Jan 21, 2025 7:54 PM
Southern California Fires Hit the Jazz Community
Roy McCurdy and his wife had just finished eating dinner and were relaxing over coffee in their Altadena home, when he…
Widow’s Taste will release Art Pepper’s The Last Concert on May 30 to commemorate the 25th anniversary of Pepper’s last concert, which took place May 30, 1982, at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. Ten days after the performance, Pepper was hospitalized with a cerebral hemorrhage. He died June 15, 1982.
The set list is comprised of three originals—“Landscape,” “Ophelia,” “Mambo Koyama”—and the standards “Over the Rainbow” and “When You’re Smiling,” a clarinet feature dedicated to Zoot Sims, who shared the evening’s bill at the Kennedy Center with Pepper.
The Last Concert is the second in a series of unreleased art projects documenting the late alto saxophonist’s work.
For more information, visit: www.straightlife.info
Gerald and John Clayton at the family home in Altadena during a photo shoot for the June 2022 cover of DownBeat. The house was lost during the Los Angeles fires.
Jan 21, 2025 7:54 PM
Roy McCurdy and his wife had just finished eating dinner and were relaxing over coffee in their Altadena home, when he…
“She said, ‘A lot of people are going to try and stop you,’” Sheryl Bailey recalls of the advice she received from jazz guitarist Emily Remler (1957–’90). “‘They’re going to say you slept with somebody, you’re a dyke, you’re this and that and the other. Don’t listen to them, and just keep playing.’”
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In the April 1982 issue of People magazine, under the heading “Lookout: A Guide To The Up and Coming,” jazz…
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In her four-decade career, Renee Rosnes has been recognized as a singular voice, both as a jazz composer and a…
As Ted Nash, left, departs the alto saxophone chair for LCJO, Alexa Tarantino steps in as the band’s first female full-time member.
Mar 4, 2025 1:29 PM
If only because openings for JLCO’s 15 permanent positions appear about as frequently as sub-freezing days on the…