/100) posted in Music November 09, 07

Thad Jones was arguably the most consistently interesting big band arranger of the 1960s and 1970s, and “Tiptoe” is o...

Gerry Mulligan: Lady Chatterley's Mother (Rating: 92/100) posted in Music October 09, 08

Gerry Mulligan's early '60s Concert Jazz Band was one of the most musically influential big bands of its time. That i...

Stan Kenton: La Guera Baila (Rating: 100/100) posted in Music March 27, 08

I love the entire Cuban Fire Suite. In fact, I love all of the music that Johnny Richards wrote for the Kenton band. ...

This track review is included in: DESERT ISLAND DOZENS: PETER ERSKINE

In the music world, but especially in the jazz world, everyone wants to know what everybody else is listening to. So ...

Warne Marsh: Moose the Mooche (Rating: 96/100) posted in Music May 07, 09

The prevailing notion that Marsh was merely a cool-toned, cerebral saxophonist began to change to some extent in the ...

Jeri Southern (with Marty Paich's Dek-tette): Lazy Bones (Rating: 95/100) posted in Music October 08, 09

I suppose it was inevitable that the two most "homespun" of song composers, Hoagy Carmichael and Johnny Mercer, would...

This track review is included in: THE DOZENS: HOAGY CARMICHAEL

Hoagy Carmichael was born in Bloomington, Indiana on November 22, 1899. His given name, Hoagland, derived fr...

The Hi-Lo's: The Lady in Red (Rating: 98/100) posted in Music November 03, 07

The Hi-Lo's were a peppy 1950s male vocal quartet whose name was self-descriptive: one guy sang high, another sang lo...

Al Cohn & Zoot Sims: Blue Hodge (Rating: 92/100) posted in Music October 26, 07

Tenorists Al Cohn and Zoot Sims played together as members of Woody Herman’s famous Second Herd and later continued t...

Herbie Mann & Buddy Collette: Give a Little Whistle (Rating: 94/100) posted in Music November 30, 07

Disney's animated morality play Pinocchio (1940) depicts a puppet's quest to become human by resisting corruption. "A...

This track review is included in: THE DOZENS: TWELVE ESSENTIAL JAZZ FLUTE PERFORMANCES

"The flute," flutist Bud Shank informed historian Ted Gioia in 1988, "is a stupid instrument to be playing jazz music...

Gerry Mulligan-Ben Webster: Tell Me When (Rating: 95/100) posted in Music July 06, 09

The Gerry Mulligan Meets Ben Webster album is best known for its exquisite version of Billy Strayhorn's "Chelsea Brid...

Benny Carter: Central City Sketches (Rating: 94/100) posted in Music December 08, 07

Benny Carter was six months shy of his 80th birthday when he debuted this extended composition at a "standing room on...

Marty Paich: Violets for Your Furs (Rating: 92/100) posted in Music October 30, 07

Art Pepper was a leading West Coast alto saxophonist during the 1950s before personal problems removed him from the s...

Art Pepper: 'Round Midnight (Rating: 97/100) posted in Music October 31, 07

Due to what the 1950s jazz press euphemistically called "personal problems," the once-prolific Art Pepper made just o...

Terry Gibbs: Main Stem (Rating: 90/100) posted in Music November 01, 07

DC's Duke Ellington and Brooklyn's Terry Gibbs deserve to be honorary Mainers. After all, Maine's motto Dirigo ("I le...

Previous Page | Next Page