Sunday Session: January 19, 2020

Gregory Porter

Here's this week's roundup of various music-related items of interest:

* Beatles' Abbey Road tops US bestselling vinyl LPs of the 2010s (The Guardian)
* Gary Clark Jr.: "Music is my religion" (CBS News)
* Jason Moran is making jazz history. Don’t miss it.  (Washington Post)
* “If You’re in the Song, Keep on Playing”: An Interview With Pharoah Sanders (The New Yorker)
* Jonathan Kreisberg: A Spirit Captured in Constant Motion (AllAboutJazz.com)
* A music artist says Apple Music pays her 4 times what Spotify does per stream, and it shows how wildly royalty payments can vary between services (Business Insider)
* The Sound and Myth of Charlie Parker at 100 (DownBeat)
* Jazz singer Gregory Porter is an ex-lineman with a blues-infused soul (TheUndefeated.com)
* Umbria Goes Pop (DownBeat)
* The Past Year, And Decade, In Music Listening: Video Rules, The Boy's Club Remains (NPR)
* New remastered Charlie Parker box set coming this February (JazzFM.com)
* Spotlight: Capitol Records Architect Louis Naidorf Sets the Record Straight on Myth of Tower's Iconic Design (Billboard)
* How Chicago Label International Anthem Is Rewriting the Rules of Jazz (Pitchfork)
* For Its Fifth Collection, Newvelle Issues Material From Staaf, Douglas (DownBeat)
* Telstar: The Song, And The Future That Never Was (PleaseKillMe.com)
* Alex Winter’s Frank Zappa Doc ‘Zappa’ Premieres at South by Southwest (Rolling Stone)
* Watch a Video For "Revival," the Lead Single From Gregory Porter's Forthcoming Album (WBGO)
* New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival Announces 2020 Lineup (Jazz Times)
* Jazz pianist Kris Davis on pushing the boundaries of the piano (CBC Radio)
* Andrew Cyrille Lays His Declaration of Musical Independence on UT (Austin Chronicle)
* Inspired by John Cage, an Italian Collector Commissioned Leading Artists to Transform Pianos Into Weird and Wonderful Sculptures—See Them Here (ArtNet.com)

Sunday Session: June 16, 2019

George Benson

Here's this week's roundup of various music-related items of interest:

* Anthony Davis Builds Operas From Headlines (San Francisco Classical Voice)
* Sweet Charity: Herb Alpert Foundation Celebrates 25th Anniversary (Jazz Times)
* 30th Century Music Now: Mick Houghton Remembers Sun Ra (The Quietus)
* Wonderland Lost (TheRinger.com)
* Music Is YouTube's Most Profitable Category, 'Crucial' to Bottom Line: Study (Billboard)
* Final Bow For The Night Tripper – A Tribute to Dr John (Jazzwise)
* Esperanza Spalding Knows Music Can Heal. Now She Wants to Prove It With Science (The Daily Beast)
* Bright Moments with Gary Bartz (Jazz Times)
* State Department ‘extreme vetting’ says no to traveling musicians (San Francisco Chronicle)
* They Introduced the World to Songs of Slavery. It Almost Broke Them (Topic.com)
* Jeremy Pelt: Sound Sculptor, Museumgoer (DownBeat)
* The Hippies Were Right: It's All about Vibrations, Man! (Scientific American)
* Bret Primack on Jazz Video and the Ira Gitler Documentary (AllAboutJazz.com)
* Cuba: While The Politicians Argued, The Musicians Jammed (NPR)
* Dr. John Knew the End Was Near. He Recorded One Final Album (Rolling Stone)
* Recordings by Nirvana, Janet Jackson, Eminem, Nine Inch Nails, Chuck Berry, and More Destroyed in 2008 Fire (SPIN)
* Big Mood Machine (TheBaffler.com)
* A Long Tail: Don Cherry's Brown Rice Reviewed (The Quietus)
* Melissa Aldana’s Indisputable Command (DownBeat)
* Music of a Sustainable Future: A Conversation with Linda May Han Oh and Fabian Almazan (SFJAZZ.org)
* Mac’s Wild Years (PonderosaStomp.com)
* Our brains appear uniquely tuned for musical pitch (EurekAlert.org)
* New Documentary 'Blue Note: Beyond The Notes' Surpasses Its Purpose (NPR)
* Jazz Drum Great Andrew Cyrille Revels in Collaboration at Lifetime Achievement Show (Rolling Stone)
* Why It’s Finally Time to Get Rid of Music Charts (ConsequenceOfSound.net)
* Herbie Hancock plays jazz for a more peaceful world (SydneyOperaHouse.com)
* An oral history of the Fender Stratocaster (Guitar.com)
* George Benson Salutes Rock Pioneers Chuck Berry, Fats Domino (DownBeat)
* Everything You Know Is Wrong: Rock & Roll Was Invented In Wildwood, New Jersey! (PleaseKillMe.com)
* What Was The First Rock & Roll Record? Deke Dickerson Says It’s ‘Rock Around The Clock’ (PleaseKillMe.com)
* Terence Blanchard Named First Kenny Burrell Chair at UCLA (Jazz Times)
* The Chaotic Magic of Bob Dylan’s Rolling Thunder Revue (The New Yorker)

Sunday Session: November 4, 2018

Roy Hargrove

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:

* Sonny Fortune, Stalwart Saxophonist Of New York, Dies At 79 (NPR)
* Open Land: Meeting John Abercrombie (ECM) - The late guitarist's gentle spirit is captured in a moving documentary (Jazz Times)
* Nate Wooley: Plays Whole With Others (NationalSawdust.org)
* Big in Japan: A History of Jazz in the Land of the Rising Sun, Part 1 (AllAboutJazz.com)
* This Danish Band Plays Music Underwater. The Results Are Eerily Spectacular (Time)
* REPORT: 35th Conference of the Radio Jazz Research Group, Salzburg. – " Improvisation: New Perspectives (London Jazz News)
* Guitarist Jimmy Page looks back at 50 years of Led Zeppelin (Associated Press)
* Even Classical Music Is Getting Faster These Days (Rolling Stone)
* Did the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame wait too long on Bob Marley? (Cleveland Plain Dealer)
* The Residents’ Co-Founder Hardy Fox Dead at 73 (Rolling Stone)
* Meet The Women Pushing UK Jazz Forward (ClashMusic.com)
* Festival Jazz International Rotterdam 2018 (AllAboutJazz.com)
* Jason Moran: The Harlem Hellfighters review – the soldiers who brought jazz to Europe (The Guardian)
* Is Christone ‘Kingfish’ Ingram the Future of the Blues? (Rolling Stone)
* The Secret Jewish History Of Queen (The Forward)
* Bluesman Chris Thomas King says he’s been banned by the GRAMMYs (Offbeat)
* Adam O’Farrill Does Not Play Latin Jazz (Jazz Times)
* Resonance Records Marks 10-Year Anniversary at Birdland (DownBeat)
* Tuba in the House (Jazz Times)
* An Indie Music Expert Explains Why Artists Are Turning Away From Record Deals (Rolling Stone)
* Bob James Returns with Acoustic Trio Disc (DownBeat)
* Andrew Cyrille, Lifetime Achievement Honoree at the Vision Fest, Isn't Resting on His Laurels (WBGO)
* These Duck-Billed Dinosaurs Wore Their Instruments on Their Heads (LiveScience.com)
* What is All the Fuss About? Kenny Barron Takes Years of Experience and Plays in the Moment (VoiceOfOC.org)
* Life In Frank Zappa's Pad, 1968 (PleaseKillMe.com)
* Too much Christmas music can mentally harm you (BigThink.com)
* “The tyranny of collecting” – why I gave away my entire record collection (GetIntoThis.co.uk)
* Roy Hargrove, Grammy-Winning Jazz Trumpeter, Dies At 49 (NPR)
* Inside the Secretly Lucrative World of Solo Piano Music (Rolling Stone)

Sunday Session: November 27, 2016

Andrew Cyrille

Some interesting music-related items that have landed in StLJN's inbox over the past week:

* Dap-Kings' Gabriel Roth recalls Sharon Jones' last days: 'She was blaming Trump' (Los Angeles Times)
* Bright Moments With Andrew Cyrille (Jazz Times)
* Review: Berlin Jazz Festival (Jazz Journal UK)
* The Truth About the Tower (Wall Street Journal)
* Exit Zero Festival Offers Global Tastes, Diverse Artists (DownBeat)
* The Forgotten Precursor to iTunes (Pitchfork)
* London jazz festival: Wayne Shorter review – living embodiment of jazz genius (The Guardian UK)
* ‘Look, they’re crucifying Him! And nobody cares!’: When Charlie Chaplin met Igor Stravinsky (DangerousMinds.net)
* The 15 Most Overlooked Albums of 2016 (VinylMePlease.com)
* The Broken Pop of James Bond Songs (LongReads.com)
* Vijay Iyer on Musical and Ethnic Identity (SPIN)
* How Chuck Berry Wrote “Johnny B. Goode” and Created the First Rock and Roll Guitar Hero (Guitar World)
* Why secret album-sharing forum What.CD was a music obsessive’s pirate paradise (FactMag.com)
* How Streaming Is Changing The Sound Of Pop Music (HypeBot.com)
* Sarah Vaughan Competition 2016 - London chanteuse Deelee Dubé takes top prize (Jazz Times)
* Leon Russell in the Dark (Village Voice)
* Rock photographer Michael Zagaris tells the stories behind his most famous shots (The Guardian UK)
* Open Space for Creativity: Cecil Taylor At Antioch (WYSO)
* ‘Alice’s Restaurant,’ an Undying Thanksgiving Protest Song (The Atlantic)
* To find success, soul singer Sharon Jones had to leave the US (PRI)
* Tyshawn Sorey: The Maestro (Jazz Times)
* How Sun Ra’s Definitive Singles Catalog Finally Saw The Light of Day (Bandcamp.com)
* Allison Miller: A Life Soaked in Music (Point of Departure)
* Pauline Oliveros Dead at 84 (Pitchfork)
* James Booker Was Hands Down the Greatest New Orleans Piano Player Ever (The Daily Beast)

StLJN Saturday Video Showcase: Three views of Trio 3

The news that Trio 3 will be playing St. Louis next week offers a welcome excuse to look at some video clips of the group, which includes St. Louis native Oliver Lake on saxophones along with bassist Reggie Workman and drummer Andrew Cyrille. Their performance is being presented by the Nu-Art Series on Saturday, September 19 at Luna Bar, which is next to Bar Italia at 13 Maryland Plaza in the Central West End.

Of course, many, if not most, St. Louis jazz fans already know Lake, and he's made it back home several times in recent years to perform, both on his own and with the World Saxophone Quartet.

However, he's never played here with Trio 3, though the group has been together nearly 20 years. Moreover, while Workman and Cyrille both have had long, varied and distinguished careers, neither has an extensive history of performing in St. Louis. (Nu-Art's George Sams told me that Workman has played here at least once before, in the late 1960s with Bobby Hutcherson. As for Cyrille, as best as can be determined, this may be his debut performance in St. Louis.) So the chance to see and hear these guys, both individually and collectively, is something of a rare occurrence.

Today's first video is an excerpt from a 2005 performance in Montclair, NJ, where Lake now resides. The location is obviously a church, but otherwise is unspecified. There's no indication of a song title either, but the piece does show off Workman's big sound, Lake's plaintive tone and nimble riffing and Cyrille's polyrhythmic approach to the drums.

The second clip is from the other side of the world, recorded during the group's performance in 2008 at the Taichung Jazz Festival in Taiwan. Workman once again gets a fat sound, and once things get rolling both Lake and Cyrille are considerably more aggressive than in the first video.

The third and final clip is a segment from the New Jersey public television program State of the Arts. It features some performance footage of Trio 3 at NYC's Sweet Rhythm, but it's mostly a biographical interview with Lake, in which he talks about his career and music; starting out in St. Louis; how he got together with Workman and Cyrille; and more.

Nu-Art Series to present concerts by Trio 3, Rasul Siddik

The Nu-Art Series, run by trumpeter, gallery owner and former arts administrator George Sams out of his Metropolitan Gallery downtown, is kicking off its fall 2009 season this month with two concerts featuring former St. Louisans who have earned international acclaim in the jazz world.

The group Trio 3, featuring saxophonist and former St. Louisan Oliver Lake (pictured), bassist Reggie Workman and drummer Andrew Cyrille, will perform on Saturday, September 19. The following week, trumpeter Rasul Siddik returns home to the Gateway City to headline a concert on Saturday, September 26.

Both performances will take place from 8:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. at Luna Bar, 13 Maryland Plaza in the Central West End. (Luna Bar is serving as a temporary home for the Nu-Art Series while storm damage to the Metropolitan Gallery building at 2926 Locust is being repaired. Pending the completion of construction, Sams says he hopes to resume regular operations at the gallery in October.) Tickets for each show will be $25.00 at the door.

Lake is well known to St. Louis listeners as a member of St. Louis' Black Artists Group (BAG), co-founder of the World Saxophone Quartet, and as a solo artist whose own music has run the gamut from free jazz to R&B to bop to reggae.

His work with Trio 3 represents an equal collaboration with two genuine heavyweights of the jazz world. Workman has performed or recorded with many of the notable jazz musicians of the past five decades, including landmark albums with John Coltrane and Cecil Taylor, while Cyrille is considered one of the most important and innovative drummers to emerge from the free jazz movement of the 1960s, working with Taylor, Archie Shepp, Roswell Rudd, and others.

As an added bonus, St. Louis trumpeter Floyd LeFlore, another BAG veteran, is scheduled to open the show with a solo version of his performance piece "Ritualistic Revival."

Though younger than Lake, Siddik also was affiliated BAG with as an up-and-coming musician. He has worked with many notable jazz performers, including Lester Bowie, Henry Threadgill and David Murray, and now splits his time between NYC and Paris. For his St. Louis performance, Siddik will bring along his frequent collaborator, pianist Katy Roberts, with bassist Darryl Mixon and drummer Gary Sykes added from the local ranks to complete the band.

Both of these concerts are certainly welcome additions to the fall schedule of jazz performances here in St. Louis, but, being a nosy reporter, I had to ask Sams why he booked Trio 3 on the same night of Sonny Rollins' highly anticipated performance at the Touhill Performing Arts Center (and, for that matter, the Old Webster Jazz and Blues Festival).

He explained that the show had been in the works for a year now, and September 19 was the only date Trio 3 had available. Sams added that he thought the two concerts would appeal to "different crowds." Here's hoping that he's right about that, or at least that there are enough local jazz fans willing and able to shell out their hard-earned cash to support both shows.

UPDATE - 11:00 p.m., 9/11/09: K. Curtis Lyle has more on Lake, Trio 3 and Siddik in an article for this week's St. Louis American, found online here.

(Edited after posting to fix typos.)