Feb 3, 2025 10:49 PM
The Essence of Emily
In the April 1982 issue of People magazine, under the heading “Lookout: A Guide To The Up and Coming,” jazz…
Ella Fitzgerald is one of the classic jazz artists whose albums will be reissued by Verve in 2016.
(Photo: Verve/ellafitzgerald.com)Verve Records will celebrate its 60th anniversary throughout 2016 with a series of historic reissues and new collections from its archives. The forthcoming albums include titles by Ella Fitzgerald, Charlie Parker, Billie Holiday, Count Basie, Oscar Peterson, Bill Evans, Wes Montgomery, Louis Armstrong, Jimmy Smith, Stan Getz and others.
Fitzgerald will be honored with the release of Jazz At the Philharmonic: The Ella Fitzgerald Set, a compilation that assembles all of the singer’s Jazz at the Philharmonic performances previously issued by Verve on a single collection for the first time. The collection—which includes concerts from 1949, 1953 and 1954 and features appearances by Parker, Lester Young and Hank Jones—will feature newly remastered music and an essay by author Will Friedwald.
The first set of albums, due out in March 2016, will accompany the release of the digital collection Verve 60, featuring 60 tracks by 60 different artists from throughout the label’s history, spanning from Fitzgerald and Peterson through Wayne Shorter, Herbie Hancock, Diana Krall and Christian McBride.
In addition, five albums from the Verve catalog will be reissued on vinyl: Ella & Louis, the first pairing for the label of Fitzgerald and Armstrong; Holiday’s Lady Sings The Blues; Parker’s innovative Charlie Parker With Strings; Peterson’s Night Train; and Count Basie’s April In Paris.
Several classics will also make their debuts in HD digital audio and iTunes, including titles by Fitzgerald, Evans, Parker, Wynton Kelly and Stan Getz. Organ master Jimmy Smith’s classic singles for the label will be compiled into a digital box set.
The release schedule continues in May and June with more vinyl and digital reissues, including Stan Getz and João Gilberto’s Grammy-winning bossa nova classic Getz/Gilberto, as well as albums by Wes Montgomery, Blossom Dearie, Coleman Hawkins and Anita O’Day.
A new CD collection will compile unreleased music by Charlie Parker, while Louis Armstrong’s complete studio recordings for the label will be collected in a multi-disc set.
Verve was founded in 1956 by Norman Granz, the impresario behind the popular Jazz at the Philharmonic concerts, which brought the music to new audiences.
In November 2015, Verve released D-Stringz, an acoustic album featuring Stanley Clarke on double bass, Biréli Lagrène on guitar and Jean-Luc Ponty on violin.
“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.’”
Feb 3, 2025 10:49 PM
In the April 1982 issue of People magazine, under the heading “Lookout: A Guide To The Up and Coming,” jazz…
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…
Larry Appelbaum with Wayne Shorter in 2012.
Feb 25, 2025 10:49 AM
Larry Appelbaum, a distinguished audio engineer, jazz journalist, historian and broadcaster, died Feb. 21, 2025, in…
“If you don’t keep learning, your mind slows down,” Coleman says. “Use it or lose it.”
Jan 28, 2025 11:38 AM
PolyTropos/Of Many Turns — the title for Steve Coleman’s latest recording on Pi and his 33rd album overall —…
“This is one of the great gifts that Coltrane gave us — he gave us a key to the cosmos in this recording,” says John McLaughlin.
Mar 18, 2025 3:00 PM
In his original liner notes to A Love Supreme, John Coltrane wrote: “Yes, it is true — ‘seek and ye shall…
