Orrin Keepnews

Born: March 2, 1923

"I have been deeply involved in the jazz record world for appreciably more than a half-century, and now that they have gotten around to labeling me?a "jazz master" I guess?I probably can't count on ending the association any time soon.? Not that I really would want to stop:?I remain quite proud of what I have at times accomplished in?a?varied career �� which might perhaps more accurately be?considered?an overlapping series of careers.? I have primarily thought of myself as a producer, which to?me means working with a series of artists?to help combine their talents with the realities of?recording, editing,?promoting, and in various other ways assisting them in achieving a reasonable degree of success and recognition."

Barbara Brighton: A Quarter Century Of Blazing Trails For Female Jazz Producers

August 14, 2025

Reflecting upon her extraordinary 25-year career as one of Los Angeles�� premiere and most respected jazz producers, Barbara Brighton connects powerfully with��and continues to wholeheartedly embody��an insightful quote from four-time Grammy winner Orrin Keepnews, a transcendent figure in 20th century jazz who set standards as as producer, label owner and journalist/liner notes writer. ��One of the ...

Thelonious Monk: Monk's Mood

by Geno Thackara
May 3, 2025

Thelonious Himself (Riverside, 1957) was a perfectly suitable title for a solo album showcasing the quirky essence of Thelonious Monk. It may forever be a mystery as to why he and/or producer Orrin Keepnews saw fit to add other players for the very last track, but whether it was out of place or not, we can ...

Military Music: Part 1

by Monk Rowe
October 14, 2024

Bill Evans: Waltz for Debby

March 7, 2024

Bill Evans performed his composition Waltz for Debby at dozens of clubs and concert halls and recorded it several times in the studio between 1955 and 1980. In my opinion, he aced it only once. Waltz for Debby sounds deceptively easy to play but it isn't. Having played Bill Evans transcriptions in my teens, I can ...

The Producers

by Monk Rowe
April 1, 2023

Marty Sheller: The Name Behind The Sound You All Know, Part 1

by Skip Heller
May 27, 2021

There are certain musicians who embody eras, even if they're not the player with their picture on the cover. In our contemporary musical climate, Greg Leisz comes to mind. Since 1991, he has popped up on hundreds of acclaimed albums, and without ever really changing his style, he has become centrifugal beyond the considerations of genre ...

Shabaka Hutchings: Black to the Future

by Chris May
May 6, 2021

Though he is far too modest to make any such claim himself, most observers agree that saxophonist and clarinetist Shabaka Hutchings is the standard-bearer for the new wave of jazz musicians who have emerged in London since around 2015. Hutchings is a few years older than most of the cohort. He made his debut recording in ...

Logan Richardson: To Boldly Go Where No Jazz Has Gone Before

by Chris May
March 8, 2021

In a 2016 interview, Kansas City-born alto saxophonist Logan Richardson said: “Jazz will constantly change because there's constantly a new us, new times. There will always be a fight from the conformists--but they don't represent where the tradition is coming from." Richardson was talking not long after the release of his adventurous Blue Note album, Shift, ...

Thelonious Monk: An Alternative Top Ten Albums Of Deep And Staggering Genius

by Chris May
December 23, 2020

Thelonious Monk's position in cultural history grows in stature with each passing year and every new generation. Lionised by jazz fans and a continuing influence on musicians, Monk in 2020 is also held to be a hero by the hip hop movement. While his music no longer has the power to shock that it once possessed, ...