Dec 17, 2024 9:58 AM
Tabla Master Zakir Hussain, 73, Succumbs to Illness
Tabla master Ustad Zakir Hussain, one of India’s reigning cultural ambassadors and a revered figure worldwide…
Saxophonist John Ellis’ new album By A Thread will be released May 9 on Hyena Records. Joining Ellis on the recording is his “New York City” quintet featuring Aaron Goldberg on piano, Mike Moreno on guitar, Reuben Rogers on bass and Terreon Gully on drums. This new album marks the arrival of the musician as a full-time bandleader, having recently left his five-year post as tenor saxophonist with the popular Charlie Hunter Trio.
By A Thread , which was recorded in just two days, is the follow up the Ellis’ critically acclaimed One Foot In The Swamp, a recording that was laced with funk. On the new album he dives deeper into harmonically complex waters, and stays true to his distinctive songwriting voice, including more of his classic hooks throughout the record.
“I wasn’t particularly trying to make a jazz record, a funk record, a world music record, but rather to make a record that is an honest attempt to create a personal sound,” said Ellis. “Personally, I love music that falls into many different categories, so the goal was really just to create good music.”
“Watching people like Max Roach or Elvin Jones and seeing how they utilize the whole drum kit in a very rhythmic and melodic way and how they stretched time — that was a huge inspiration to me,” Hussain said in DownBeat.
Dec 17, 2024 9:58 AM
Tabla master Ustad Zakir Hussain, one of India’s reigning cultural ambassadors and a revered figure worldwide…
“I love doing ballads,” Mike Stern says. “It’s just a part of me, some part of emotionally how I feel sometimes.”
Dec 3, 2024 12:52 PM
Stories of major shifts and rebirths among musicians during the past five years are common, from weathering the…
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…
Queen Latifah extols Harlem and the Apollo Theater at this year’s Kennedy Center Honors.
Dec 12, 2024 1:58 AM
Cuban-American jazz trumpet legend Arturo Sandoval and Harlem’s Apollo Theater were among the honorees at the 2024…
“With jazz I thought it must be OK to be Black, for the first time,” says singer Sofia Jernberg.
Jan 2, 2025 10:50 AM
On Musho (Intakt), her recent duo album with pianist Alexander Hawkins, singer Sofia Jernberg interprets traditional…
