Jazz singer, songwriter
POPULARITY
3 episodes with Betty Carter
7 episodes with Betty Carter
7 episodes with Betty Carter
3 episodes with Betty Carter
4 episodes with Betty Carter
3 episodes with Betty Carter
2 episodes with Betty Carter
2 episodes with Betty Carter
2 episodes with Betty Carter
Passing the thermometer of conversation over the rock and roll news to see where the mercury rises, which this week includes … … the new Barbra Streisand duets album. Duets are ‘playlets', small intense dramas that depend on human interaction, but so many are recorded separately (including, tragically, Ain't No Mountain High Enough by Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell). … but … duets you HAVE to hear! eg Cash & Carter, Otis Redding & Carla Thomas, Ray Charles & Betty Carter, Siouxsie & Morrissey, Nick Cave & Kylie, Peter Gabriel & Kate Bush. … the extraordinary story of the rebirth and Indian Summer of Mississippi John Hurt after 40 years of invisibility. … blues lyrics that now seem unimaginable. … Frank Zappa as a drug dealer? Miles Davis as a pimp? Cyndi Lauper as a trophy wife? Real or made-up Miami Vice rock star cameos. … great opening lines – “We got married in a fever …!” … how you always learn something you never knew about someone from their obituary - like Mike Peters' involvement in the highest altitude concert ever performed (on Everest with Glenn Tilbrook and Slim Jim Phantom). … where people listen to the Word In Your Ear “poddy” – eg in the bath, in court, at wedding receptions, by the Allman Brothers' graveside. Plus birthday guest John Montagna on rock stars who should be in a TV series.Help us to keep the conversation going by joining our Patreon community: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Passing the thermometer of conversation over the rock and roll news to see where the mercury rises, which this week includes … … the new Barbra Streisand duets album. Duets are ‘playlets', small intense dramas that depend on human interaction, but so many are recorded separately (including, tragically, Ain't No Mountain High Enough by Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell). … but … duets you HAVE to hear! eg Cash & Carter, Otis Redding & Carla Thomas, Ray Charles & Betty Carter, Siouxsie & Morrissey, Nick Cave & Kylie, Peter Gabriel & Kate Bush. … the extraordinary story of the rebirth and Indian Summer of Mississippi John Hurt after 40 years of invisibility. … blues lyrics that now seem unimaginable. … Frank Zappa as a drug dealer? Miles Davis as a pimp? Cyndi Lauper as a trophy wife? Real or made-up Miami Vice rock star cameos. … great opening lines – “We got married in a fever …!” … how you always learn something you never knew about someone from their obituary - like Mike Peters' involvement in the highest altitude concert ever performed (on Everest with Glenn Tilbrook and Slim Jim Phantom). … where people listen to the Word In Your Ear “poddy” – eg in the bath, in court, at wedding receptions, by the Allman Brothers' graveside. Plus birthday guest John Montagna on rock stars who should be in a TV series.Help us to keep the conversation going by joining our Patreon community: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Passing the thermometer of conversation over the rock and roll news to see where the mercury rises, which this week includes … … the new Barbra Streisand duets album. Duets are ‘playlets', small intense dramas that depend on human interaction, but so many are recorded separately (including, tragically, Ain't No Mountain High Enough by Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell). … but … duets you HAVE to hear! eg Cash & Carter, Otis Redding & Carla Thomas, Ray Charles & Betty Carter, Siouxsie & Morrissey, Nick Cave & Kylie, Peter Gabriel & Kate Bush. … the extraordinary story of the rebirth and Indian Summer of Mississippi John Hurt after 40 years of invisibility. … blues lyrics that now seem unimaginable. … Frank Zappa as a drug dealer? Miles Davis as a pimp? Cyndi Lauper as a trophy wife? Real or made-up Miami Vice rock star cameos. … great opening lines – “We got married in a fever …!” … how you always learn something you never knew about someone from their obituary - like Mike Peters' involvement in the highest altitude concert ever performed (on Everest with Glenn Tilbrook and Slim Jim Phantom). … where people listen to the Word In Your Ear “poddy” – eg in the bath, in court, at wedding receptions, by the Allman Brothers' graveside. Plus birthday guest John Montagna on rock stars who should be in a TV series.Help us to keep the conversation going by joining our Patreon community: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Laura revisits a radio episode from the archives about April anniversaries, some good, many disastrous. And there's a little side quest about Bob Dylan and Modernist poetry.One note – I forgot to mention that the performance of “Spring Can Really Hang You Up the Most” is by Betty Carter.Get your Definitely Dylan baseball cap here.You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.
Greetings Glocal Citizens! This week's conversation comes in two parts. Like it's geographical spread, northern hemisphere to southern hemisphere, think of this two part discussion as a way of engaging both hemispheres of your brain--the creative and the analytic. My guest is fellow Stanford alum and founder of The Jazz & Democracy Project® (J&D) (https://www.jazzdemocracy.com), Wesley “Dr. Wes” J. Watkins. After several years working in the education sector, Dr. Wes launched the program in November 2009 at Rosa Parks Elementary School, located in San Francisco's historic Fillmore District. J&D is a music integrated curriculum that utilizes jazz as a metaphor to bring democracy to life, enrich the study and teaching of history, government, civics and culture, and inspire youth to become active, positive contributors to their communities. He first proposed the curriculum as part of his undergraduate honors program at Stanford's School of Education and later conducted research for his undergraduate honors thesis at Oxford University where he engaged and learned from music educators at both local elementary schools and world renowned secondary institutions. Now based in Sydney, Australia, J&D has traveled to countries all over the world and, in these times of global social transition, Dr. Wes anticipates continued opportunities to feature and further innovate using tools that will leave lasting impact on the ways that youth and educators approach building and living in their communities and beyond. Where to find Wesley? On LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/wesleywatkins/) On Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/JazzDemocracy) On Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/jazzdemocracy/) On YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/@JazzDemocracy) Who's Wesley listening to? Joseph Solomon (https://www.youtube.com/@whatisjoedoing) Other topics of interest: Activist Oakland, CA (https://www.oaklandca.gov/topics/oaklands-history-of-resistance-to-racism) Northern Beaches, Sydney Lifestyle (https://content.knightfrank.com/research/2789/documents/en/northern-beaches-lifestyle-guide-2024-10795.pdf) United States Studies Center (https://www.ussc.edu.au/about/mission-and-history) Crikey! or Kriky! (https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/crikey#google_vignette) Flat White vs Latte (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_white) Geechi Taylor (https://www.geechitaylor.com/#!/HOME) Find Rachelle Farrell, Meshell N'Degeocello, on J&D (https://www.jazzdemocracy.com/interviews.html) Ledisi (https://www.ledisi.com) Christian McBride (https://www.christianmcbride.com) Betty Carter + Ray Charles (https://youtu.be/1IM3weosOTY?si=PXNlcx1a5UetHPAN) Episode 47 featuring Wynton Marsalis (https://glocalcitizens.fireside.fm/guests/wynton-marsalis) Jazz for Young People @ Lincoln Center (https://jazz.org/education/school-programs/jazz-for-young-people/) Check out the Chris Botti SF Show (https://youtu.be/j9cNsLPXWnA?si=rmoX7ljb9EO4a1y5) About Robert (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_McFerrin), Bobby (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_McFerrin) and Madison (https://www.madisonmcferrin.com) McFerrin Special Guest: Wesley J. Watkins.
Greetings Glocal Citizens! This week's conversation comes in two parts. Like it's geographical spread, northern hemisphere to southern hemisphere, think of this two part discussion as a way of engaging both hemispheres of your brain--the creative and the analytic. My guest is fellow Stanford alum and founder of The Jazz & Democracy Project® (J&D) (https://www.jazzdemocracy.com), Wesley “Dr. Wes” J. Watkins. After several years working in the education sector, Dr. Wes launched the program in November 2009 at Rosa Parks Elementary School, located in San Francisco's historic Fillmore District. J&D is a music integrated curriculum that utilizes jazz as a metaphor to bring democracy to life, enrich the study and teaching of history, government, civics and culture, and inspire youth to become active, positive contributors to their communities. He first proposed the curriculum as part of his undergraduate honors program at Stanford's School of Education and later conducted research for his undergraduate honors thesis at Oxford University where he engaged and learned from music educators at both local elementary schools and world renowned secondary institutions. Now based in Sydney, Australia, J&D has traveled to countries all over the world and, in these times of global social transition, Dr. Wes anticipates continued opportunities to feature and further innovate using tools that will leave lasting impact on the ways that youth and educators approach building and living in their communities and beyond. Where to find Wesley? On LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/wesleywatkins/) On Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/JazzDemocracy) On Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/jazzdemocracy/) On YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/@JazzDemocracy) Who's Wesley listening to? Joseph Solomon (https://www.youtube.com/@whatisjoedoing) Other topics of interest: Activist Oakland, CA (https://www.oaklandca.gov/topics/oaklands-history-of-resistance-to-racism) Northern Beaches, Sydney Lifestyle (https://content.knightfrank.com/research/2789/documents/en/northern-beaches-lifestyle-guide-2024-10795.pdf) United States Studies Center (https://www.ussc.edu.au/about/mission-and-history) Crikey! or Kriky! (https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/crikey#google_vignette) Flat White vs Latte (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_white) Geechi Taylor (https://www.geechitaylor.com/#!/HOME) Find Rachelle Farrell, Meshell N'Degeocello, on J&D (https://www.jazzdemocracy.com/interviews.html) Ledisi (https://www.ledisi.com) Christian McBride (https://www.christianmcbride.com) Betty Carter + Ray Charles (https://youtu.be/1IM3weosOTY?si=PXNlcx1a5UetHPAN) Episode 47 featuring Wynton Marsalis (https://glocalcitizens.fireside.fm/guests/wynton-marsalis) Jazz for Young People @ Lincoln Center (https://jazz.org/education/school-programs/jazz-for-young-people/) Check out the Chris Botti SF Show (https://youtu.be/j9cNsLPXWnA?si=rmoX7ljb9EO4a1y5) About Robert (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_McFerrin), Bobby (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_McFerrin) and Madison (https://www.madisonmcferrin.com) McFerrin Special Guest: Wesley J. Watkins.
durée : 00:59:43 - No quiero bailar - par : Nathalie Piolé - Incroyable mais vrai : ce soir Dizzy Gillespie ne veut pas danser.
Programa 292 donde el desmadre ha sido la pauta. Compruébelo. ADIVINA LA PELÍCULA. Gran Orquesta Sinf. PRELUDIO de La Verbena de la Paloma SAN TORAL. Lorez Alexandria. SATIN DOLL Joan Manuel Serrat. PARAULES DE AMOR Miguel Ligero. COPLAS DE DON HILARIÓN de La Verbena de la Paloma. EFEMÉRIDES. Harry Nilsson. WITHOUT YOU. Betty Carter. MY […] The post Los Tres Tenores 19/02/2025 first appeared on Ripollet Ràdio.
durée : 00:30:12 - Jazz Collection - par : Alex Dutilh - Les voix buissonnières, ce sont des voix hors des sentiers battus, à l'écart des clichés attendus des chanteuses ou des chanteurs de jazz. Dans cet épisode : Jeanne Lee, Bobby McFerrin, Betty Carter, Carmen McRae, Mark Murphy, Shirley Horn, Helen Merrill, Monica Zetterlund, Susanne Abbuehl... - réalisé par : Pierre Willer
durée : 00:00:38 - Découvrez Les voix buissonnières, la nouvelle Jazz Collection d'Alex Dutilh - Que serait le jazz sans la voix ? Alex Dutilh nous embarque dans un voyage vocal : de Blossom Dearie à Jimmy Scott, Jeanne Lee à David Linx ou encore Bobby McFerrin, Shirley Horn, Betty Carter, Youn Sun Nah, Dhafer Youssef, Gregory Porter, Cécile McLorin Salvant...
There's a not so polite saying about teaching music and music teachers that goes like this: If you can, play. If you can't, teach. That is what jazz legend Ellis Marsalis once said to a Detroit drummer who was considering becoming a music teacher. I'm talking about drummer, educator, producer and band leader Clarence Penn. Fortunately, Clarence did not take it to heart, eventually acquiring a master's in music education from Rutgers University. It was also to the benefit of future musicians who became Clarence's students. In this episode, Clarence Penn and I engage in deep reflection on jazz and jazz music instruction. He started playing music with the drum set influenced by his drummer neighbor Ricky Hudson around eight years old. In 1986, while still in high school, he attended the Interlochen Arts Academy where Clarence focused on classical percussion aiming to be a timpanist, but later eventually committed to jazz in high school after meeting NEA Jazz Master, trumpeter, and Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra Music Director, Wynton Marsalis. He started studying at the University of Miami in Florida in 1986 but transferred to Virginia Commonwealth University which is when he began working with the great Ellis Marsalis. The conversation navigates his brief stint with trumpet, his preference for jazz over classical due to its broader voice and creativity and reflects on the evolving definition of jazz. The discussion also delves into his teaching philosophy, emphasizing individualized attention, deliberate practice, and the importance of being a well-rounded person. What Ellis Marsalis said about teaching, he later retracted when Clarence told him he was pursuing a master's at Rutgers in music education. He said, according to Clarence, “…that those who can play, teach,” thus giving Clarence his blessing. Clarence Penn also talks about various influences and collaborations, his views on the business of being a musician, and his expressive performance style. He mentions his project with the 2025 Grammy nominated American Patchwork Quartet, its diverse cultural influences, and explains his latest album 'Behind the Voice', which pays homage to drummers who have significantly impacted music. His resume more so lays out his career as a jazz musician than a teacher of percussion instruments, performing with Ellis and Wynton Marsalis, Maria Schneider, Stanley Clark, Betty Carter, Christian Sands, Lakecia Benjamin, Dee Dee Bridgewater, and Kurt Elling, among many other highly accomplished musicians. He concludes by discussing the importance of teaching as therapy and the rewarding relationships with students. In this episode, we'll listen to three tracks of music, thanks to Origin Records. Two will come from Clarence Penn's latest project, Behind the Voice, released in 2024, more so a R&B/soul sound that has enormously brilliant drumming and keyboards by Clarence. The third track comes from his 2014 recording, Monk: The Lost Files, a highly acclaimed release that revisits some of the most memorable compositions by jazz legend Thelonious Monk. You will hear the first song just prior to the conversation opening. 1. “Send One Your Love” (Steve Wonder)-Behind the Voice-3:15; Clarence Penn-drums, percussion, keyboards, vocoder; Aaron Marcellus-vocals; The second track will play at about 31 minutes into the program. 2. “Hackensack”: Monk: The Lost Files; Chad Lefkowitz-Brown - Saxes; Donald Vega-Piano; Yasushi Nakamura - Acoustic & Electric Bass; Clarence Penn - Drums, producer-arranger. The third song will close the conversation. 3. “You Are” (Clarence Penn, Tyrone Corbett), Behind the Voice -3:52; Clarence Penn—drums, percussion, keyboards, vocoder; Chelsea Jackson-vocals; Yasushi Nakamura-bass Thank you for listening. I know there are many podcasts for you to enjoy so it means a great deal to me that you are spending time with this conversation.
Baby, it's controversial up in here! Covers by: Ella Fitzgerald & Louis Jordan; Louis Armstrong & Velma Middleton; Dean Martin; Ray Charles & Betty Carter; Jessica Simpson & Nick Lachey; James Taylor & Natalie Cole; Lady A; Weihnactslieder/Xmas Hits Collective Tidal playlist here
Det handler ikke om melodien: Finn Slumstrup tegnede i 2008 et portræt af den amerikanske jazzsangerinde Betty Carter.
This week, Joe is featuring Vocalist Betty Carter from her 1992 PolyGram Records recording titled “It's Not About The Melody.”
This special Catch-Up episode with the Dutch singer Ineke Vandoorn focuses on her album with Jasper van 't Hof, “Dancing on Water”, with lots of music from the album. You'll also get to hear of her inspirational experience learning from Betty Carter. When Ineke Vandoorn won the prestigous Edison Jazz Award for her album ‘Love is a Golden Glue' the jury wrote:"Ineke Vandoorn distinguishes herself as a singer with her adventurous way of singing. First of all because of her exceptional, striking voice with an extreme range with which she can do anything. Her voice control enables her to cross her limits. Every note is placed at the right spot. Apart from that the singer has a huge amount of guts." I couldn't agree more! It was such a pleasure to have this opportunity to speak with Ineke again. My 2023 episode with her is here, during which she sang live for the podcast: 2023 Interview https://www.leahroseman.com/episodes/ineke-vandoorn Like all my episodes, you can watch this on my YouTube channel or listen to the podcast, and I've also linked the transcript to my website, everything linked here: https://www.leahroseman.com/episodes/ineke-vandoorn-dancing-on-water Ineke's website https://www.inekevandoorn.com/ Dancing on Water album https://baiximrecords.bandcamp.com/album/dancing-on-water Original Merch for sale: https://www.leahroseman.com/beautiful-shirts-and-more Can you buy this independent podcaster a coffee? https://ko-fi.com/leahroseman Complete Catalog of Episodes: https://www.leahroseman.com/about Newsletter sign-up: https://mailchi.mp/ebed4a237788/podcast-newsletter Linktree for social media: https://linktr.ee/leahroseman Timestamps: (00:00) Intro (01:54) about the album “Dancing on Water” with Jasper van 't Hof (03:17) Paul Simon song “Quiet” with excerpt (05:59) process of creating the album (07:40) meeting Betty Carter (11:30) Marsch Fur Oelze with excerpt (13:03) Yayapriya with excerpt (16:35) please support this indepedent podcast! (17:18) Quiet American with clips (21:04) challenges of writing lyrics, The Way She Looks with clip (24:30) about Dance on the Water, with complete song (31:27) the satisfying challenge of this project
durée : 00:59:09 - Le jazz sur France Musique - par : Nathalie Piolé - La playlist jazz de Nathalie Piolé.
Pianist Mulgrew Miller, born August 13, 1955, toured with the Duke Ellington Orchestra for three years right out of college, later accompanying singer Betty Carter, then three year stints with trumpeter Woody Shaw followed by Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers. He was already recording with his own groups when he joined drummer Tony Williams in quintet and trio settings, he also served as director of jazz studies at William Paterson college up unto his tragic death of a stroke at age 57. His playing never lost its roots as a church pianist, but he also incorporated the pyrotechnic technical influences of Oscar Peterson and the harmonic language of McCoy Tyner.
Alvester Garnett Interview Alvester Garnett is a top-tier jazz drummer, celebrated for his swing, passion, and professionalism. His career began in Richmond, Virginia, where early influences included Ellis Marsalis and the jazz program at Virginia Commonwealth University. After moving to New York, Garnett quickly made a name for himself, working with legends like Betty Carter and Abbey Lincoln. He was the only drummer from the Thelonious Monk competition invited to Betty's Jazz Ahead program, which launched his career. Garnett has since collaborated with notable artists such as Pharoah Sanders, Dee Dee Bridgewater, and Benny Golson. He also became the regular drummer for violinist Regina Carter, who later became his wife. In September, Garnett will lead his band, The Artworks Ensemble, at the Central Jersey Jazz Festival in Somerville, NJ. The performance will feature original compositions and include special guest trombonist Papo Vázquez, alongside Bruce Williams, Charlie Sigler, Brandon McCune, and Santi Debriano. This performance highlights Garnett's ongoing commitment to jazz and his ability to blend leadership with collaboration. Alvester Garnett will lead his band, The Artworks Ensemble, at the Central Jersey Jazz Festival on September 15th in Somerville, NJ. The performance will feature original compositions and include special guest trombonist Papo Vázquez, alongside Bruce Williams, Charlie Sigler, Brandon McCune, and Santi Debriano. https://centraljerseyjazzfestival.com/
Episode 9: A conversation with Multi-Award Winning Artist, Educator, and Entrepreneur, Jazzmeia Horn►Jazzmeia Horn website: https://www.artistryofjazzhorn.com“Horn is among the most exciting young vocalists in jazz, with a proud traditionalism that keeps her tightly linkedto the sound of classic figures like Nancy Wilson and Betty Carter, but a vivacity of spirit and conviction that places her firmly in the present”~The New York Times~Jazzmeia's mother“What do you do with what you know how to do?~Jazzmeia Horn►Key Moments:0:00 - Introductions2:25 – The teacher mission5:20 – Harriet Horn, Jazzmeia's grandmother8:51 –Musical beginnings in Dallas and the “peewee” choir14:25 – Early experience with music school19:55 – The move to New York City25:43 – “Battle Scars”32:40 – Bandleading styles (balancing feminine and masculine)37:14 – Empress Legacy Records 44:33 – What's next?46:28 – The writing process (and Garage Band example)►Follow John Daversa Online:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/johndaversa/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JohnDaversaMusic/YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/johndaversamusicWebsite: http://www.johndaversa.com ►CreditsHost and Producer: John DaversaVideo Editing: Max NierlichVideo and Audio Capture: Dudley MerriamGraphic Design: Marcus SassevilleAdditional Graphic Design: Izzi GuzmanRecorded in Coral Gables, FL, November 6, 2023►Music"The John Daversa Podcast""Moonlight Muse""Junk Wagon"All compositions composed and arranged by John DaversaDaversafications Publications (ASCAP)#jazzmeiahorn #empresslegacyrecords #jazzvocal #johndaversa #johndaversapodcastSupport the Show.►CreditsHost and Producer: John DaversaVideo: Max NierlichAudio: Dudley MerriamMarcus Sasseville: Graphic DesignRecorded in Miami, FL►Music"The John Daversa Podcast""Moonlight Muse""Junk Wagon" All compositions composed and arranged by John DaversaDaversafications Publications (ASCAP)
Don Braden Interview Don Braden, is a distinguished jazz saxophonist, flutist, composer, and educator. A Harvard graduate, Braden quickly became a sought-after sideman in New York, playing with legends like Betty Carter and Wynton Marsalis. As a bandleader, he has released numerous acclaimed albums, such as The Fire Within and Earth Wind and Wonder. Known for his rich tone and melodic inventiveness, Braden also excels as an educator, teaching at institutions like Harvard and the New Jersey Performing Arts Center, significantly contributing to the jazz world through both performance and education.
My intention this week to produce a joyous new episode further celebrating contraltos, was undermined by multiple deaths this past week in the musical world, including French pop icon Françoise Hardy, Swiss tenor Eric Tappy, American art song icon Paul Sperry, and R&B diva Angela Bofill, capped by the tragic demise of young Belgian coloratura soprano Jodie Devos of breast cancer at the age of only 35. The episode, thus, begins with brief musical excerpts from all of these recently departed artists. In the main episode, I spread the contralto net even wider than last time, focusing on low-voiced doyennes of popular song. We hear jazz singers (Betty Carter, Sarah Vaughan, Carmen McRae); stars of stage, screen, and radio (Marlene Dietrich, Polly Bergen, Connee Boswell, Alice Faye, Lisa Kirk, Kate Smith); purveyors of the Blues (Bessie Smith, Bertice Reading); French cabaret singers (Damia, Barbara); fado, rebetika, and tango artists (Amália Rodrigues, Milva, Maria Bethânia, Sotiria Bellou); and late-20th century pop icons (Cher, Tina Turner, Karen Carpenter, Annie Lennox); with a few delightful surprises along the way. I should also note, in honor of Pride Month, that more than a few of these artists flaunted societal norms regarding their affectional preferences, living either furtively or openly at a time when such expressions could have serious consequences. I love putting this kind of episode together and I hope that you enjoy the kaleidoscopic sounds that emerge from the throats of these deep-voiced pop divas. Countermelody is a podcast devoted to the glory and the power of the human voice raised in song. Singer and vocal aficionado Daniel Gundlach explores great singers of the past and present focusing in particular on those who are less well-remembered today than they should be. Daniel's lifetime in music as a professional countertenor, pianist, vocal coach, voice teacher, and journalist yields an exciting array of anecdotes, impressions, and “inside stories.” At Countermelody's core is the celebration of great singers of all stripes, their instruments, and the connection they make to the words they sing. By clicking on the following link (https://linktr.ee/CountermelodyPodcast) you can find the dedicated Countermelody website which contains additional content including artist photos and episode setlists. The link will also take you to Countermelody's Patreon page, where you can pledge your monthly support at whatever level you can afford.
JAZZ CORNER, lundi et jeudi à 13h et 18h. Chronique animée par Serge Mariani, Louise Hodé ou Géraldine Elbaz : concerts à ne pas manquer, albums à écouter au plus vite et des artistes à découvrir. Cette semaine, Géraldine nous parle du pianiste Jacky Terrasson. Le célèbre pianiste Jacky Terrasson, salué par le New York Times comme “l'un des artistes susceptibles de façonner la culture américaine”, dévoile “Moving On”. De retour en France après trois décennies passées à New York, il organise un jeu de piste à double nationalité, mêlant Chopin et le jazz, avec des artistes invités tels que Kareen Guiock-Thuram, Camille Bertault et Grégoire Maret. Avec une joie de vivre retrouvée, chaque morceau raconte une aventure, une histoire, une délicate célébration du bonheur. Présenté dans le New York Times en 1994 comme “l'un des trente artistes susceptibles de changer la culture américaine dans les trente prochaines années”, le pianiste Jacky Terrasson honore cette promesse en étant le musicien de jazz français le plus écouté sur les plateformes digitales. Né à Berlin en 1965, d'une mère américaine et d'un père français, il intègre (après des études en France de piano classique) le Berklee College of Music et remporte en 1993 le prestigieux Prix du Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz International Piano Competition. C'est au côté de BETTY CARTER, DEE DEE BRIDGEWATER, CASSANDRA WILSON, ou encore CHARLES AZNAVOUR, GUY LAFITTE, BARNEY WILEN et RAY BROWN qu'il débute sa carrière. Il signe avec le légendaire label Blue Note et son emblématique président Bruce Lundvall, pour une longue et impressionnante aventure de 25 ans de succès. © Alexandre LacombeHébergé par Ausha. Visitez ausha.co/politique-de-confidentialite pour plus d'informations.
JAZZ CORNER, lundi et jeudi à 13h et 18h. Chronique animée par Serge Mariani, Louise Hodé ou Géraldine Elbaz : concerts à ne pas manquer, albums à écouter au plus vite et des artistes à découvrir. Cette semaine, Géraldine nous parle du pianiste Jacky Terrasson. Le célèbre pianiste Jacky Terrasson, salué par le New York Times comme “l'un des artistes susceptibles de façonner la culture américaine”, dévoile “Moving On”. De retour en France après trois décennies passées à New York, il organise un jeu de piste à double nationalité, mêlant Chopin et le jazz, avec des artistes invités tels que Kareen Guiock-Thuram, Camille Bertault et Grégoire Maret. Avec une joie de vivre retrouvée, chaque morceau raconte une aventure, une histoire, une délicate célébration du bonheur. Présenté dans le New York Times en 1994 comme “l'un des trente artistes susceptibles de changer la culture américaine dans les trente prochaines années”, le pianiste Jacky Terrasson honore cette promesse en étant le musicien de jazz français le plus écouté sur les plateformes digitales. Né à Berlin en 1965, d'une mère américaine et d'un père français, il intègre (après des études en France de piano classique) le Berklee College of Music et remporte en 1993 le prestigieux Prix du Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz International Piano Competition. C'est au côté de BETTY CARTER, DEE DEE BRIDGEWATER, CASSANDRA WILSON, ou encore CHARLES AZNAVOUR, GUY LAFITTE, BARNEY WILEN et RAY BROWN qu'il débute sa carrière. Il signe avec le légendaire label Blue Note et son emblématique président Bruce Lundvall, pour une longue et impressionnante aventure de 25 ans de succès. © Alexandre LacombeHébergé par Ausha. Visitez ausha.co/politique-de-confidentialite pour plus d'informations.
JAZZ FEED lundi, mercredi et vendredi à 17h30. Serge Mariani présente régulièrement un choix d'albums sortis récemment ou sur le point de l'être, des extraits de leur musique, des informations, des commentaires, des impressions, des émotions, c'est la nouvelle émission de Serge Mariani sur Art District Radio: JAZZFEED ! AuprogrammedeJazzFeed4èmeépisode,lesalbumsdePierre-FrançoisBlanchard, Sylvain Beuf et Annie Chen. Ce sont les 4 dernières compositions des 8 constituant le nouvel album de la chanteuse Annie Chen qui lui donnent leur titre: Guardians. Pour ce qui concerne la musique, les 4 compositions évoquées forment une suite en 4 mouvements qui viennent compléter les 4 premiers titres de l'album. Annie Chen a rassemblé autour de sa voix des instruments plutôt inattendus comme les tambours japonais et l'accordéon… Outre la musique, un message nous est adressé, un appel urgent, qui nous demande de devenir les défenseurs de la nature. Cette thématique sert en quelque sorte de substrat au 2ème thème de l'album, Underground Dance, à l'inspiration franchement dystopique. L'humanité est réduite à vivre sous terre tant la surface de la planète a été ravagée par une exploitation effrénée des ressources et un mépris pour la vie. Il n'en reste pas moins,heureusement,quel'espoiresttoujoursvivace.Contrairementaupontbriséqu'elle évoque dans Underground Dance, qui s'élançait de la terre vers le ciel, celui qu'Annie Chen a bâti, au fil des 3 albums de sa discographie, est consolidé par son dialogue est-ouest très personnel grâce à sa connaissance du répertoire de chanteuses telles que Carmen McRae, Betty Carter ou Abbey Lincoln, celle de l'opéra chinois et bien entendu du jazz le plus contemporain. Au long d'une carrière d'une trentaine d'années, le saxophoniste Sylvain Beuf s'est patiemment affirmé comme un sideman apprécié et comme un compositeur dont le premier album sorti en 1993. 30 ans plus tard, il nous propose de découvrir ses nouvelles compositions dans un album dont le titre en anglais ne nécessite pas une version française: Long Distance et au cours duquel chacun des musiciens qui entourent le saxophoniste s'exprime avec une belle maîtrise et une enthousiasmante liberté: Philippe Aerts à la contrebasse, Gautier Garrigue à la batterie et Pierre- Alain Goualch au piano. Dédié à Wayne Shorter, décédé en 2023, Long Distance est cependant davantage qu'un hommage à l'un des plus éminents musiciens de jazz. C'est le carnet de route d'un homme qui met dans sa musique les émotions, les sentiments et les pensées qui l'animentet qu'il est bien agréable d'accompagner le long de ce long chemin. Long Distance sort ce 29 mars sur le label Trébim Music. Après Dunkerque les 11, 12 et 13 avril, Sylvain Beuf présentera son album à Paris, au Sunside, les 31 mai et 1er juin. Séparé, momentanément, de Marion Rampal, le pianiste Pierre-François Blanchard a failli nous proposer un opus en quasi-solo mais en fait non, il s'agit d'un duo avec un autre instrumentiste talentueux, le clarinettiste Thomas Savy. Et son album est intitulé Puzzled. On y entend d'émouvantes réminiscences classiques. C'est le style et la culture musicale de Pierre-François Blanchard qui donnent corps et voix à ses compositions. En anglais, « puzzled » peut signifier étonné, perplexe, embarrassé même. Pourtant ici, c'est la référence au puzzle, ce jeu de pièces découpées dans un ensemble à reconstituer, qu'il faut prendre en compte. Avec Marion Rampal, il ne faut pas oublier la place tenue par Pierre Barouh et Archie Shepp dans le parcours artistique et humain de Pierre-François Blanchard. Blues et poésie se rejoignent toujours sous ses doigts et si le clavier de son piano est comparable à un puzzle, c'est d'un tableau néo...
BETTY CARTER IT'S NOT ABOUT THE MELODY New York, 1992In the still of the night (1,4,8)Betty Carter (vcl) acc by Craig Handy (ts-10) Cyrus Chestnut (p-1) Mulgrew Miller (p-2) John Hicks (p-3) Ari Rowland (b-4) Christian McBride (b-5) Walter Booker (b-6) Clarence Penn (d-7) Lewis Nash (d-8) Jeff “Tain” Watts (d-9) JANE IRA BLOOM MIGHTY LIGHTS New York, November 17-18, 1982I got rhythm but no melodyJane Ira Bloom (sop) Fred Hersch (p-1) Charlie Haden (b) Ed Blackwell (d) GERI ALLEN IN THE YEAR OF THE DRAGON New York, March, 1989Oblivion, The InvisibleGeri Allen (p) Charlie Haden (b) Paul Motian (d) Juan Lazaro Mendolas (bamboo-fl-1) REGINA CARTER MOTOR CITY MOMENTS New York, April 19, 20, 21 & 25, 2000Don't git sassyMarcus Belgrave (tp) James Carter (b-cl,ts) Werner “Vana” Gierig (p) Regina Carter (vln) Darryl Hall (b) Alvester Garnett (d) ALICE COLTRANE PTAH, THE EL DAOUD Dix Hills, New York, January 26, 1970Mantra (1)Pharoah Sanders (ts-1,alto fl-2,bells) Joe Henderson (ts,fl) Alice Coltrane (p,harp-3) Ron Carter (b) Ben Riley (d) Chuck Stewart (bells) CARLA BLEY THE LOST CHORDS Live, Europe, October, 2003Tropical depressionAndy Sheppard (sop,ts) Carla Bley (p) Steve Swallow (el-b) Billy Drummond (d) MARIA SCHNEIDER CONCERT IN THE GARDEN New York, March 8-11, 2004Danca illusoria (1,2)Tony Kadleck, Greg Gisbert, Laurie Frink, Ingrid Jensen (tp,flhrn) Keith O'Quinn, Rock Ciccarone, Larry Farrell (tb) Pete McGuinness (tb-1) George Flynn (b-tb,contrabass-tb) Tim Ries (as,sop,cl,fl,alto-fl,b-fl) Charles Pillow (as,sop,cl,fl,alto-fl,oboe,eng-hrn) Rich Perry (ts,fl) Donny McCaslin (ts,sop,cl,fl) Andy Middleton (ts-2) Scott Robinson (bar,fl,cl,b-cl,contrabass-cl) Gary Versace (accor-3) Frank Kimbrough (p) Ben Monder (g) Jay Anderson (b) Clarence Penn (d) Jeff Ballard, Gonzalo Grau (cajon-4) Luciana Souza (vcl,pandeiro-5) Maria Schneider (comp,arr,dir) Continue reading Puro Jazz 07 marzo 2024 at PuroJazz.
durée : 00:59:01 - Banzzaï du jeudi 29 février 2024 - par : Nathalie Piolé - La playlist jazz de Nathalie Piolé.
In this final episode, we turn to people living with HIV today — longtime survivors of a plague who, despite their pain, frustrations and desires to just be done with it, realize they can't be done with it. These are people like Kia LaBeija, an artist who has been HIV-positive since birth, who turned to photography at 16, shortly after her mother died, to help make sense of her story. And they are people like Phill Wilson, an activist who still bears the scars of his decades fighting in the HIV and AIDS trenches; Valerie Reyes-Jimenez, the proudly positive woman we met in the first episode, who talks about what it's like to age as a HIV-positive woman; Victor Reyes, one of the children who went through Harlem Hospital and lived long enough to grow up and start a family of his own; and Lizzette Rivera, who who lost her mother to AIDS in 1984 and spent decades trying to find her mother's burial spot so that she could properly mourn and honor her. Together, these five remind us that the HIV and AIDS epidemic is not over — and there is still so much we need to do to bring it out of the shadows.Voices in this episode include:• Kia LaBeija, a former mother of the House of LaBeija, is an image-maker and storyteller born and raised in Hell's Kitchen in the heart of New York City. Her performative self-portraits embody memory and dream-like imagery to narrate complex stories at the intersections of womanhood, sexuality and navigating the world as an Afro Filipina living with HIV.• Warren Benbow is a drummer who has worked with Nina Simone, James “Blood” Ulmer, Betty Carter and Whitney Houston, among others. He grew up in Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn, and went to the High School of Performing Arts. Warren is Kia's father.• Phill Wilson is the founder of the Black AIDS Institute, AIDS policy director for the city of Los Angeles at the height of the epidemic, and a celebrated AIDS activist in both the LGBTQ+ and Black communities since the early 1980s.• Valerie Reyes-Jimenez is a HIV-positive woman, activist and organizer with Housing Works. She saw the AIDS crisis develop from a nameless monster into a pandemic from her home on New York City's Lower East Side.• Victor Reyes was born at Harlem Hospital Center and spent much of his childhood receiving treatment and care at the hospital's pediatric AIDS unit. He is the director of an after school program at a grade school in Washington, D.C. He also does research at the Global Community Health Lab at Howard University.• Lizzette Rivera is a data analyst who remains haunted by her mother's death in 1984. Rivera spent years trying to find the whereabouts of mother's burial site on Hart Island. She finally succeeded in 2020. She now visits her mother's grave regularly.Blindspot is a co-production of The HISTORY® Channel and WNYC Studios, in collaboration with The Nation Magazine.A companion photography exhibit by Kia LaBeija featuring portraits from the series is on view through March 11 at The Greene Space at WNYC. The photography for Blindspot was supported by a grant from the Economic Hardship Reporting Project, a nonprofit organization that promotes coverage of social inequality and economic justice.
Born in Washington, D.C., and raised in Greenville, NC, contemporary jazz vocalist Christie N. Dashiell honed her skills at Howard University and later at the Manhattan School of Music. Ms. Dashiell's trajectory includes performances with Howard's premiere vocal jazz ensemble, Afro Blue. She has also performed at the Kennedy Center as a participant in the 2010 Betty Carter's Jazz Ahead program; at the Lincoln Theater in Washington, D.C.; and, as a part of Jazz at Lincoln Center's Jazz for Young People program. She is the recipient of DownBeat magazine's Best College Graduate Jazz Vocalist and Outstanding Soloist awards in the jazz vocal category. Most recently, Ms. Dashiell appeared on season three of NBC's The Sing-Off, as a member of Afro Blue. She can be heard on several nationally released recordings including John Blake's Motherless Child, The Jolley Brothers' memoirs Between Brothers, and as a Kennedy Center Discovery Artist on NPR's JazzSet hosted by Dee Dee Bridgewater. She has since performed in concert with Esperanza Spalding, Fred Hammond, Smokey Robinson, Geri Allen, and Allan Harris. If you enjoyed this episode please make sure to subscribe, follow, rate, and/or review this podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, ect. Connect with us on all social media platforms and at www.improvexchange.com
durée : 00:59:33 - Trouver la flamme ! - par : Nathalie Piolé - ❤️
You're an aspiring musician, and you want to learn from the best. But sometimes it becomes difficult, as the student in many aspects, has learned as much as the teacher in their hometown knows. But finding music instructors of the next level can be time consuming, and often quite expensive. Enter the online platform “Open Studio”. Created by entrepreneur and acclaimed jazz pianist Peter Martin, this web-based program affords you the opportunity and ability to learn from some of the best musicians in the world. At your pace, and within your level of expertise without fear of being overwhelmed. In this episode, we discuss the Open Studio concept, how it's designed to work at one's own pace, and its benefits as a useful and versatile learning tool for creative musicians. We also chat with Peter's new jazz album project titled “Generation S”. Peter Martin is an acclaimed jazz pianist, composer, arranger, educator and entrepreneur. His touring career has taken him to six continents, and Brian has been invited to play the White House on several occasions. Peter Martin performed on and arranged Dianne Reeves' Grammy-winning release A Little Moonlight and appeared in George Clooney's 2005 film Good Night, and Good Luck, as well as being the featured pianist and an arranger on the Grammy-winning soundtrack. Peter has also performed, toured, and recorded with Wynton Marsalis, Chris Botti, Betty Carter, Christian McBride, and Joshua Redman, as well as the Berlin Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony Orchestra and the New York Philharmonic. Peter attended the Juilliard School of Music and has been on the faculties of Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville, Northwestern University, Tulane University, the University of New Orleans and New Orleans Center for Creative Arts. He has performed workshops and master classes at institutions worldwide, including Oberlin College, Duke University, the Carnegie Hall Professional Training Workshops, Steinway Piano Gallery, the Rotterdam Conservatory, and the Royal Scottish Academy of Music in Glasgow. In 2015, after launching an successful educational video podcast, 2-Minute Jazz, Martin founded a revolutionary jazz educational web platform, Open Studio, where students from over 120 countries are part of an active community and are continuing to learn from Martin, Dianne Reeves, Fred Hersch, Christian McBride, Greg Hutchinson, Romero Lubambo and other artists. www.openstudiojazz.com www.brianmartinmusic.com Creator and Executive Producer Emeritus: Tom Sabella Showrunner and Host (the guy who has a face for podcasting): Bob Bender Management Representation: Chuck Thompson for Thompson Entertainment Group, LLC Co-Producer - Audio/Video Editor (the man behind the curtain): Mark Sabella Director of Video and Continuity (the brains of the entire operation): Deborah Halle Marketing and Social Media (all knowing): Sarah Fleshner for 362 Entertainment All Around Problem Solver (and Mental Health Therapist for us): Connie Ribas Recorded inside what could be an old beat up Airstream Trailer located somewhere on what's left of Music Row in Nashville TN (Man we sure do miss Noshville, and the Longhorn Steakhouse) Mixed and Mastered at Music Dog Studios in Nashville, TN Editing and Post at Midnight Express Studio located in Olian, NY Production Sound Design: Keith Stark Voice Over and Promo: Lisa Fuson Special Thanks to the creator and founder of the podcast, Tom Sabella, along with Traci Snow for producing and hosting over 100 episodes of the original "Business Side of Music" podcast and trusting us to carry on their legacy. Website: If you would like to be a guest on the show, please submit a request to: bob@businesssideofmusic.com If you're interested in becoming a sponsor for the show, let us know and we'll send you a media / sponsorship kit to you. Contact us at bob@businesssideofmusic.com The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed on this show provided by the guest(s), are those of the guest(s) own, and do not necessarily represent the views, thoughts, and opinions of the host or producers of this podcast. The material and information presented here is for general information purposes only. The Business Side of Music's name and all forms and abbreviations are the property of its owner (Lotta Dogs Productions LLC), and its use does not imply endorsement of or opposition to any specific organization, product, or service. Copyright © 2024 Lotta Dogs Productions, LLC, All rights reserved.
Jazz musician has seen the world, playing with some of the greats of the genre. Now, with his new record, Peter and his group, Generation S, recorded the whole album, live in studio and on-line.On top of playing, Peter is teaching, helping introduce people of all ages into the joys of the art form. For more information, check out Peter's website, or you can learn more about lessons on the Open Studio website.
DJ Spinna is an anomaly. As a world-renowned DJ, producer, remixer, label head, promoter, curator, and influencer-- Spinna has crafted his artistic vision since the 1990s. His musical spectrum spans all flavors-- from Hip-Hop [as founding member of The Jigmastas], to Soul and R&B [authoring remixes for Stevie Wonder and Mary J. Blige] to Jazz and Funk [reviving productions from Roy Ayers, Donald Byrd, Betty Carter, Al Jarreau, Eddie Kendricks] to Electronic/Dance and Soulful House [transforming Shaun Escoffery's “Days Like This” into a worldwide dance floor anthem]. His prolific studio work led to his 2002 cult-classic LP, Here To There, released on the iconic BBE label.Every week on Apple Music Hits, DJ Spinna's “Here To There Radio” features two hours of themed selections that showcase his versatile expertise and massive vinyl collection. On Twitch, he has amassed 20,000 followers spinning live, marathon sets and interacting with his chatroom on two weekly shows, DJ Spinna Presents Journey and Galactic Quiet Storm.DJ Spinna is synonymous with ground-breaking, annual tribute events. Since 2001, “WONDER-Full” has celebrated the Guest of Honor, Stevie Wonder. “Soul Slam,” 20-years strong, is the authoritative Michael Jackson vs. Prince party. At Spike Lee's “BK Loves MJ,” DJ Spinna commemorates Michael Jackson's birthday in Brooklyn. In 2001, Motown tapped DJ Spinna for a brilliant remix of Michael Jackson's “We're Almost There.” DJ Spinna's collaborations with Stevie Wonder include remixes for “My Love Is On Fire" and “Sweetest Somebody.” In October 2012, Spinna performed an opening DJ set for Stevie Wonder's United Nations Peace Concert. DJ Spinna is undoubtedly the master of all genres with over 1200 music credits. Whether spinning the classics or releasing new music, DJ Spinna's passion, professionalism, prowess, and pure vibes are felt with every note. This week's episode is brought to you by Manscaped! Get 20% Off and Free Shipping with the code THECHOPSHOP at Manscaped.com. That's 20% off with free shipping at manscaped.com and use code THECHOPSHOP. Unlock your confidence and always use the right tools for the job with MANSCAPED™.Support the showWEBSITE AND MERCH! - http://www.officialchopshoppod.com
DJ Spinna is an anomaly. As a world-renowned DJ, producer, remixer, label head, promoter, curator, and influencer-- Spinna has crafted his artistic vision since the 1990s. His musical spectrum spans all flavors-- from Hip-Hop [as founding member of The Jigmastas], to Soul and R&B [authoring remixes for Stevie Wonder and Mary J. Blige] to Jazz and Funk [reviving productions from Roy Ayers, Donald Byrd, Betty Carter, Al Jarreau, Eddie Kendricks] to Electronic/Dance and Soulful House [transforming Shaun Escoffery's “Days Like This” into a worldwide dance floor anthem]. His prolific studio work led to his 2002 cult-classic LP, Here To There, released on the iconic BBE label. DJ Spinna is synonymous with ground-breaking, annual tribute events. Since 2001, “WONDER-Full” has celebrated the Guest of Honor, Stevie Wonder. “Soul Slam,” 20-years strong, is the authoritative Michael Jackson vs. Prince party. At Spike Lee's “BK Loves MJ,” DJ Spinna commemorates Michael Jackson's birthday in Brooklyn. In 2001, Motown tapped DJ Spinna for a brilliant remix of Michael Jackson's “We're Almost There.” DJ Spinna's collaborations with Stevie Wonder include remixes for “My Love Is On Fire" and “Sweetest Somebody.” In October 2012, Spinna performed an opening DJ set for Stevie Wonder's United Nations Peace Concert. Spinna has blessed global dance floors across Europe, Asia, Africa, and the United States. Every week on Apple Music Hits, DJ Spinna's “Here To There Radio” features two hours of themed selections that showcase his versatile expertise and massive vinyl collection. On Twitch, he has amassed 20,000 followers spinning live, marathon sets and interacting with his chatroom on two weekly shows, DJ Spinna Presents Journey and Galactic Quiet Storm. DJ Spinna is undoubtedly the master of all genres with over 1200 music credits. Whether spinning the classics or releasing new music, DJ Spinna's passion, professionalism, prowess, and pure vibes are felt with every note. In this conversation DJ Spinna talks about his history, his early confirmation of him being in music, his first club experience, as well as his view on traditions when it comes to DJing and the advice he has for newer up-and-coming DJs. www.djspinna.com Recorded in Long Island City, Queens on September 13, 2023. Hosted & produced by Mari Ella. In partnership with Ladies of Hip Hop x Snipes studio. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/dancetothemusic/support
This episode features a very special interview with jazz icon Wynton Marsalis by his old friend Christian McBride from The Jazz Cruise earlier this year. The two have a long history going back to 1984 when Christian was a 14-year-old bassist in Philadelphia and Wynton took him under his wing. He even assured Christian's mother that we would watch over Christian when he moved to NYC a few years later. Given their relationship and how they both became mentors to so many musicians across multiple generations, it should come as no surprise that the theme of their conversation here was about mentorship and inspiration. Wynton discussed his unique relationship with the late jazz writer and provocateur Stanley Crouch and with Betty Carter, as well as his connection to so many greats, not only in jazz, but in Black American culture, like Ralph Ellison, August Wilson and Albert Murray. Christian also gave Wynton a three-song Blindfold Test, featuring trumpeters. You can guess how that went. The two also played a couple of duets. But throughout their talk, it's the stories about their elders that resonated.
Aujourd'hui on parle de "What'd I Say" de Ray Charles et de la carrière de ce dernier dans le jazz, la soul et la country. Ray Charles, Hallelujah, I Love Her So Thelonius Monk et John Coltrane, Blue Monk Ray Charles et Milt Jackson, How Long How Long Blues Ray Charles/Margie Hendrix The Right Time Ray Charles, Yes Indeed Pinetop Smith, Pinetop's Boogie Woogie Ray Charles, What'd I Say Ray Charles, Let The Good Times Roll Ray Charles, Georgia on My Mind Ray Charles, One Mint Julep Ray Charles, Hit the Road Jack Ray Charles et Betty Carter, Baby It's Cold Outside Ray Charles, You Don't Know Me Ray Charles et Willie Nelson, It Was A Very Good Year
Gregory "Hutch" Hutchinson is one of the most highly regarded and highly recorded jazz drummers on the planet. Part of what makes him so special is that he sits at the crossroads of the old school and the new school. He was mentored by old jazz masters like Red Rodney, Ray Brown and Betty Carter. He worked extensively with Joshua Redman and Roy Hargrove, among many other innovative jazz musicians of his generation. He has also collaborated with the likes of Common, Karriem Riggins and James Poyser, all practitioners of a new school rhythm approach, influenced by pioneering producer J Dilla. Hutch is able to summon the spirit authentically from both sides because both are part of his personal truth. But until now he has not been a recording artist. Now, at 53 years of age, after having played with everybody, he is releasing his debut solo record Da Bang, and it is not necessarily what one might have expected. Rooted in the jazz tradition, the album demonstrates Hutchinson's versatility, dynamism, and imagination. It may be unexpected, but as Hutch will tell you, it's coming straight from the heart, and the songs are as much a reflection of the way he feels as they are of the way he plays. Here he talks about growing up in Brooklyn, playing drums as a boy, his mentors, the importance of personal style and of friendship among musicians, his next phase (“this is Hutch 3.0”) and his favorite drummers. He casually invokes so many names that talking to Hutch is like a master class in the music, and you can feel how important it is to him to recognize the contributions of those who came before him, and to place his own contribution within that context. VOTE FOR THE THIRD STORY for the 2023 Signal Awards: https://vote.signalaward.com/PublicVoting#/2023/shows/general/music www.third-story.com www.patreon.com/thirdstorypodcast www.wbgo.org/podcast/the-third-story
Episode 168 of A History of Rock Music in Five Hundred Songs looks at “I Say a Little Prayer”, and the interaction of the sacred, political, and secular in Aretha Franklin's life and work. Click the full post to read liner notes, links to more information, and a transcript of the episode. Patreon backers also have a forty-five-minute bonus episode available, on "Abraham, Martin, and John" by Dion. Tilt Araiza has assisted invaluably by doing a first-pass edit, and will hopefully be doing so from now on. Check out Tilt's irregular podcasts at http://www.podnose.com/jaffa-cakes-for-proust and http://sitcomclub.com/ Resources No Mixcloud this week, as there are too many songs by Aretha Franklin. Even splitting it into multiple parts would have required six or seven mixes. My main biographical source for Aretha Franklin is Respect: The Life of Aretha Franklin by David Ritz, and this is where most of the quotes from musicians come from. Information on C.L. Franklin came from Singing in a Strange Land: C. L. Franklin, the Black Church, and the Transformation of America by Nick Salvatore. Country Soul by Charles L Hughes is a great overview of the soul music made in Muscle Shoals, Memphis, and Nashville in the sixties. Peter Guralnick's Sweet Soul Music: Rhythm And Blues And The Southern Dream Of Freedom is possibly less essential, but still definitely worth reading. Information about Martin Luther King came from Martin Luther King: A Religious Life by Paul Harvey. I also referred to Burt Bacharach's autobiography Anyone Who Had a Heart, Carole King's autobiography A Natural Woman, and Soul Serenade: King Curtis and his Immortal Saxophone by Timothy R. Hoover. For information about Amazing Grace I also used Aaron Cohen's 33 1/3 book on the album. The film of the concerts is also definitely worth watching. And the Aretha Now album is available in this five-album box set for a ludicrously cheap price. But it's actually worth getting this nineteen-CD set with her first sixteen Atlantic albums and a couple of bonus discs of demos and outtakes. There's barely a duff track in the whole nineteen discs. Patreon This podcast is brought to you by the generosity of my backers on Patreon. Why not join them? Transcript A quick warning before I begin. This episode contains some moderate references to domestic abuse, death by cancer, racial violence, police violence, and political assassination. Anyone who might be upset by those subjects might want to check the transcript rather than listening to the episode. Also, as with the previous episode on Aretha Franklin, this episode presents something of a problem. Like many people in this narrative, Franklin's career was affected by personal troubles, which shaped many of her decisions. But where most of the subjects of the podcast have chosen to live their lives in public and share intimate details of every aspect of their personal lives, Franklin was an extremely private person, who chose to share only carefully sanitised versions of her life, and tried as far as possible to keep things to herself. This of course presents a dilemma for anyone who wants to tell her story -- because even though the information is out there in biographies, and even though she's dead, it's not right to disrespect someone's wish for a private life. I have therefore tried, wherever possible, to stay away from talk of her personal life except where it *absolutely* affects the work, or where other people involved have publicly shared their own stories, and even there I've tried to keep it to a minimum. This will occasionally lead to me saying less about some topics than other people might, even though the information is easily findable, because I don't think we have an absolute right to invade someone else's privacy for entertainment. When we left Aretha Franklin, she had just finally broken through into the mainstream after a decade of performing, with a version of Otis Redding's song "Respect" on which she had been backed by her sisters, Erma and Carolyn. "Respect", in Franklin's interpretation, had been turned from a rather chauvinist song about a man demanding respect from his woman into an anthem of feminism, of Black power, and of a new political awakening. For white people of a certain generation, the summer of 1967 was "the summer of love". For many Black people, it was rather different. There's a quote that goes around (I've seen it credited in reliable sources to both Ebony and Jet magazine, but not ever seen an issue cited, so I can't say for sure where it came from) saying that the summer of 67 was the summer of "'retha, Rap, and revolt", referring to the trifecta of Aretha Franklin, the Black power leader Jamil Abdullah al-Amin (who was at the time known as H. Rap Brown, a name he later disclaimed) and the rioting that broke out in several major cities, particularly in Detroit: [Excerpt: John Lee Hooker, "The Motor City is Burning"] The mid sixties were, in many ways, the high point not of Black rights in the US -- for the most part there has been a lot of progress in civil rights in the intervening decades, though not without inevitable setbacks and attacks from the far right, and as movements like the Black Lives Matter movement have shown there is still a long way to go -- but of *hope* for Black rights. The moral force of the arguments made by the civil rights movement were starting to cause real change to happen for Black people in the US for the first time since the Reconstruction nearly a century before. But those changes weren't happening fast enough, and as we heard in the episode on "I Was Made to Love Her", there was not only a growing unrest among Black people, but a recognition that it was actually possible for things to change. A combination of hope and frustration can be a powerful catalyst, and whether Franklin wanted it or not, she was at the centre of things, both because of her newfound prominence as a star with a hit single that couldn't be interpreted as anything other than a political statement and because of her intimate family connections to the struggle. Even the most racist of white people these days pays lip service to the memory of Dr Martin Luther King, and when they do they quote just a handful of sentences from one speech King made in 1963, as if that sums up the full theological and political philosophy of that most complex of men. And as we discussed the last time we looked at Aretha Franklin, King gave versions of that speech, the "I Have a Dream" speech, twice. The most famous version was at the March on Washington, but the first time was a few weeks earlier, at what was at the time the largest civil rights demonstration in American history, in Detroit. Aretha's family connection to that event is made clear by the very opening of King's speech: [Excerpt: Martin Luther King, "Original 'I Have a Dream' Speech"] So as summer 1967 got into swing, and white rock music was going to San Francisco to wear flowers in its hair, Aretha Franklin was at the centre of a very different kind of youth revolution. Franklin's second Atlantic album, Aretha Arrives, brought in some new personnel to the team that had recorded Aretha's first album for Atlantic. Along with the core Muscle Shoals players Jimmy Johnson, Spooner Oldham, Tommy Cogbill and Roger Hawkins, and a horn section led by King Curtis, Wexler and Dowd also brought in guitarist Joe South. South was a white session player from Georgia, who had had a few minor hits himself in the fifties -- he'd got his start recording a cover version of "The Purple People Eater Meets the Witch Doctor", the Big Bopper's B-side to "Chantilly Lace": [Excerpt: Joe South, "The Purple People Eater Meets the Witch Doctor"] He'd also written a few songs that had been recorded by people like Gene Vincent, but he'd mostly become a session player. He'd become a favourite musician of Bob Johnston's, and so he'd played guitar on Simon and Garfunkel's Sounds of Silence and Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme albums: [Excerpt: Simon and Garfunkel, "I am a Rock"] and bass on Bob Dylan's Blonde on Blonde, with Al Kooper particularly praising his playing on "Visions of Johanna": [Excerpt: Bob Dylan, "Visions of Johanna"] South would be the principal guitarist on this and Franklin's next album, before his own career took off in 1968 with "Games People Play": [Excerpt: Joe South, "Games People Play"] At this point, he had already written the other song he's best known for, "Hush", which later became a hit for Deep Purple: [Excerpt: Deep Purple, "Hush"] But he wasn't very well known, and was surprised to get the call for the Aretha Franklin session, especially because, as he put it "I was white and I was about to play behind the blackest genius since Ray Charles" But Jerry Wexler had told him that Franklin didn't care about the race of the musicians she played with, and South settled in as soon as Franklin smiled at him when he played a good guitar lick on her version of the blues standard "Going Down Slow": [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "Going Down Slow"] That was one of the few times Franklin smiled in those sessions though. Becoming an overnight success after years of trying and failing to make a name for herself had been a disorienting experience, and on top of that things weren't going well in her personal life. Her marriage to her manager Ted White was falling apart, and she was performing erratically thanks to the stress. In particular, at a gig in Georgia she had fallen off the stage and broken her arm. She soon returned to performing, but it meant she had problems with her right arm during the recording of the album, and didn't play as much piano as she would have previously -- on some of the faster songs she played only with her left hand. But the recording sessions had to go on, whether or not Aretha was physically capable of playing piano. As we discussed in the episode on Otis Redding, the owners of Atlantic Records were busily negotiating its sale to Warner Brothers in mid-1967. As Wexler said later “Everything in me said, Keep rolling, keep recording, keep the hits coming. She was red hot and I had no reason to believe that the streak wouldn't continue. I knew that it would be foolish—and even irresponsible—not to strike when the iron was hot. I also had personal motivation. A Wall Street financier had agreed to see what we could get for Atlantic Records. While Ahmet and Neshui had not agreed on a selling price, they had gone along with my plan to let the financier test our worth on the open market. I was always eager to pump out hits, but at this moment I was on overdrive. In this instance, I had a good partner in Ted White, who felt the same. He wanted as much product out there as possible." In truth, you can tell from Aretha Arrives that it's a record that was being thought of as "product" rather than one being made out of any kind of artistic impulse. It's a fine album -- in her ten-album run from I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You through Amazing Grace there's not a bad album and barely a bad track -- but there's a lack of focus. There are only two originals on the album, neither of them written by Franklin herself, and the rest is an incoherent set of songs that show the tension between Franklin and her producers at Atlantic. Several songs are the kind of standards that Franklin had recorded for her old label Columbia, things like "You Are My Sunshine", or her version of "That's Life", which had been a hit for Frank Sinatra the previous year: [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "That's Life"] But mixed in with that are songs that are clearly the choice of Wexler. As we've discussed previously in episodes on Otis Redding and Wilson Pickett, at this point Atlantic had the idea that it was possible for soul artists to cross over into the white market by doing cover versions of white rock hits -- and indeed they'd had some success with that tactic. So while Franklin was suggesting Sinatra covers, Atlantic's hand is visible in the choices of songs like "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction" and "96 Tears": [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "96 Tears'] Of the two originals on the album, one, the hit single "Baby I Love You" was written by Ronnie Shannon, the Detroit songwriter who had previously written "I Never Loved a Man (the Way I Love You)": [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "Baby I Love You"] As with the previous album, and several other songs on this one, that had backing vocals by Aretha's sisters, Erma and Carolyn. But the other original on the album, "Ain't Nobody (Gonna Turn Me Around)", didn't, even though it was written by Carolyn: [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "Ain't Nobody (Gonna Turn Me Around)"] To explain why, let's take a little detour and look at the co-writer of the song this episode is about, though we're not going to get to that for a little while yet. We've not talked much about Burt Bacharach in this series so far, but he's one of those figures who has come up a few times in the periphery and will come up again, so here is as good a time as any to discuss him, and bring everyone up to speed about his career up to 1967. Bacharach was one of the more privileged figures in the sixties pop music field. His father, Bert Bacharach (pronounced the same as his son, but spelled with an e rather than a u) had been a famous newspaper columnist, and his parents had bought him a Steinway grand piano to practice on -- they pushed him to learn the piano even though as a kid he wasn't interested in finger exercises and Debussy. What he was interested in, though, was jazz, and as a teenager he would often go into Manhattan and use a fake ID to see people like Dizzy Gillespie, who he idolised, and in his autobiography he talks rapturously of seeing Gillespie playing his bent trumpet -- he once saw Gillespie standing on a street corner with a pet monkey on his shoulder, and went home and tried to persuade his parents to buy him a monkey too. In particular, he talks about seeing the Count Basie band with Sonny Payne on drums as a teenager: [Excerpt: Count Basie, "Kid From Red Bank"] He saw them at Birdland, the club owned by Morris Levy where they would regularly play, and said of the performance "they were just so incredibly exciting that all of a sudden, I got into music in a way I never had before. What I heard in those clubs really turned my head around— it was like a big breath of fresh air when somebody throws open a window. That was when I knew for the first time how much I loved music and wanted to be connected to it in some way." Of course, there's a rather major problem with this story, as there is so often with narratives that musicians tell about their early career. In this case, Birdland didn't open until 1949, when Bacharach was twenty-one and stationed in Germany for his military service, while Sonny Payne didn't join Basie's band until 1954, when Bacharach had been a professional musician for many years. Also Dizzy Gillespie's trumpet bell only got bent on January 6, 1953. But presumably while Bacharach was conflating several memories, he did have some experience in some New York jazz club that led him to want to become a musician. Certainly there were enough great jazz musicians playing the clubs in those days. He went to McGill University to study music for two years, then went to study with Darius Milhaud, a hugely respected modernist composer. Milhaud was also one of the most important music teachers of the time -- among others he'd taught Stockhausen and Xenakkis, and would go on to teach Philip Glass and Steve Reich. This suited Bacharach, who by this point was a big fan of Schoenberg and Webern, and was trying to write atonal, difficult music. But Milhaud had also taught Dave Brubeck, and when Bacharach rather shamefacedly presented him with a composition which had an actual tune, he told Bacharach "Never be ashamed of writing a tune you can whistle". He dropped out of university and, like most men of his generation, had to serve in the armed forces. When he got out of the army, he continued his musical studies, still trying to learn to be an avant-garde composer, this time with Bohuslav Martinů and later with Henry Cowell, the experimental composer we've heard about quite a bit in previous episodes: [Excerpt: Henry Cowell, "Aeolian Harp and Sinister Resonance"] He was still listening to a lot of avant garde music, and would continue doing so throughout the fifties, going to see people like John Cage. But he spent much of that time working in music that was very different from the avant-garde. He got a job as the band leader for the crooner Vic Damone: [Excerpt: Vic Damone. "Ebb Tide"] He also played for the vocal group the Ames Brothers. He decided while he was working with the Ames Brothers that he could write better material than they were getting from their publishers, and that it would be better to have a job where he didn't have to travel, so he got himself a job as a staff songwriter in the Brill Building. He wrote a string of flops and nearly hits, starting with "Keep Me In Mind" for Patti Page: [Excerpt: Patti Page, "Keep Me In Mind"] From early in his career he worked with the lyricist Hal David, and the two of them together wrote two big hits, "Magic Moments" for Perry Como: [Excerpt: Perry Como, "Magic Moments"] and "The Story of My Life" for Marty Robbins: [Excerpt: "The Story of My Life"] But at that point Bacharach was still also writing with other writers, notably Hal David's brother Mack, with whom he wrote the theme tune to the film The Blob, as performed by The Five Blobs: [Excerpt: The Five Blobs, "The Blob"] But Bacharach's songwriting career wasn't taking off, and he got himself a job as musical director for Marlene Dietrich -- a job he kept even after it did start to take off. Part of the problem was that he intuitively wrote music that didn't quite fit into standard structures -- there would be odd bars of unusual time signatures thrown in, unusual harmonies, and structural irregularities -- but then he'd take feedback from publishers and producers who would tell him the song could only be recorded if he straightened it out. He said later "The truth is that I ruined a lot of songs by not believing in myself enough to tell these guys they were wrong." He started writing songs for Scepter Records, usually with Hal David, but also with Bob Hilliard and Mack David, and started having R&B hits. One song he wrote with Mack David, "I'll Cherish You", had the lyrics rewritten by Luther Dixon to make them more harsh-sounding for a Shirelles single -- but the single was otherwise just Bacharach's demo with the vocals replaced, and you can even hear his voice briefly at the beginning: [Excerpt: The Shirelles, "Baby, It's You"] But he'd also started becoming interested in the production side of records more generally. He'd iced that some producers, when recording his songs, would change the sound for the worse -- he thought Gene McDaniels' version of "Tower of Strength", for example, was too fast. But on the other hand, other producers got a better sound than he'd heard in his head. He and Hilliard had written a song called "Please Stay", which they'd given to Leiber and Stoller to record with the Drifters, and he thought that their arrangement of the song was much better than the one he'd originally thought up: [Excerpt: The Drifters, "Please Stay"] He asked Leiber and Stoller if he could attend all their New York sessions and learn about record production from them. He started doing so, and eventually they started asking him to assist them on records. He and Hilliard wrote a song called "Mexican Divorce" for the Drifters, which Leiber and Stoller were going to produce, and as he put it "they were so busy running Redbird Records that they asked me to rehearse the background singers for them in my office." [Excerpt: The Drifters, "Mexican Divorce"] The backing singers who had been brought in to augment the Drifters on that record were a group of vocalists who had started out as members of a gospel group called the Drinkard singers: [Excerpt: The Drinkard Singers, "Singing in My Soul"] The Drinkard Singers had originally been a family group, whose members included Cissy Drinkard, who joined the group aged five (and who on her marriage would become known as Cissy Houston -- her daughter Whitney would later join the family business), her aunt Lee Warrick, and Warrick's adopted daughter Judy Clay. That group were discovered by the great gospel singer Mahalia Jackson, and spent much of the fifties performing with gospel greats including Jackson herself, Clara Ward, and Sister Rosetta Tharpe. But Houston was also the musical director of a group at her church, the Gospelaires, which featured Lee Warrick's two daughters Dionne and Dee Dee Warwick (for those who don't know, the Warwick sisters' birth name was Warrick, spelled with two rs. A printing error led to it being misspelled the same way as the British city on a record label, and from that point on Dionne at least pronounced the w in her misspelled name). And slowly, the Gospelaires rather than the Drinkard Singers became the focus, with a lineup of Houston, the Warwick sisters, the Warwick sisters' cousin Doris Troy, and Clay's sister Sylvia Shemwell. The real change in the group's fortunes came when, as we talked about a while back in the episode on "The Loco-Motion", the original lineup of the Cookies largely stopped working as session singers to become Ray Charles' Raelettes. As we discussed in that episode, a new lineup of Cookies formed in 1961, but it took a while for them to get started, and in the meantime the producers who had been relying on them for backing vocals were looking elsewhere, and they looked to the Gospelaires. "Mexican Divorce" was the first record to feature the group as backing vocalists -- though reports vary as to how many of them are on the record, with some saying it's only Troy and the Warwicks, others saying Houston was there, and yet others saying it was all five of them. Some of these discrepancies were because these singers were so good that many of them left to become solo singers in fairly short order. Troy was the first to do so, with her hit "Just One Look", on which the other Gospelaires sang backing vocals: [Excerpt: Doris Troy, "Just One Look"] But the next one to go solo was Dionne Warwick, and that was because she'd started working with Bacharach and Hal David as their principal demo singer. She started singing lead on their demos, and hoping that she'd get to release them on her own. One early one was "Make it Easy On Yourself", which was recorded by Jerry Butler, formerly of the Impressions. That record was produced by Bacharach, one of the first records he produced without outside supervision: [Excerpt: Jerry Butler, "Make it Easy On Yourself"] Warwick was very jealous that a song she'd sung the demo of had become a massive hit for someone else, and blamed Bacharach and David. The way she tells the story -- Bacharach always claimed this never happened, but as we've already seen he was himself not always the most reliable of narrators of his own life -- she got so angry she complained to them, and said "Don't make me over, man!" And so Bacharach and David wrote her this: [Excerpt: Dionne Warwick, "Don't Make Me Over"] Incidentally, in the UK, the hit version of that was a cover by the Swinging Blue Jeans: [Excerpt: The Swinging Blue Jeans, "Don't Make Me Over"] who also had a huge hit with "You're No Good": [Excerpt: The Swinging Blue Jeans, "You're No Good"] And *that* was originally recorded by *Dee Dee* Warwick: [Excerpt: Dee Dee Warwick, "You're No Good"] Dee Dee also had a successful solo career, but Dionne's was the real success, making the names of herself, and of Bacharach and David. The team had more than twenty top forty hits together, before Bacharach and David had a falling out in 1971 and stopped working together, and Warwick sued both of them for breach of contract as a result. But prior to that they had hit after hit, with classic records like "Anyone Who Had a Heart": [Excerpt: Dionne Warwick, "Anyone Who Had a Heart"] And "Walk On By": [Excerpt: Dionne Warwick, "Walk On By"] With Doris, Dionne, and Dee Dee all going solo, the group's membership was naturally in flux -- though the departed members would occasionally join their former bandmates for sessions, and the remaining members would sing backing vocals on their ex-members' records. By 1965 the group consisted of Cissy Houston, Sylvia Shemwell, the Warwick sisters' cousin Myrna Smith, and Estelle Brown. The group became *the* go-to singers for soul and R&B records made in New York. They were regularly hired by Leiber and Stoller to sing on their records, and they were also the particular favourites of Bert Berns. They sang backing vocals on almost every record he produced. It's them doing the gospel wails on "Cry Baby" by Garnet Mimms: [Excerpt: Garnet Mimms, "Cry Baby"] And they sang backing vocals on both versions of "If You Need Me" -- Wilson Pickett's original and Solomon Burke's more successful cover version, produced by Berns: [Excerpt: Solomon Burke, "If You Need Me"] They're on such Berns records as "Show Me Your Monkey", by Kenny Hamber: [Excerpt: Kenny Hamber, "Show Me Your Monkey"] And it was a Berns production that ended up getting them to be Aretha Franklin's backing group. The group were becoming such an important part of the records that Atlantic and BANG Records, in particular, were putting out, that Jerry Wexler said "it was only a matter of common decency to put them under contract as a featured group". He signed them to Atlantic and renamed them from the Gospelaires to The Sweet Inspirations. Dan Penn and Spooner Oldham wrote a song for the group which became their only hit under their own name: [Excerpt: The Sweet Inspirations, "Sweet Inspiration"] But to start with, they released a cover of Pops Staples' civil rights song "Why (Am I treated So Bad)": [Excerpt: The Sweet Inspirations, "Why (Am I Treated So Bad?)"] That hadn't charted, and meanwhile, they'd all kept doing session work. Cissy had joined Erma and Carolyn Franklin on the backing vocals for Aretha's "I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You": [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You"] Shortly after that, the whole group recorded backing vocals for Erma's single "Piece of My Heart", co-written and produced by Berns: [Excerpt: Erma Franklin, "Piece of My Heart"] That became a top ten record on the R&B charts, but that caused problems. Aretha Franklin had a few character flaws, and one of these was an extreme level of jealousy for any other female singer who had any level of success and came up in the business after her. She could be incredibly graceful towards anyone who had been successful before her -- she once gave one of her Grammies away to Esther Phillips, who had been up for the same award and had lost to her -- but she was terribly insecure, and saw any contemporary as a threat. She'd spent her time at Columbia Records fuming (with some justification) that Barbra Streisand was being given a much bigger marketing budget than her, and she saw Diana Ross, Gladys Knight, and Dionne Warwick as rivals rather than friends. And that went doubly for her sisters, who she was convinced should be supporting her because of family loyalty. She had been infuriated at John Hammond when Columbia had signed Erma, thinking he'd gone behind her back to create competition for her. And now Erma was recording with Bert Berns. Bert Berns who had for years been a colleague of Jerry Wexler and the Ertegun brothers at Atlantic. Aretha was convinced that Wexler had put Berns up to signing Erma as some kind of power play. There was only one problem with this -- it simply wasn't true. As Wexler later explained “Bert and I had suffered a bad falling-out, even though I had enormous respect for him. After all, he was the guy who brought over guitarist Jimmy Page from England to play on our sessions. Bert, Ahmet, Nesuhi, and I had started a label together—Bang!—where Bert produced Van Morrison's first album. But Bert also had a penchant for trouble. He courted the wise guys. He wanted total control over every last aspect of our business dealings. Finally it was too much, and the Erteguns and I let him go. He sued us for breach of contract and suddenly we were enemies. I felt that he signed Erma, an excellent singer, not merely for her talent but as a way to get back at me. If I could make a hit with Aretha, he'd show me up by making an even bigger hit on Erma. Because there was always an undercurrent of rivalry between the sisters, this only added to the tension.” There were two things that resulted from this paranoia on Aretha's part. The first was that she and Wexler, who had been on first-name terms up to that point, temporarily went back to being "Mr. Wexler" and "Miss Franklin" to each other. And the second was that Aretha no longer wanted Carolyn and Erma to be her main backing vocalists, though they would continue to appear on her future records on occasion. From this point on, the Sweet Inspirations would be the main backing vocalists for Aretha in the studio throughout her golden era [xxcut line (and when the Sweet Inspirations themselves weren't on the record, often it would be former members of the group taking their place)]: [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "Ain't Nobody (Gonna Turn Me Around)"] The last day of sessions for Aretha Arrives was July the twenty-third, 1967. And as we heard in the episode on "I Was Made to Love Her", that was the day that the Detroit riots started. To recap briefly, that was four days of rioting started because of a history of racist policing, made worse by those same racist police overreacting to the initial protests. By the end of those four days, the National Guard, 82nd Airborne Division, and the 101st Airborne from Clarksville were all called in to deal with the violence, which left forty-three dead (of whom thirty-three were Black and only one was a police officer), 1,189 people were injured, and over 7,200 arrested, almost all of them Black. Those days in July would be a turning point for almost every musician based in Detroit. In particular, the police had murdered three members of the soul group the Dramatics, in a massacre of which the author John Hersey, who had been asked by President Johnson to be part of the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders but had decided that would compromise his impartiality and did an independent journalistic investigation, said "The episode contained all the mythic themes of racial strife in the United States: the arm of the law taking the law into its own hands; interracial sex; the subtle poison of racist thinking by “decent” men who deny they are racists; the societal limbo into which, ever since slavery, so many young black men have been driven by our country; ambiguous justice in the courts; and the devastation in both black and white human lives that follows in the wake of violence as surely as ruinous and indiscriminate flood after torrents" But these were also the events that radicalised the MC5 -- the group had been playing a gig as Tim Buckley's support act when the rioting started, and guitarist Wayne Kramer decided afterwards to get stoned and watch the fires burning down the city through a telescope -- which police mistook for a rifle, leading to the National Guard knocking down Kramer's door. The MC5 would later cover "The Motor City is Burning", John Lee Hooker's song about the events: [Excerpt: The MC5, "The Motor City is Burning"] It would also be a turning point for Motown, too, in ways we'll talk about in a few future episodes. And it was a political turning point too -- Michigan Governor George Romney, a liberal Republican (at a time when such people existed) had been the favourite for the Republican Presidential candidacy when he'd entered the race in December 1966, but as racial tensions ramped up in Detroit during the early months of 1967 he'd started trailing Richard Nixon, a man who was consciously stoking racists' fears. President Johnson, the incumbent Democrat, who was at that point still considering standing for re-election, made sure to make it clear to everyone during the riots that the decision to call in the National Guard had been made at the State level, by Romney, rather than at the Federal level. That wasn't the only thing that removed the possibility of a Romney presidency, but it was a big part of the collapse of his campaign, and the, as it turned out, irrevocable turn towards right-authoritarianism that the party took with Nixon's Southern Strategy. Of course, Aretha Franklin had little way of knowing what was to come and how the riots would change the city and the country over the following decades. What she was primarily concerned about was the safety of her father, and to a lesser extent that of her sister-in-law Earline who was staying with him. Aretha, Carolyn, and Erma all tried to keep in constant touch with their father while they were out of town, and Aretha even talked about hiring private detectives to travel to Detroit, find her father, and get him out of the city to safety. But as her brother Cecil pointed out, he was probably the single most loved man among Black people in Detroit, and was unlikely to be harmed by the rioters, while he was too famous for the police to kill with impunity. Reverend Franklin had been having a stressful time anyway -- he had recently been fined for tax evasion, an action he was convinced the IRS had taken because of his friendship with Dr King and his role in the civil rights movement -- and according to Cecil "Aretha begged Daddy to move out of the city entirely. She wanted him to find another congregation in California, where he was especially popular—or at least move out to the suburbs. But he wouldn't budge. He said that, more than ever, he was needed to point out the root causes of the riots—the economic inequality, the pervasive racism in civic institutions, the woefully inadequate schools in inner-city Detroit, and the wholesale destruction of our neighborhoods by urban renewal. Some ministers fled the city, but not our father. The horror of what happened only recommitted him. He would not abandon his political agenda." To make things worse, Aretha was worried about her father in other ways -- as her marriage to Ted White was starting to disintegrate, she was looking to her father for guidance, and actually wanted him to take over her management. Eventually, Ruth Bowen, her booking agent, persuaded her brother Cecil that this was a job he could do, and that she would teach him everything he needed to know about the music business. She started training him up while Aretha was still married to White, in the expectation that that marriage couldn't last. Jerry Wexler, who only a few months earlier had been seeing Ted White as an ally in getting "product" from Franklin, had now changed his tune -- partly because the sale of Atlantic had gone through in the meantime. He later said “Sometimes she'd call me at night, and, in that barely audible little-girl voice of hers, she'd tell me that she wasn't sure she could go on. She always spoke in generalities. She never mentioned her husband, never gave me specifics of who was doing what to whom. And of course I knew better than to ask. She just said that she was tired of dealing with so much. My heart went out to her. She was a woman who suffered silently. She held so much in. I'd tell her to take as much time off as she needed. We had a lot of songs in the can that we could release without new material. ‘Oh, no, Jerry,' she'd say. ‘I can't stop recording. I've written some new songs, Carolyn's written some new songs. We gotta get in there and cut 'em.' ‘Are you sure?' I'd ask. ‘Positive,' she'd say. I'd set up the dates and typically she wouldn't show up for the first or second sessions. Carolyn or Erma would call me to say, ‘Ree's under the weather.' That was tough because we'd have asked people like Joe South and Bobby Womack to play on the sessions. Then I'd reschedule in the hopes she'd show." That third album she recorded in 1967, Lady Soul, was possibly her greatest achievement. The opening track, and second single, "Chain of Fools", released in November, was written by Don Covay -- or at least it's credited as having been written by Covay. There's a gospel record that came out around the same time on a very small label based in Houston -- "Pains of Life" by Rev. E. Fair And The Sensational Gladys Davis Trio: [Excerpt: Rev. E. Fair And The Sensational Gladys Davis Trio, "Pains of Life"] I've seen various claims online that that record came out shortly *before* "Chain of Fools", but I can't find any definitive evidence one way or the other -- it was on such a small label that release dates aren't available anywhere. Given that the B-side, which I haven't been able to track down online, is called "Wait Until the Midnight Hour", my guess is that rather than this being a case of Don Covay stealing the melody from an obscure gospel record he'd have had little chance to hear, it's the gospel record rewriting a then-current hit to be about religion, but I thought it worth mentioning. The song was actually written by Covay after Jerry Wexler asked him to come up with some songs for Otis Redding, but Wexler, after hearing it, decided it was better suited to Franklin, who gave an astonishing performance: [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "Chain of Fools"] Arif Mardin, the arranger of the album, said of that track “I was listed as the arranger of ‘Chain of Fools,' but I can't take credit. Aretha walked into the studio with the chart fully formed inside her head. The arrangement is based around the harmony vocals provided by Carolyn and Erma. To add heft, the Sweet Inspirations joined in. The vision of the song is entirely Aretha's.” According to Wexler, that's not *quite* true -- according to him, Joe South came up with the guitar part that makes up the intro, and he also said that when he played what he thought was the finished track to Ellie Greenwich, she came up with another vocal line for the backing vocals, which she overdubbed. But the core of the record's sound is definitely pure Aretha -- and Carolyn Franklin said that there was a reason for that. As she said later “Aretha didn't write ‘Chain,' but she might as well have. It was her story. When we were in the studio putting on the backgrounds with Ree doing lead, I knew she was singing about Ted. Listen to the lyrics talking about how for five long years she thought he was her man. Then she found out she was nothing but a link in the chain. Then she sings that her father told her to come on home. Well, he did. She sings about how her doctor said to take it easy. Well, he did too. She was drinking so much we thought she was on the verge of a breakdown. The line that slew me, though, was the one that said how one of these mornings the chain is gonna break but until then she'll take all she can take. That summed it up. Ree knew damn well that this man had been doggin' her since Jump Street. But somehow she held on and pushed it to the breaking point." [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "Chain of Fools"] That made number one on the R&B charts, and number two on the hot one hundred, kept from the top by "Judy In Disguise (With Glasses)" by John Fred and his Playboy Band -- a record that very few people would say has stood the test of time as well. The other most memorable track on the album was the one chosen as the first single, released in September. As Carole King told the story, she and Gerry Goffin were feeling like their career was in a slump. While they had had a huge run of hits in the early sixties through 1965, they had only had two new hits in 1966 -- "Goin' Back" for Dusty Springfield and "Don't Bring Me Down" for the Animals, and neither of those were anything like as massive as their previous hits. And up to that point in 1967, they'd only had one -- "Pleasant Valley Sunday" for the Monkees. They had managed to place several songs on Monkees albums and the TV show as well, so they weren't going to starve, but the rise of self-contained bands that were starting to dominate the charts, and Phil Spector's temporary retirement, meant there simply wasn't the opportunity for them to place material that there had been. They were also getting sick of travelling to the West Coast all the time, because as their children were growing slightly older they didn't want to disrupt their lives in New York, and were thinking of approaching some of the New York based labels and seeing if they needed songs. They were particularly considering Atlantic, because soul was more open to outside songwriters than other genres. As it happened, though, they didn't have to approach Atlantic, because Atlantic approached them. They were walking down Broadway when a limousine pulled up, and Jerry Wexler stuck his head out of the window. He'd come up with a good title that he wanted to use for a song for Aretha, would they be interested in writing a song called "Natural Woman"? They said of course they would, and Wexler drove off. They wrote the song that night, and King recorded a demo the next morning: [Excerpt: Carole King, "(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman (demo)"] They gave Wexler a co-writing credit because he had suggested the title. King later wrote in her autobiography "Hearing Aretha's performance of “Natural Woman” for the first time, I experienced a rare speechless moment. To this day I can't convey how I felt in mere words. Anyone who had written a song in 1967 hoping it would be performed by a singer who could take it to the highest level of excellence, emotional connection, and public exposure would surely have wanted that singer to be Aretha Franklin." She went on to say "But a recording that moves people is never just about the artist and the songwriters. It's about people like Jerry and Ahmet, who matched the songwriters with a great title and a gifted artist; Arif Mardin, whose magnificent orchestral arrangement deserves the place it will forever occupy in popular music history; Tom Dowd, whose engineering skills captured the magic of this memorable musical moment for posterity; and the musicians in the rhythm section, the orchestral players, and the vocal contributions of the background singers—among them the unforgettable “Ah-oo!” after the first line of the verse. And the promotion and marketing people helped this song reach more people than it might have without them." And that's correct -- unlike "Chain of Fools", this time Franklin did let Arif Mardin do most of the arrangement work -- though she came up with the piano part that Spooner Oldham plays on the record. Mardin said that because of the song's hymn-like feel they wanted to go for a more traditional written arrangement. He said "She loved the song to the point where she said she wanted to concentrate on the vocal and vocal alone. I had written a string chart and horn chart to augment the chorus and hired Ralph Burns to conduct. After just a couple of takes, we had it. That's when Ralph turned to me with wonder in his eyes. Ralph was one of the most celebrated arrangers of the modern era. He had done ‘Early Autumn' for Woody Herman and Stan Getz, and ‘Georgia on My Mind' for Ray Charles. He'd worked with everyone. ‘This woman comes from another planet' was all Ralph said. ‘She's just here visiting.'” [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman"] By this point there was a well-functioning team making Franklin's records -- while the production credits would vary over the years, they were all essentially co-productions by the team of Franklin, Wexler, Mardin and Dowd, all collaborating and working together with a more-or-less unified purpose, and the backing was always by the same handful of session musicians and some combination of the Sweet Inspirations and Aretha's sisters. That didn't mean that occasional guests couldn't get involved -- as we discussed in the Cream episode, Eric Clapton played guitar on "Good to Me as I am to You": [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "Good to Me as I am to You"] Though that was one of the rare occasions on one of these records where something was overdubbed. Clapton apparently messed up the guitar part when playing behind Franklin, because he was too intimidated by playing with her, and came back the next day to redo his part without her in the studio. At this point, Aretha was at the height of her fame. Just before the final batch of album sessions began she appeared in the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade, and she was making regular TV appearances, like one on the Mike Douglas Show where she duetted with Frankie Valli on "That's Life": [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin and Frankie Valli, "That's Life"] But also, as Wexler said “Her career was kicking into high gear. Contending and resolving both the professional and personal challenges were too much. She didn't think she could do both, and I didn't blame her. Few people could. So she let the personal slide and concentrated on the professional. " Her concert promoter Ruth Bowen said of this time "Her father and Dr. King were putting pressure on her to sing everywhere, and she felt obligated. The record company was also screaming for more product. And I had a mountain of offers on my desk that kept getting higher with every passing hour. They wanted her in Europe. They wanted her in Latin America. They wanted her in every major venue in the U.S. TV was calling. She was being asked to do guest appearances on every show from Carol Burnett to Andy Williams to the Hollywood Palace. She wanted to do them all and she wanted to do none of them. She wanted to do them all because she's an entertainer who burns with ambition. She wanted to do none of them because she was emotionally drained. She needed to go away and renew her strength. I told her that at least a dozen times. She said she would, but she didn't listen to me." The pressures from her father and Dr King are a recurring motif in interviews with people about this period. Franklin was always a very political person, and would throughout her life volunteer time and money to liberal political causes and to the Democratic Party, but this was the height of her activism -- the Civil Rights movement was trying to capitalise on the gains it had made in the previous couple of years, and celebrity fundraisers and performances at rallies were an important way to do that. And at this point there were few bigger celebrities in America than Aretha Franklin. At a concert in her home town of Detroit on February the sixteenth, 1968, the Mayor declared the day Aretha Franklin Day. At the same show, Billboard, Record World *and* Cash Box magazines all presented her with plaques for being Female Vocalist of the Year. And Dr. King travelled up to be at the show and congratulate her publicly for all her work with his organisation, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Backstage at that show, Dr. King talked to Aretha's father, Reverend Franklin, about what he believed would be the next big battle -- a strike in Memphis: [Excerpt, Martin Luther King, "Mountaintop Speech" -- "And so, as a result of this, we are asking you tonight, to go out and tell your neighbors not to buy Coca-Cola in Memphis. Go by and tell them not to buy Sealtest milk. Tell them not to buy—what is the other bread?—Wonder Bread. And what is the other bread company, Jesse? Tell them not to buy Hart's bread. As Jesse Jackson has said, up to now, only the garbage men have been feeling pain; now we must kind of redistribute the pain. We are choosing these companies because they haven't been fair in their hiring policies; and we are choosing them because they can begin the process of saying, they are going to support the needs and the rights of these men who are on strike. And then they can move on downtown and tell Mayor Loeb to do what is right."] The strike in question was the Memphis Sanitation Workers' strike which had started a few days before. The struggle for Black labour rights was an integral part of the civil rights movement, and while it's not told that way in the sanitised version of the story that's made it into popular culture, the movement led by King was as much about economic justice as social justice -- King was a democratic socialist, and believed that economic oppression was both an effect of and cause of other forms of racial oppression, and that the rights of Black workers needed to be fought for. In 1967 he had set up a new organisation, the Poor People's Campaign, which was set to march on Washington to demand a program that included full employment, a guaranteed income -- King was strongly influenced in his later years by the ideas of Henry George, the proponent of a universal basic income based on land value tax -- the annual building of half a million affordable homes, and an end to the war in Vietnam. This was King's main focus in early 1968, and he saw the sanitation workers' strike as a major part of this campaign. Memphis was one of the most oppressive cities in the country, and its largely Black workforce of sanitation workers had been trying for most of the 1960s to unionise, and strike-breakers had been called in to stop them, and many of them had been fired by their white supervisors with no notice. They were working in unsafe conditions, for utterly inadequate wages, and the city government were ardent segregationists. After two workers had died on the first of February from using unsafe equipment, the union demanded changes -- safer working conditions, better wages, and recognition of the union. The city council refused, and almost all the sanitation workers stayed home and stopped work. After a few days, the council relented and agreed to their terms, but the Mayor, Henry Loeb, an ardent white supremacist who had stood on a platform of opposing desegregation, and who had previously been the Public Works Commissioner who had put these unsafe conditions in place, refused to listen. As far as he was concerned, he was the only one who could recognise the union, and he wouldn't. The workers continued their strike, marching holding signs that simply read "I am a Man": [Excerpt: Stevie Wonder, "Blowing in the Wind"] The Southern Christian Leadership Conference and the NAACP had been involved in organising support for the strikes from an early stage, and King visited Memphis many times. Much of the time he spent visiting there was spent negotiating with a group of more militant activists, who called themselves The Invaders and weren't completely convinced by King's nonviolent approach -- they believed that violence and rioting got more attention than non-violent protests. King explained to them that while he had been persuaded by Gandhi's writings of the moral case for nonviolent protest, he was also persuaded that it was pragmatically necessary -- asking the young men "how many guns do we have and how many guns do they have?", and pointing out as he often did that when it comes to violence a minority can't win against an armed majority. Rev Franklin went down to Memphis on the twenty-eighth of March to speak at a rally Dr. King was holding, but as it turned out the rally was cancelled -- the pre-rally march had got out of hand, with some people smashing windows, and Memphis police had, like the police in Detroit the previous year, violently overreacted, clubbing and gassing protestors and shooting and killing one unarmed teenage boy, Larry Payne. The day after Payne's funeral, Dr King was back in Memphis, though this time Rev Franklin was not with him. On April the third, he gave a speech which became known as the "Mountaintop Speech", in which he talked about the threats that had been made to his life: [Excerpt: Martin Luther King, "Mountaintop Speech": “And then I got to Memphis. And some began to say the threats, or talk about the threats that were out. What would happen to me from some of our sick white brothers? Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn't matter with me now. Because I've been to the mountaintop. And I don't mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land. So I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried about anything. I'm not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord."] The next day, Martin Luther King was shot dead. James Earl Ray, a white supremacist, pled guilty to the murder, and the evidence against him seems overwhelming from what I've read, but the King family have always claimed that the murder was part of a larger conspiracy and that Ray was not the gunman. Aretha was obviously distraught, and she attended the funeral, as did almost every other prominent Black public figure. James Baldwin wrote of the funeral: "In the pew directly before me sat Marlon Brando, Sammy Davis, Eartha Kitt—covered in black, looking like a lost, ten-year-old girl—and Sidney Poitier, in the same pew, or nearby. Marlon saw me, and nodded. The atmosphere was black, with a tension indescribable—as though something, perhaps the heavens, perhaps the earth, might crack. Everyone sat very still. The actual service sort of washed over me, in waves. It wasn't that it seemed unreal; it was the most real church service I've ever sat through in my life, or ever hope to sit through; but I have a childhood hangover thing about not weeping in public, and I was concentrating on holding myself together. I did not want to weep for Martin, tears seemed futile. But I may also have been afraid, and I could not have been the only one, that if I began to weep I would not be able to stop. There was more than enough to weep for, if one was to weep—so many of us, cut down, so soon. Medgar, Malcolm, Martin: and their widows, and their children. Reverend Ralph David Abernathy asked a certain sister to sing a song which Martin had loved—“Once more,” said Ralph David, “for Martin and for me,” and he sat down." Many articles and books on Aretha Franklin say that she sang at King's funeral. In fact she didn't, but there's a simple reason for the confusion. King's favourite song was the Thomas Dorsey gospel song "Take My Hand, Precious Lord", and indeed almost his last words were to ask a trumpet player, Ben Branch, if he would play the song at the rally he was going to be speaking at on the day of his death. At his request, Mahalia Jackson, his old friend, sang the song at his private funeral, which was not filmed, unlike the public part of the funeral that Baldwin described. Four months later, though, there was another public memorial for King, and Franklin did sing "Take My Hand, Precious Lord" at that service, in front of King's weeping widow and children, and that performance *was* filmed, and gets conflated in people's memories with Jackson's unfilmed earlier performance: [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "Take My Hand, Precious Lord (at Martin Luther King Memorial)"] Four years later, she would sing that at Mahalia Jackson's funeral. Through all this, Franklin had been working on her next album, Aretha Now, the sessions for which started more or less as soon as the sessions for Lady Soul had finished. The album was, in fact, bookended by deaths that affected Aretha. Just as King died at the end of the sessions, the beginning came around the time of the death of Otis Redding -- the sessions were cancelled for a day while Wexler travelled to Georgia for Redding's funeral, which Franklin was too devastated to attend, and Wexler would later say that the extra emotion in her performances on the album came from her emotional pain at Redding's death. The lead single on the album, "Think", was written by Franklin and -- according to the credits anyway -- her husband Ted White, and is very much in the same style as "Respect", and became another of her most-loved hits: [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "Think"] But probably the song on Aretha Now that now resonates the most is one that Jerry Wexler tried to persuade her not to record, and was only released as a B-side. Indeed, "I Say a Little Prayer" was a song that had already once been a hit after being a reject. Hal David, unlike Burt Bacharach, was a fairly political person and inspired by the protest song movement, and had been starting to incorporate his concerns about the political situation and the Vietnam War into his lyrics -- though as with many such writers, he did it in much less specific ways than a Phil Ochs or a Bob Dylan. This had started with "What the World Needs Now is Love", a song Bacharach and David had written for Jackie DeShannon in 1965: [Excerpt: Jackie DeShannon, "What the "World Needs Now is Love"] But he'd become much more overtly political for "The Windows of the World", a song they wrote for Dionne Warwick. Warwick has often said it's her favourite of her singles, but it wasn't a big hit -- Bacharach blamed himself for that, saying "Dionne recorded it as a single and I really blew it. I wrote a bad arrangement and the tempo was too fast, and I really regret making it the way I did because it's a good song." [Excerpt: Dionne Warwick, "The Windows of the World"] For that album, Bacharach and David had written another track, "I Say a Little Prayer", which was not as explicitly political, but was intended by David to have an implicit anti-war message, much like other songs of the period like "Last Train to Clarksville". David had sons who were the right age to be drafted, and while it's never stated, "I Say a Little Prayer" was written from the perspective of a woman whose partner is away fighting in the war, but is still in her thoughts: [Excerpt: Dionne Warwick, "I Say a Little Prayer"] The recording of Dionne Warwick's version was marked by stress. Bacharach had a particular way of writing music to tell the musicians the kind of feel he wanted for the part -- he'd write nonsense words above the stave, and tell the musicians to play the parts as if they were singing those words. The trumpet player hired for the session, Ernie Royal, got into a row with Bacharach about this unorthodox way of communicating musical feeling, and the track ended up taking ten takes (as opposed to the normal three for a Bacharach session), with Royal being replaced half-way through the session. Bacharach was never happy with the track even after all the work it had taken, and he fought to keep it from being released at all, saying the track was taken at too fast a tempo. It eventually came out as an album track nearly eighteen months after it was recorded -- an eternity in 1960s musical timescales -- and DJs started playing it almost as soon as it came out. Scepter records rushed out a single, over Bacharach's objections, but as he later said "One thing I love about the record business is how wrong I was. Disc jockeys all across the country started playing the track, and the song went to number four on the charts and then became the biggest hit Hal and I had ever written for Dionne." [Excerpt: Dionne Warwick, "I Say a Little Prayer"] Oddly, the B-side for Warwick's single, "Theme From the Valley of the Dolls" did even better, reaching number two. Almost as soon as the song was released as a single, Franklin started playing around with the song backstage, and in April 1968, right around the time of Dr. King's death, she recorded a version. Much as Burt Bacharach had been against releasing Dionne Warwick's version, Jerry Wexler was against Aretha even recording the song, saying later “I advised Aretha not to record it. I opposed it for two reasons. First, to cover a song only twelve weeks after the original reached the top of the charts was not smart business. You revisit such a hit eight months to a year later. That's standard practice. But more than that, Bacharach's melody, though lovely, was peculiarly suited to a lithe instrument like Dionne Warwick's—a light voice without the dark corners or emotional depths that define Aretha. Also, Hal David's lyric was also somewhat girlish and lacked the gravitas that Aretha required. “Aretha usually listened to me in the studio, but not this time. She had written a vocal arrangement for the Sweet Inspirations that was undoubtedly strong. Cissy Houston, Dionne's cousin, told me that Aretha was on the right track—she was seeing this song in a new way and had come up with a new groove. Cissy was on Aretha's side. Tommy Dowd and Arif were on Aretha's side. So I had no choice but to cave." It's quite possible that Wexler's objections made Franklin more, rather than less, determined to record the song. She regarded Warwick as a hated rival, as she did almost every prominent female singer of her generation and younger ones, and would undoubtedly have taken the implication that there was something that Warwick was simply better at than her to heart. [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "I Say a Little Prayer"] Wexler realised as soon as he heard it in the studio that Franklin's version was great, and Bacharach agreed, telling Franklin's biographer David Ritz “As much as I like the original recording by Dionne, there's no doubt that Aretha's is a better record. She imbued the song with heavy soul and took it to a far deeper place. Hers is the definitive version.” -- which is surprising because Franklin's version simplifies some of Bacharach's more unusual chord voicings, something he often found extremely upsetting. Wexler still though thought there was no way the song would be a hit, and it's understandable that he thought that way. Not only had it only just been on the charts a few months earlier, but it was the kind of song that wouldn't normally be a hit at all, and certainly not in the kind of rhythmic soul music for which Franklin was known. Almost everything she ever recorded is in simple time signatures -- 4/4, waltz time, or 6/8 -- but this is a Bacharach song so it's staggeringly metrically irregular. Normally even with semi-complex things I'm usually good at figuring out how to break it down into bars, but here I actually had to purchase a copy of the sheet music in order to be sure I was right about what's going on. I'm going to count beats along with the record here so you can see what I mean. The verse has three bars of 4/4, one bar of 2/4, and three more bars of 4/4, all repeated: [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "I Say a Little Prayer" with me counting bars over verse] While the chorus has a bar of 4/4, a bar of 3/4 but with a chord change half way through so it sounds like it's in two if you're paying attention to the harmonic changes, two bars of 4/4, another waltz-time bar sounding like it's in two, two bars of four, another bar of three sounding in two, a bar of four, then three more bars of four but the first of those is *written* as four but played as if it's in six-eight time (but you can keep the four/four pulse going if you're counting): [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "I Say a Little Prayer" with me counting bars over verse] I don't expect you to have necessarily followed that in great detail, but the point should be clear -- this was not some straightforward dance song. Incidentally, that bar played as if it's six/eight was something Aretha introduced to make the song even more irregular than how Bacharach wrote it. And on top of *that* of course the lyrics mixed the secular and the sacred, something that was still taboo in popular music at that time -- this is only a couple of years after Capitol records had been genuinely unsure about putting out the Beach Boys' "God Only Knows", and Franklin's gospel-inflected vocals made the religious connection even more obvious. But Franklin was insistent that the record go out as a single, and eventually it was released as the B-side to the far less impressive "The House That Jack Built". It became a double-sided hit, with the A-side making number two on the R&B chart and number seven on the Hot One Hundred, while "I Say a Little Prayer" made number three on the R&B chart and number ten overall. In the UK, "I Say a Little Prayer" made number four and became her biggest ever solo UK hit. It's now one of her most-remembered songs, while the A-side is largely forgotten: [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "I Say a Little Prayer"] For much of the
The Maroon's Jake Zucker and Gregory Caesar interview pianist and saxophonist Adegoke Colson, who performed live at the 2023 Hyde Park Jazz Festival. They are joined by his wife, composer and vocalist Iqua Colson, who is a Hyde Park native and alumna of Kenwood Academy. About Ade: "STEVE COLSON – aka ADEGOKE – pianist and composer, has performed internationally as a leader of jazz ensembles ranging from trios to orchestras. Born in Newark and raised in East Orange, NJ, he received his degree from Northwestern University School of Music and lived in Chicago for a decade before returning to reside on the East Coast. "A critically acclaimed figure in modern jazz, Steve's compositions are finding their way into the “jazz standard” repertoire and are being performed and recorded by some of today's jazz greats as well as by his own group. He became a member of The Association for Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) in the early 70s, a musicians' collective that has influenced music internationally in the 20th and 21st Century." About Iqua: "IQUA COLSON has been praised internationally by the media and placed in the company of some of our finest known vocal innovators including Betty Carter, Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan and Abbey Lincoln, Iqua's work has been discussed in countless periodicals and books including a chapter in “Black Women & Music, More than the Blues” – which also features the great Leontyne Price. Her industry accolades include Vocal Talent Deserving Wider Recognition by Downbeat Magazine and Distinguished Achievement as a lyricist by Billboard. "A native of Chicago, Iqua was accepted to Northwestern University School of Music as a pianist after three years of high school. She was voted into The Association for Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) in the early 70s, the influential musicians' collective acknowledged worldwide as a primary influence in 20th and 21st Century music. She has recorded and performed in the U.S. and overseas collaborating with great artists, most frequently with her husband decorated pianist/composer Steve Colson." Read more about Ade and Iqua This interview was recorded at the Study at University of Chicago on Friday, September 22, 2023. Photo courtesy of colsonsmusic.com
Saxophonist, Multi-Reedist, Composer, Recording Artist, Bandleader, and Educator Sharel Cassity (pron. "Sha-Relle") is a musician well-established on the New York and Chicago jazz scenes. Listed as "Rising Star Alto Saxophone" in Downbeat Magazine for the past decade, Sharel has appeared on the Today Show, won the 2007 ASCAP Young Jazz Composers Award & has been inducted into the Oklahoma Jazz Hall of Fame. Her four albums released as a leader have received top-rated reviews in publications like JazzTimes, Jazziz, Downbeat & American Indian News & earned her a cover story in Saxophone Journal. Cassity's latest album, "Evolve," was recorded and distributed on her record label, Relsha Music. Selected to attend The Juilliard School Jazz program under full scholarship for a Masters in Music, Sharel earned her BFA from The New School for Jazz & Contemporary Music in 2005. A skilled and versatile sideman, Sharel is a regular member of the Dizzy Gillespie Latin Experience, Nicholas Payton TSO, Cyrus Chestnut Brubeck Quartet, and the Jimmy Heath Big Band. She has also performed regularly alongside renowned Grammy-winning artists Roy Hargrove, Lewis Nash, Joe Chambers & Darcy James Argue. Sharel has toured 24 countries and performed at leading venues like the Newport Jazz Festival, Monterey Jazz Festival & the North Sea Jazz Festival. Additionally, she has shared the stage with Herbie Hancock, Wynton Marsalis, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Christian McBride, Jeremy Pelt and Natalie Cole. Sharel was lead alto in the Diva Jazz Orchestra from 2007-2014 and performed in Wynton Marsalis' Broadway musical After Midnight. In mainstream genres, Sharel joined Top 40 hit singer-songwriter Natalie Merchant on her recording "Paradise is Here." She has also performed with Aretha Franklin, Vanessa Williams, K.D. Lang, Fantasia, Trisha Yearwood, Seth MacFarland (Family Guy), Ruben Blades, and DJ Logic. Sharel appears in publications "I Walked with Giants" by Jimmy Heath, "AM Jazz: Three Generations Under the Lens" by Adrianna Mateo and "Freedom of Expression: Interviews with Women in Jazz" by Chris Becker. An alumnus of IAJE Sisters in Jazz, Betty Carter's Jazz Ahead, and the Ravinia Summer Residency, Sharel has received Downbeat Student Music Awards for Best Jazz Soloist, Composition, and Ensemble. As a classical pianist, Sharel placed third in the Disney International Piano Concerto Competition at the age of 10, among many other collegiate and state piano competitions. An accomplished classical saxophonist, Sharel was offered a full scholarship to North Texas State University for classical saxophone. Currently, Cassity has accepted a temporary full-time position at the University of Wisconsin-Madison as Professor of Saxophone for the Fall 2019 semester. Additionally, she has three adjunct positions in the Chicago area at Elgin Community College, Columbia College, and DePaul University. Between 2016-17 Sharel taught internationally as the Woodwind Professor at Qatar Music Academy in Doha, Qatar. If you enjoyed this episode please make sure to subscribe, follow, rate, and/or review this podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, ect. Connect with us on all social media platforms and at www.improvexchange.com
This week on Echoes of Indiana Avenue we'll continue our look back at the Indiana Avenue Jazz Festival — an annual concert series that flourished on the Avenue from 1983 to 1997. The festival was established at a time when the Avenue was in decline. The expansion of IUPUI during the 1970s saw whole neighborhoods wiped out. By the early 1980s, this once-vibrant mecca of entertainment and culture was beginning to fall silent. The organizers of the Indiana Avenue Jazz Festival dreamed of celebrating the Avenue's rich legacy, by bringing world class music back to the neighborhood – and they succeeded. The festival started small, featuring a line-up drawn from local talent. But in a few short years, the festival attracted legendary jazz stars – including: Ahmad Jamal, Betty Carter, Ramsey Lewis, Terence Blanchard, Pharoah Sanders, and more. Join us as we take a year-by-year look back at the Indiana Avenue Jazz Festival. We'll listen to music from artists who performed at the festival, with a focus on local musicians - including David Young, Keni Washington and OmniVerse, The Hampton Sisters, Billy Wooten, Cherryl Hayes, Terence Blanchard and more.
Japanese jazz pianist Miki Yamanaka, born and raised in Kyoto and Kobe Japan, now resides in New York City with her drummer husband Jimmy Macbride. Her upcoming album, Shades of Rainbow is set to drop on September 8. Excitement explodes in Miki during this hour-long interview with this jubilant pianist who is a mainstay at New York's prime jazz clubs for emerging talent, Smalls and Mezzrow, both found in the West Village in Greenwich Village in the lower west side of Manhattan. Miki's been a New York resident since 2012. She did her graduate work at Queens College in Jazz Performance 2014-2015. Her street education occurred in New York City jazz clubs and concert halls before the COVID pandemic, performing with the likes of Antonio Hart, Peter Bernstein, Nicole Glover, Joe Farnsworth, Tivon Pennicott, Roxy Coss, Mark Turner and Fred Hersch. But all of that came to a grounding halt in March 2020 as COVID wiped the streets clean, leaving all jazz musicians jobless and at home with nobody to play with. This required inventiveness. Taking the cue from friend and fellow jazz pianist Emmet Cohen, Miki began to assemble ensembles in hers and Jimmy's Harlem apartment and stream her show “Miki's Mood” on the internet. Perhaps not as successful as “Live at Emmet's Place” it became a place where Miki, Jimmy and friends could play and jam once more and make a little money. In 2015 she was one of three pianists selected to participate in “Betty Carter's Jazz Ahead”, an intensive composition residency at the Kennedy Center. She earned her Master of Music degree from Queens College, receiving the Sir Roland Hanna Award. Recently, Miki was one of ten new talent identified by The Academy (Grammy) as top emerging jazz talent. Shades of Rainbow is Miki's fourth release, her second for Vancouver-based record company, Cellar Music. Her debut release, Miki, was also from Cellar Music. Her previous two recordings, Human Dust Suite and Stairway to the Stars can be found on the Outside in Music label. You can find this episode on all of the major podcast streaming providers. Support live jazz. Support women in jazz. Subscribe to be one of the first to receive SJS podcasts, news and information. Photo by Martina DaSilva. Thanks for listening. Steve Braunginn
For the next two weeks on Echoes of Indiana Avenue we'll look back at the Indiana Avenue Jazz Festival — an annual concert series that flourished on the Avenue from 1983 to 1997. We'll listen to music from artists who performed at the festival, with a focus on local musicians. The festival was established at a time when the Avenue was in decline. The expansion of IUPUI during the 1970s saw whole neighborhoods wiped out. By the early 1980s, this once-vibrant mecca of entertainment and culture was beginning to fall silent. The organizers of the Indiana Avenue Jazz Festival dreamed of celebrating the Avenue's rich legacy, by bringing world-class music back to the neighborhood – and they succeeded. It started small, featuring a line-up drawn from local talent. But in a few short years, the festival attracted legendary jazz stars – including: Ahmad Jamal, Betty Carter, Ramsey Lewis, Terence Blanchard, Pharoah Sanders, and more.
Born on June 16, 1965, in Carthage, Missouri, Javon Jackson was raised in Denver, Colorado and chose saxophone at the age of 10. At age 16 he switched from alto to tenor and later enrolled at the University of Denver before spending part of 1985–86 at the Berklee College of Music in Boston. He left Berklee in 1986 to join Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers, where he later played alongside pianist Benny Green, trumpeter Philip Harper, trombonist Robin Eubanks and bassist Peter Washington. Jackson remained a fixture in the Jazz Messengers until Blakey's passing in 1990. In 1991, Jackson made his recording debut with Me and Mr. Jones, featuring James Williams, Christian McBride, and master drummer Elvin Jones. He joined Jones' group in 1992, appearing on the great drummer's albums Youngblood and Going Home. Jackson's 1994 Blue Note debut, When the Time Is Right, was a straight-ahead affair produced by iconic jazz vocalist and bandleader Betty Carter. His subsequent four recordings for the Blue Note label through the ‘90s were produced by Craig Street and featured wildly eclectic programs ranging from Caetano Veloso, Frank Zappa and Santana to Muddy Waters, Al Green and Serge Gainsbourg. His subsequent four recordings for the Palmetto label had him exploring a blend of funk, jazz and soul with such stellar sidemen as organist Dr. Lonnie Smith, guitarists Mark Whitfield and David Gilmore, trombonist Fred Wesley and drummer Lenny White. In 2009, Javon was commissioned by the Syracuse International Film Festival to compose a full-length score for the Alfred Hitchcock film, “The Lodger,” a silent movie based on the hunt for Jack the Ripper. The original score had its debut at the festival, performed live by Jackson's band (featuring pianist Manasia) at the film's screening in October 2010. In 2012, the saxophonist released a potent tribute to a towering influence, Celebrating John Coltrane, his inaugural release on his Solid Jackson Records which featured the venerable drummer and former Coltrane collaborator Jimmy Cobb. He followed later in 2012 with Lucky 13, which featured the great soul-jazz keyboardist Les McCann and included a mellow instrumental rendition of Stevie Wonder's “Don't You Worry ‘Bout a Thing” along with a version of McCann's 1969 hit, “Compared to What.” That same remarkably productive year, Jackson was the recipient of the prestigious Benny Golson Award from Howard University in Washington, D.C. for recognition of excellence in jazz. Jackson's debut on the Smoke Sessions label, 2014's Expression, was a live quartet recording from the Smoke Jazz & Supper Club in Upper Manhattan. On February 18, 2022, Javon will release, The Gospel According to Nikki Giovanni, his fifth album for his Solid Jackson Records label. Jackson finished and received his undergraduate degree from the Berklee College of Music and obtained a master's degree from the State University of New York at Purchase, where he also taught. In 2013, he accepted the position of Professor of Jazz Saxophone; Director of the Jackie McLean Institute of Jazz Studies at the University of Hartford's Hartt School of Music, Theatre and Dance. In this episode, Javon shares his background, education, and musical journey. If you enjoyed this episode please make sure to subscribe, follow, rate, and/or review this podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, ect. Connect with us on all social media platforms and at www.improvexchange.com
It was great to catch up with world renowned drummer/musician and educator, Clarence Penn to talk about pursuing his dream of a career in music, his life's journey, and operating and living his purpose. Of course we talked about music, and so much more. Clarence's bio: Clarence Penn is one of the busiest jazz drummers in the world, a leader of multiple bands, a composer, a prolific producer, and an educator.Since 1991, when he arrived in New York City, Penn has placed his unique blend of mega-chops, keen intellect, and heady musicianship at the service of a staggering array of A-list artists—a chronological short-list includes Ellis and Wynton Marsalis, Betty Carter, Stanley Clarke, Steps Ahead, Makoto Ozone, Michael Brecker, Dave Douglas, Maria Schneider, Luciana Souza, Richard Galliano, and Fourplay. Penn's impressive discography includes several hundred studio albums (including the Grammy-winning recordings 34th and Lex by Randy Brecker and Concert in the Garden and Sky Blue by Maria Schneider) representing a 360-spectrum of jazz expression, and he's toured extensively throughout the United States, the Americas, Europe, Japan, and Southeast Asia. He's composed music for films and commercials, and produced tracks for numerous singers in the pop and alternative arenas. He earned a “Ten Best of 1997” accolade from the New York Times for his first leader recording, Penn's Landing.A graduate of Virginia Commonwealth University, where he was a protégé of Ellis Marsalis, Penn is active as an educator and drum clinician. From 2004 to 2012, he taught on the faculty of the Banff International Workshop in Jazz and Creative Music. He's also served on faculty at the Stanford Jazz Workshop, the Saint Louis College of Music in Rome, Italy, and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Intensive Jazz Institute.Penn currently leads several ensembles. His most recent “rhythmically intoxicating” recording is 2014's “Monk The Lost Files”arrangements of the music of Thelonious Monk. Released on the Origin record lable, an amazing quartet comprising saxophonist Chad Leftkowitz-Brown, Pianist Gerald Clayton/Donald Vega, and bassist Yasushi Nakamura performing the music of Thelonius Monk with today's modern jazz sensibility. Near completion is a “world music” studio project of songs and instrumentals that melds background voices—including his own—with a world class band.Whether Penn is leading his own band or performing as a sideman, he brings to the table unfailing versatility and professionalism, an ability to find creative ways to interpret a global array of styles and idioms, and a stated intention “to play music that's warm and organic for the people and for myself.”His motto: “When people hear my name, I want them to think, ‘I don't know what band he's playing with tonight or what he'll be doing, but it's going to be good, it's going to be musical.'”
The Not Ready for Prime Time Podcast: The Early Years of SNL
The 16th episode of season 1 of "Saturday Night" is hosted by the star of the 1960 classic "Psycho" (and former teen idol?) Anthony Perkins with musical guest Betty Carter. Perkins comes to the show ready to play and willing to do whatever is asked of him, and it is wonderful! We see Norman Bates (and Mother?), the return of The Muppets, and an absolutely brilliant sketch with Gilda and Jane (How Great is Jane?). We also get John's first time at the Weekend Update desk as a guest and it too is a treat. All of this is very well received by Brad (shocking, right?) who seems to have turned over a new leaf and is just full (for him) with positivity! Give this episode a listen, it's a lot of fun and be sure to share it with Mother.Subscribe today! And follow us on social media on X (Twitter), Instagram, and Facebook.
Featuring NYC legend Joan As Policewoman; Nashville rising saxophone star Jake Botts; ensemble improvisation at the highest level on Joe Lovano's new Trio Tapestry record on ECM; a journey into the world of modern dance composition from boy genius Sufjan Stevens and co.; a murderer's row of jazz legends including McCoy Tyner, John McLaughlin, Betty Carter, James Booker, and Louis Stewart; rounded out by two Americana treasures, Willie Nelson and Bob Dylan.
Fourth generation Chicagoan and critically lauded vocalist Kimberly Gordon is sought after by the elite jazz listener. Kimberly's grandfather was a dancer at the historic Chêz Pareé nightclub and her Nana was a camera girl there, a position aquired by childhood friend and mobster Sam Giancana. These stories and personal ties to Chicago nightclub history laid the foundation for Kimberly's love of early 20th century music. With a deep understanding of the American Songbook it has led her on a path that celebrates composers, lyricists, and jazz masters alike.In New York City, Kimberly was the first woman to hold a Saturday night residency at the now historic Smalls Jazz Club in Manhattan. Kimberly's years in N.Y.C allowed her to perform with jazz greats such as Roy Hargrove, Betty Carter, Wynton Marsalis, Harry "Sweets" Edison, and John Hicks, just to name a handful. Kimberly's sound reflects the old school style of delivering standards, deeply rooted in the ways of the masters, always true to the melody as written; this separates her from the rest.When she is not touring Europe or hiding from a pandemic you can find Kimberly at Winter's Jazz Club in Chicago, weaving her way through the American songbook with long time pianist/organist Chris Foreman. Look for Kimberly in Greece soon as she will be relocating there in 2024From Hawai'i to Paris Kimberly is the singer's singer, the musician's singer, and the jazz lover's singer....Kimberly Gordon Organ TrioGreen Mill Lounge:https://youtu.be/GWjtCNDGO6UKimberly Gordon, Paris, Sunset Sunside, February, 2018:Squeeze Me:https://youtu.be/QaZn44wixgUKimberly Gordon Big Band/Big Band Boom!:Do Nothin til You Hear From Me, http://bit.ly/14gDx3mKimberly Gordon Duo:That's Allhttps://youtu.be/WSimtx2502QKimberly Gordon Organ Trio, "Sunday", Sirens Records:https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/sunday-feat.-chris-foreman/id458443950Kimberly Gordon Trio, "Melancholy Serenade",Sirens Records https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/melancholy-serenade/id65599728Live on WDCB Radio “Churchill” CD tour 2017:https://youtu.be/wmlbhisUwNYMore Than You Know,https://youtu.be/fOcki66P-JEFollow on Instagram:Instagram.com/kimberlygordonvocalsInstagram.com/thejazzfoodieInstagram.com/kimigphotoSupport the show
Michael Mwenso was born in Freetown, Sierra Leone but spent his teenage years hanging out at the legendary jazz club Ronnie Scott's in London where he was exposed to musicians such as Betty Carter, Elvin Jones, Ray Brown and Cedar Walton. In his youth, Mwenso started honing his talents as a trombonist, singer and performer playing in swing bands, reggae and Afrobeat horn sections. Mwenso's talent as a performer caught the attention of many, which subsequently led him to meet James Brown who allotted space for him to sing and dance at his London shows. In 2012, friend and jazz musician Wynton Marsalis brought Mwenso to New York City to serve as curator and programming associate at Jazz at Lincoln Center where he also booked nightly sets at Dizzy's Club Coca-Cola. Over the next few years, Mwenso also booked throughout the institution at large. Through these performances at Dizzy's, Mwenso began to collaborate with a wide variety of Juilliard trained musicians that soon became known as The Shakes. This unique group of global artists presents music that merges entertainment and artistry through African and Afro-American music. In addition, Mwenso continues to break new ground as a cultural ambassador and artist in residence at various universities. Driven by Mwenso's deep ancestral understanding of the African-American music tradition, his role at these Universities is to not only teach numerous classes on Black music but grow the arts scene within their local community while creating more programming focusing on Black artists. Through this work, Mwenso has partnered with Penn State University, Georgia Tech, Miami University, University at Buffalo and Sonoma State University as a guest professor and cultural ambassador of Black music. Michael is a sought-after cultural curator as well as a master at distributing the spiritual nutrition inherent in Black music with Electric Root, the mission-driven company he co-leads with Jono Gasparro. The Caring Economy made it onto FeedSpots Top 30 CSR Podcasts Don't forget to check out my book that inspired this podcast series, The Caring Economy: How to Win With Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/toby-usnik/support
© 2020-2025 Ivy Podcast Discovery LLC
