A few tracks into the soundtrack of Questlove’s music-fest documentary, an emcee introduces the next performer, David Ruffin. A year after being bounced out of the Temptations, the notoriously troubled Ruffin already sounds nostalgic: “I’d like to go back to the olden days,” he says, with a glimmer of humor, as his backup band starts into the Temps’ “My Girl.”
Only five years had passed since that hit had conquered the world, but as Ruffin himself may have gleaned, Black music had grown exponentially in that short time.
Only five years had passed since that hit had conquered the world, but as Ruffin himself may have gleaned, Black music had grown exponentially in that short time.
- 1/28/2022
- by David Browne
- Rollingstone.com
Questlove’s new Summer of Soul doc is a trove of incredible footage, featuring extended clips of Sly and the Family Stone, Mavis Staples, Nina Simone, Stevie Wonder, and other icons at the height of their performing powers. But one of the film’s most striking sequences spotlights a lesser-known figure who shared the bill with these legends at 1969’s Harlem Cultural Festival: the guitarist Sonny Sharrock, seen convulsing and grimacing onstage as he wrings a gritty expressionist racket from his hollow-body ax during an appearance backing flutist Herbie Mann.
- 6/25/2021
- by Hank Shteamer
- Rollingstone.com
Chick Corea, the virtuosic keyboardist who broadened the scope of jazz during a career spanning more than five decades, died on Tuesday from a rare form of cancer. A post on his Facebook page confirmed the news. Corea was 79.
“Throughout his life and career, Chick relished in the freedom and the fun to be had in creating something new, and in playing the games that artists do,” his family wrote in a statement. “Through his body of work and the decades he spent touring the world, he touched and inspired the lives of millions.
“Throughout his life and career, Chick relished in the freedom and the fun to be had in creating something new, and in playing the games that artists do,” his family wrote in a statement. “Through his body of work and the decades he spent touring the world, he touched and inspired the lives of millions.
- 2/11/2021
- by Hank Shteamer
- Rollingstone.com
Better Call Saul returns for its fifth season on February 23rd — but don’t expect any current music to make it on to the soundtrack. If there’s one word creators Vince Gilligan and Peter Gould would use to describe the sound of Saul, it’s “wistful.” And, to hit that note, the duo and their music team often turn to the vaults.
When we last left struggling lawyer Jimmy McGill (Bob Odenkirk), he had finally been granted permission to practice law again — and he’s doing so under the name Saul Goodman (finally). Meantime,...
When we last left struggling lawyer Jimmy McGill (Bob Odenkirk), he had finally been granted permission to practice law again — and he’s doing so under the name Saul Goodman (finally). Meantime,...
- 2/19/2020
- by Brenna Ehrlich
- Rollingstone.com
"Are you kidding me, man?!" composer Angelo Badalamenti howls jokingly when Rolling Stone asks him what he thought of Twin Peaks, the TV series he scored in the early Nineties. "It was really off the wall. I thought it was either going to sink violently down the drain or, hopefully, capture the intrigue of enthusiastic people conversing by the office water cooler on a Monday morning."
12 Things We Learned from David Lynch's Talk at Bam
As it turned out, Twin Peaks was an instant hit when it premiered on April 8th,...
12 Things We Learned from David Lynch's Talk at Bam
As it turned out, Twin Peaks was an instant hit when it premiered on April 8th,...
- 7/25/2014
- Rollingstone.com
Yusef Lateef, who died on Monday after a bout with prostate cancer, was a devout Muslim who did not like his music to be called jazz because of the supposed indecent origins and connotations of the word (although those origins are still debated). He preferred the self-coined phrase "autophysiopsychic music." Furthermore, his music encompassed an impressively broad range of styles, and the only Grammy he won was in the New Age category -- for a recording of a symphony. Think about those things amid the flood of Lateef obituaries with "jazz" in the headline.
That said, certainly Lateef's own musical origins indisputably revolved around jazz. Growing up in Detroit, a highly fertile musical environment in the 1930s and beyond, Lateef got his first instrument, an $80 Martin alto sax, at age 18. Within a year he was on the road with the 13 Spirits of Swing (arrangements by Milt Buckner).
A Detroit friend,...
That said, certainly Lateef's own musical origins indisputably revolved around jazz. Growing up in Detroit, a highly fertile musical environment in the 1930s and beyond, Lateef got his first instrument, an $80 Martin alto sax, at age 18. Within a year he was on the road with the 13 Spirits of Swing (arrangements by Milt Buckner).
A Detroit friend,...
- 12/25/2013
- by SteveHoltje
- www.culturecatch.com
Savannah, Ga. — Musician Ben Tucker performed with stars from Quincy Jones to Peggy Lee before he settled in the 1970s in Savannah, where the jazz bassist became one of the Georgia city's best-known working musicians.
He was killed in a car crash Tuesday at age 82.
Tucker was driving a golf cart across a road on Hutchinson Island when a car slammed into him at high speed, said Savannah-Chatham County police spokesman Julian Miller. Tucker was pronounced dead at a local hospital. The driver of the car that struck him was charged with vehicular homicide and other criminal counts.
The news stunned musicians and jazz enthusiasts in Savannah, where Tucker had been a musical fixture for roughly four decades. Tucker made his living playing upright bass – an instrument he'd named Bertha and claimed was 240 years old – in all sorts of settings from jazz festivals to wedding receptions, from nightclub gigs to bar mitzvahs.
He was killed in a car crash Tuesday at age 82.
Tucker was driving a golf cart across a road on Hutchinson Island when a car slammed into him at high speed, said Savannah-Chatham County police spokesman Julian Miller. Tucker was pronounced dead at a local hospital. The driver of the car that struck him was charged with vehicular homicide and other criminal counts.
The news stunned musicians and jazz enthusiasts in Savannah, where Tucker had been a musical fixture for roughly four decades. Tucker made his living playing upright bass – an instrument he'd named Bertha and claimed was 240 years old – in all sorts of settings from jazz festivals to wedding receptions, from nightclub gigs to bar mitzvahs.
- 6/5/2013
- by AP
- Huffington Post
Washington -- The Congressional Black Caucus will honor Whitney Houston with a resolution that will be sent to Houston's family in time for the late singer's funeral on Saturday, according to Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D-Mo.), chairman of the caucus.
The measure won't be the same kind of resolution that would normally go before the House and get voted on, he said. Instead, the document will come directly from the CBC and go directly to Houston's family, signed only by caucus members, at the family's request.
"It will probably look pretty official. Like you can buy downstairs," Cleaver told The Huffington Post, apparently referring to decorative documents sold in the basement of the Capitol complex. "I mean, it's not going to be shabbily sent to the family."
Cleaver said Houston's family asked that the caucus send something for the funeral. A spokeswoman for the caucus said later that...
The measure won't be the same kind of resolution that would normally go before the House and get voted on, he said. Instead, the document will come directly from the CBC and go directly to Houston's family, signed only by caucus members, at the family's request.
"It will probably look pretty official. Like you can buy downstairs," Cleaver told The Huffington Post, apparently referring to decorative documents sold in the basement of the Capitol complex. "I mean, it's not going to be shabbily sent to the family."
Cleaver said Houston's family asked that the caucus send something for the funeral. A spokeswoman for the caucus said later that...
- 2/16/2012
- by Jennifer Bendery
- Huffington Post
If USC professor Josh Kun had his way, the Jewish people might not be known as "the People of the Book" but rather "the People of the Record." "Jews on Vinyl," curated by Kun and Roger Bennett, of the Charles and Andrea Bronfman Foundation, is the new exhibition at the Skirball Cultural Center, where you can seat yourself on a midcentury-modern couch and tap your feet to Irving Fields' 1959 recording "Bagels and Bongos"; grin while listening to a wide spectrum of albums - from Herbie Mann's "Push Push" to Barbra Streisand's "Superman"; comedy albums by Sophie Tucker, Myron Cohen and Lenny Bruce; Leo Fuchs' "Shalom Pardner"; or even the Barry Sisters singing their Yiddish rendition of "My Way." The exhibition, which ran in San Francisco for almost a year, is based on Kun and Bennett's 2008 book "And You Shall...
- 5/14/2010
- by Tom Teicholz
- Huffington Post
MoviesOnline recently sat down with Michael Jackson’s musical director, Michael Bearden, to talk about his new film, Michael Jackson’s This Is It, which offers Jackson fans and music lovers worldwide a rare, behind-the-scenes look at the performer as he developed, created and rehearsed for his sold-out concerts that would have taken place beginning this past summer in London’s O2 Arena.
Bearden is an accomplished musical director/keyboardist/arranger/composer for a diverse range of musical superstars. He has performed and/or recorded with some of popular music’s giants including: Sting, Carlos Santana, Whitney Houston, Lionel Richie, Chaka Kahn, Patti Austin, James Ingrahm, Patti Labelle, Yoko Ono, George Benson, Natalie Cole, Yossou NDour, Boz Scaggs, Lenny Kravitz, Luther Vandross, Issac Hayes, Aaron Neville, Edie Brickell, Jon Bonjovi and legends Nancy Wilson, Queen, Stevie Wonder, Michael Jackson, Liza Minelli, Elton John, Aretha Franklin, and Ray Charles and served...
Bearden is an accomplished musical director/keyboardist/arranger/composer for a diverse range of musical superstars. He has performed and/or recorded with some of popular music’s giants including: Sting, Carlos Santana, Whitney Houston, Lionel Richie, Chaka Kahn, Patti Austin, James Ingrahm, Patti Labelle, Yoko Ono, George Benson, Natalie Cole, Yossou NDour, Boz Scaggs, Lenny Kravitz, Luther Vandross, Issac Hayes, Aaron Neville, Edie Brickell, Jon Bonjovi and legends Nancy Wilson, Queen, Stevie Wonder, Michael Jackson, Liza Minelli, Elton John, Aretha Franklin, and Ray Charles and served...
- 11/5/2009
- MoviesOnline.ca
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