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Jazz Articles about Leroy Vinnegar
Trio and Quintet
by C. Michael Bailey
Pianist and composer Elmo Hope has more in common with Tadd Dameron than most of his other jazz peers. Both men were primarily composers and arrangers who concentrated on their own music rather than standards. Both men spent their professional lives in New York City during the twilight of bebop and the flourishing of hard bop. Neither man boasted large discographies as leaders, but appeared on a significant number of recordings as sidemen. Their careers were both shortened dramatically by ...
Continue ReadingLes McCann: Never A Dull Moment! Live from Coast to Coast 1966-1967
by Stefano Merighi
Vi sono sempre stati musicisti di jazz per i quali la musica è immediatezza, semplicità, gioia di vivere, empatia senza fronzoli. Les McCann era uno di questi. Il pianista del Kentucky, morto alla fine dello scorso anno, ha sempre privilegiato una comunicazione diretta con il suo pubblico, basata su quell'irresistibile mix di swing, soul con venature gospel che ne hanno messo a fuoco il marchio di fabbrica. Eppure, negli anni '70, anche Les ha subito una fascinazione per ...
Continue ReadingHoward McGhee: Maggie's Back In Town!!
by Richard J Salvucci
A picture (a video, in fact) is worth a thousand words. Consider one of Howard McGhee around 1966. It is at the Newport Jazz Festival, and an unlikely group of trumpeters is doing a bop tune at metronome-busting speed. The group includes Bobby Hackett and Ruby Braff (unlikely, no?). Hackett is delightedly laughing. Braff walks off into the wings sulking. Young Jimmy Owens has just upstaged Howard McGhee, to put it mildly. The guy selected to teach Owens a lesson ...
Continue ReadingShelly Manne & His Friends: Modern Jazz Performances Of Songs From My Fair Lady
by Richard J Salvucci
The musical My Fair Lady (1956) is a story from another age. All things considered, it is probably best that a contemporary audience may not know the lyrics to the songs, let alone the tunes. The tale involves the efforts of an insufferable Henry Higgins to teach a Cockney lass, Eliza Doolittle, how to properly pronounce the Queen's English, BBC style. Alas, Higgins succeeds too well, only to render the fey Doolittle attractive to a rival suitor of some means. ...
Continue ReadingSonny Rollins: Go West! The Contemporary Records Albums
by Richard J Salvucci
Apparently, the median age of a jazz listener is in his or her mid to late 40s. So, perhaps, the representative listener was born in the mid-1970s. Sonny Rollins first recorded in 1949. The recordings reviewed here were made in the late 1950s, well before many contemporary listeners were born. While there have been ample reissues of Rollins' work, most coincided with the still-active phase of his career. Much of his work has appeared since “Skylark" on The Next Album ...
Continue ReadingLeroy Vinnegar: Leroy Vinnegar Walks
by Richard J Salvucci
Chances are good that the name of bassist Leroy Vinnegar does not ring much of a bell among contemporary audiences. He does not have the cachet of a Ray Brown or an Oscar Pettiford, two names that a lot of professional bassists will instantly recognize, along with Scott LaFaro, with whom Vinnegar all too briefly overlapped. It is a bit surprising, although no one ever claimed that Vinnegar was a revolutionary. He was clearly in the ...
Continue ReadingArt Pepper: The Return of Art Pepper
by C. Michael Bailey
Alto saxophonist Art Pepper's first incarceration for drugs took place between August 1954 and July 1956, a period conspicuous for Pepper's absence from the recording studio. Pepper's first recording as a leader after his release was, aptly, The Return of Art Pepper. He had been busy as a sideman for trumpeters Shorty Rogers (Big Shorty Express (RCA, 1956)) and Chet Baker (The Route (Pacific Jazz, 1956)) before entering Capitol Studios on August 5, 1956 to record the ten pieces that ...
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