Jul 17, 2025 12:44 PM
DownBeat’s 73rd Annual Critics Poll: One for the Record Books
You see before you what we believe is the largest and most comprehensive Critics Poll in the history of jazz. DownBeat…
Randy Weston at the 2013 Chicago Jazz Festival
(Photo: Michael Jackson)Pianist Randy Weston, an NEA Jazz Master, Doris Duke Impact Award recipient, United States Artist Fellow and Guggenheim Foundation Fellow, died Sept. 1 in Brooklyn. He was 92.
A DownBeat Hall of Fame inductee, Weston remained active in recent years, performing live and issuing 2016’s The African Nubian Suite (African Rhythms), a two-CD recording of a 2012 concert performance at New York University featuring an international cast of musicians, and 2017’s Sound (African Rhythms), a two-CD solo piano recording from a 2001 engagement at Montreux Palace in Switzerland.
Throughout his lengthy recording career, which began with his 1954 debut, Cole Porter In A Modern Mood (Riverside), Weston drew connections between the jazz and blues that surrounded him while growing up in Brooklyn, New York, and the music of Africa, his ancestral homeland.
Africa became the theme of numerous Weston albums, many with arrangements by Melba Liston. They include Uhuru Africa (1960), Highlife (1963), African Cookbook (1969) and Blue Moses (1972). He first visited Africa in 1961 and then again in 1963 as a part of The American Society of African Culture. Weston traveled throughout the continent in 1967 for the U.S State Department and settled in Tangiers, Morocco, where he remained for five years and operated a venue called the African Rhythms Club.
Weston held honorary doctor of music degrees from Colby College, Brooklyn College and New England Conservatory of Music. He served as artist-in-residence at New York University, the New School and Medgar Evers College at City University of New York.
In 2010, Duke University Press published African Rhythms: The Autobiography of Randy Weston, written by Weston and arranged by Willard Jenkins. His decades of work are archived at Harvard University. DB
James Brandon Lewis earned honors for Artist of the Year and Tenor Saxophonist of the Year. Three of his recordings placed in the Albums of the Year category.
Jul 17, 2025 12:44 PM
You see before you what we believe is the largest and most comprehensive Critics Poll in the history of jazz. DownBeat…
Galper was often regarded as an underrated master of his craft.
Jul 22, 2025 10:58 AM
Hal Galper, a pianist, composer and arranger who enjoyed a substantial performing career but made perhaps a deeper…
Chuck Mangione on the cover of the May 8, 1975, edition of DownBeat.
Jul 29, 2025 1:00 PM
Chuck Mangione, one of the most popular trumpeters in jazz history, passed away on July 24 at home in Rochester, New…
“Hamiet was one of the most underrated musicians ever,” says Whitaker of baritone saxophonist Hamiet Bluiett.
Jul 8, 2025 7:30 AM
At 56, Rodney Whitaker, professor of jazz bass and director of jazz studies at Michigan State University, is equally…
Jul 17, 2025 11:35 AM
The DownBeat Critics Poll provides a wonderful snapshot of the jazz scene today, with much to explore and many great…