Aug 26, 2025 1:53 PM
Blindfold Test: Buster Williams
Buster Williams, who at the age of 83 has been on the scene for 65 years, had never done a Blindfold Test. The first…
Conguero Ray Barretto, one of the leading forces on the Latin Jazz scene, died Friday morning at at the Hackensack University Medical Center in Hackensack, N.J. Barretto had suffered a heart attack in January, shortly after he received the NEA Jazz Masters Fellowship. He was 76.
The son of Puerto Rican parents, Barretto was born in Brooklyn on April 29, 1929, and grew up in the Bronx and Spanish Harlem. While he was reared with Afro-Latin music, he became involved with jazz in the late ‘40s by sitting in at various sessions. After a tour with the U.S. Army in Europe in the early ‘50s, he became a music professional in 1954. He first worked with Jose Curbelo for two years, then joined Tito Puente, replacing Mongo Santamaria. Following four years with Puente, he left to join Herbie Mann, then formed his own band after four months.
Barretto had also been working and recording as a first-call Latin percussionist with jazz players such as Red Garland, Gene Ammons, Lou Donaldson, Cannonball Adderley, Dizzy Gillespie, Freddie Hubbard and others. His leadership credentials were cemented by the 1963 crossover hit “El Watusi” and he has continued to lead groups since that time, including New World Spirit, which he formed in 1992, the most directly linked to his Latin-jazz roots.
“What I got from Percy was the dignity of playing the bass,” Buster Williams said of Percy Heath.
Aug 26, 2025 1:53 PM
Buster Williams, who at the age of 83 has been on the scene for 65 years, had never done a Blindfold Test. The first…
Don and Maureen Sickler serve as the keepers of engineer Rudy Van Gelder’s flame at Van Gelder Studio, perhaps the most famous recording studio in jazz history.
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Butcher Brown, clockwise from top left: Marcus Tenney, DJ Harrison, Morgan Burrs, Corey Fonville and Andrew Randazzo. (Keyboardist Harrison couldn’t make the gig, so special guest Jacob Mann sat in with the band at the Reno Jazz Festival.)
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This year’s Jazz em Agosto set by the Darius Jones Trio captured the titular alto saxophonist at his most ferocious.
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