Oct 17, 2023 4:04 PM
Carla Bley, Provocative Composer-Pianist, Dies at Age 87
With her iconic bangs, sharp features and free-flowing sense of the absurd, Carla Bley, who died Oct. 17 of brain…
Bley told DownBeat in 1984: “I’m just a composer, and I use jazz musicians because they’re smarter, and they can save your ass in a bad situation. … I need all the help I can get.”
Oct 17, 2023 4:04 PM
With her iconic bangs, sharp features and free-flowing sense of the absurd, Carla Bley, who died Oct. 17 of brain…
Carla Bley, the 2021 critics’ choice for the DownBeat Hall of Fame
Aug 17, 2021 12:42 PM
Given the tenor of the times, Carla Bley’s extraordinary career shouldn’t have happened. What were the chances…
Carla Bley, the critics’ choice for the DownBeat Hall of Fame
Jul 21, 2021 11:44 AM
The 69th Annual DownBeat International Critics Poll delivered a warm blanket to a jazz community shivering through the…
Carla Bley (left), Steve Swallow and Andy Sheppard recorded Life Goes On for the ECM label.
Jan 5, 2021 7:54 AM
The list below is a roundup of the 5-, 4.5- and 4-star reviews that ran in the print edition of DownBeat during 2020.…
Steve Swallow’s early heroes included acoustic bassist Percy Heath.
Dec 14, 2020 1:15 PM
To paraphrase Shakespeare, some are born great, and some achieve greatness. But when it comes to playing the electric…
Fifty years ago, Manfred Eicher co-founded Edition of Contemporary Music, better known as ECM, and has issued more than 1,600 titles spanning jazz and classical sounds.
Oct 29, 2019 9:36 AM
A search for the heart of the ECM Records operation leads to a small, quiet space located on the second floor of a…
Released in conjunction with a companion video series, Roxy Coss’ Quintet draws from her entire catalog and ranks as the the follow-up to The Future Is Female, the bandleader’s provocative response to the 2016 elections.
Sep 4, 2019 9:58 AM
Though she’s only 33, saxophonist Roxy Coss already has made her mark as a bandleader, while becoming a torchbearer…
Pianist Carla Bley leads a trio with bassist Steve Swallow and saxophonist Andy Sheppard at the Big Ears Festival in Knoxville, Tennessee, on March 23.
Apr 9, 2019 2:58 PM
Pianist Carla Bley’s longtime trio with bassist Steve Swallow and saxophonist Andy Sheppard is set to head into a…
Matt Wilson’s new album Honey And Salt will be released August 25 on Palmetto Records.
Jun 2, 2017 10:20 PM
When Carl Sandburg died in 1967, President Lyndon B. Johnson hailed the famed poet as “more than the voice of…
Carla Bley was among the jazz-leaning instrumentalists that performed at the Big Ears Festival in Knoxville, Tennessee, March 23-26.
Apr 4, 2017 4:18 PM
Perched on a stool in front of a projector screen and nestled behind a laptop, alto saxophonist Matana Roberts had a…
