Sunday Session: April 15, 2018

Nina Simone

Here's a roundup of various music-related items of interest that have shown up in one of StLJN's various inboxes or feeds over the past week:

* The British jazz explosion: meet the musicians rewriting the rulebook (The Guardian)
* Monika Herzig’s SHEroes Addresses Gender in Jazz (DownBeat)
* Why Hip-Hop Is Taking Center Stage On Netflix's Original Music Programming (Forbes.com)
* At Tiny Telephone music studio, recording to tape is not a metaphor (KALW)
* MATA at 20 (New Music Box)
* How Drummer Albert "Tootie" Heath Learned to Play Jazz (Westword)
* Philadelphia native James Mtume returns to celebrate 35th anniversary of ‘Juicy Fruit’ (New Pittsburgh Courier)
* Jimmie Vaughan’s B-3 Vibe (Jazz Times)
* The Deceptively Accessible Music of Cecil Taylor (The Atlantic)
* Illuminating Cecil Taylor with Pianist Jason Moran, on The Checkout (WBGO)
* Turning The Tables: The 150 Greatest Albums Made By Women (As Chosen By You) (NPR)
* “All at Full Fullness”: Remembering Cecil Taylor - Steve Coleman, Vijay Iyer, Jason Moran, Matthew Shipp and Wadada Leo Smith pay tribute to an avant-jazz icon (Jazz Times)
* All That Jazz: A #JazzAppreciationMonth Podcast Round-up (Arts.gov)
* Music Publishers Win Major Copyright Fight Over Streaming of Legendary Rock Concerts (Hollywood Reporter)
* Composer Tyondai Braxton: 'I'm at war with myself. That's what the piece sounds like' (The Guardian)
* Spotify could kill Jazz, Soul and Classical music. Really. (SoulTracks.com)
* Q&A with Al Di Meola: In a Good Place (DownBeat)
* The New Jazz Torchbearer: Kamasi Washington on His Musical Message (Rolling Stone)
* Cecil Taylor and the Art of Noise (The New Yorker)
* The Revolutionary Genius of Cecil Taylor (The New Yorker)
* The British Guitar Embargo: When Brits Were Banned from Buying American (Reverb.com)
* How Nina Simone Captivated a New Generation (Rolling Stone)
* In Memoriam: Cecil Taylor (DownBeat)
* ‘It’s an insane project’: Toronto resident documenting city’s live-music history through posters (The Globe and Mail)
* Esperanza Spalding: Redefining Production - The bassist, composer and bandleader on her innovative recent "pop-up" album, "Exposure" (Jazz Times)
* How Musicians Are Using Field Recordings to Capture the Politics of Place (Pitchfork.com)
* ‘A Singular Sound, A Singular Force’: Artists Remember Jazz Great Cecil Taylor (BedfordAndBowery.com)
* Saxophonist Kamasi Washington Announces New Album 'Heaven and Earth' With Two Teaser Videos (NextBop.com)
* Hitting Reboot: Manhattan Transfer (DownBeat)
* American orchestras: Revamping the model, or embracing the obvious? (Washington Post)

Return To Forever ticket presale starts Wednesday, March 26

Tickets for the Return to Forever reunion tour concert on Tuesday, June 17* at St. Louis' Fox Theatre go on sale to the general public this Saturday, March 29.

However, the Fox and its ticket agency Metrotix also are conducting an online presale beginning at 10:00 a.m. this Wednesday, March 26 and ending at 10:00 p.m. on Friday, March 28. To purchase tickets via the presale, go online to metrotix.com/promotions and enter the promotion code JAZZFOREVER.

*StLJN's earlier item on this concert originally listed a different show date that had appeared on the Return to Forever Web site and tour schedule. That item has been edited to reflect the correct date, Tuesday, June 17.

Return to Forever reunion tour coming to the Fox Theatre on June 17

The 1970s jazz-fusion supergroup Return to Forever is reuniting this summer for an extended tour of the United States and Europe that will include a concert at St. Louis' Fox Theatre on Tuesday, June 17.

The tour reunites the band's best-known lineup - founding members Chick Corea on keyboards and Stanley Clarke on bass (pictured), plus guitarist Al DiMeola and drummer Lenny White - for the first time in more than 25 years. The quartet will play more than 50 dates from May through August, including performances at major summer jazz festivals in Montreal; Montreux, Switzerland; San Sebastian, Spain; Nice, France; and Saratoga Springs, New York.

RTF also are releasing a double-CD anthology to coincide with the tour featuring remixed and remastered tracks from the band's albums originally recorded from 1973 through 1976, Hymn of the Seventh Galaxy, Where Have I Known You Before, the Grammy-winning No Mystery and Romantic Warrior.

There's been no announcement yet about tickets for Return to Forever's St. Louis date, but StLJN will have more information as it becomes available. In the meantime, you can fire up the embedded video window below to enjoy a vintage clip of Return to Forever playing "Romantic Warrior" back in 1976 for the British television program The Old Grey Whistle Test.



Edited 3/25/08 to correct the date of the show in the headline and text.