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…
Charlie Parker (1920–’55)
(Photo: William P. Gottlieb/Ira and Leonore S. Gershwin Fund Collection, Music Division, Library of Congress)
Chet Baker (1929–’88)
(Photo: DownBeat Archives)
Clark Terry (1920–2015)
(Photo: DownBeat Archives)The people have spoken, and they want more movie recommendations.
If you’ve managed to watch the 20 previous film recommendations we’ve made (you can find them here and here), start on the selections below, which include an imagined history of Buddy Bolden and Kirk Douglas portraying the doomed Bix Beiderbecke. DB
Bird (Amazon)
None other than Clint Eastwood directed this film about Charlie Parker, who’s portrayed by the inimitable Forest Whitaker.
Bolden (Amazon)
Dan Pritzker, a musician and filmmaker, enlisted Wynton Marsalis as composer, performer and executive producer for this feature film that imagines Buddy Bolden’s life and times.
The Girls in the Band (Google Play)
This 2011 documentary explores the contributions made to jazz by performers who were members of all-women bands during the 1930s and 1940s, and follows the music forward as performers pushed back against marginalization and discrimination.
Jazz On A Summer’s Day (iTunes)
Everyone from Mahalia Jackson to Jimmy Giuffre, Thelonious Monk, Sonny Stitt, Dinah Washington, Gerry Mulligan and Chuck Berry make an appearance in this 1958 Newport Jazz Festival concert film.
Kansas City (Amazon)
The Robert Altman film recreates the jazz scene of the 1930s, and does so with stellar musical performances by James Carter, Joshua Redman, David Murray, Russell Malone, Craig Handy and Kevin Mahogany. Star turns by Harry Belafonte, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Steve Buscemi.
Keep On Keepin’ On (Google Play)
Clark Terry serves as a mentor to a young Justin Kauflin in this truly beautiful 2014 documentary.
Let’s Get Lost (Amazon)
Photographer and director Bruce Weber turns in a documentary that traces the stormy life of Chet Baker. Tune in for an appearance by a young Flea.
Straight No Chaser (iTunes)
Produced by Clint Eastwood’s company, this Thelonious Monk documentary includes vintage footage, as well as interviews with saxophonist Charlie Rouse and drummer T.S. Monk.
Sun Ra: A Joyful Noise (Snag Films)
Travel the spaceways with a visionary composer and bandleader in this 1980 film that splices together performances from several gigs with candid interviews.
Whiplash (Amazon)
This 2014 feature depicts the tempestuous relationship between a drum student and his teacher.
Young Man With A Horn (Amazon)
Largely overlooked today, cornetist Bix Beiderbecke was fictionalized in a 1938 Dorothy Baker novel that later was turned into this film starring Kirk Douglas and Lauren Bacall.
Updated April 20.
“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.”
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Stories of major shifts and rebirths among musicians during the past five years are common, from weathering the…
Queen Latifah extols Harlem and the Apollo Theater at this year’s Kennedy Center Honors.
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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…
Robertson had a penetrating, pliant sound with a remarkable softness at its center.
Dec 11, 2024 10:34 AM
Herb Robertson, a trumpeter and flugelhornist known for his wide-lens explorations of the avant-garde, died Dec. 10. He…
