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Charles Mingus: Peggy's Blue Skylight
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
About an hour and 45 minutes north of Manhattan sits the village of Millbrook, N.Y. In the 1960s, a sprawling American Queen Anne mansion just outside the village became something of a counterculture landmark. Built in 1912, the house and the 2,500-acre estate was acquired at the start of the 1960s by the twin sons of the wealthy Mellon-Hitchcock family. The sons' grandfather was William Larimer Mellon, a co-founder of Gulf Oil. Their mother, Margaret, had married Thomas Hitchcock Jr., ...
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The David Frost Show: 1969-1972
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
The David Frost Show debuted in the U.S. in 1969 and lasted until 1972. It was broadcast in color from New York and was produced by Westinghouse's Group W Productions for syndication, airing three days a week. What made the show special, in addition to featuring an intelligent host, was the diversity of guests and their performances. What's more, Billy Taylor was the show's bandleader, with arrangements by Ralph Carmichael and others. Under Taylor's direction, the band remains one of ...
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Count Basie: New YouTube Videos
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
Wednesday is especially good for a message from Count Basie. The Count's swing should get you over the midweek blues. Here are seven recently uploaded videos of the band and other groups playing Basie's music: Here's the band in 1980 with Duffy Jackson on drums... Here's the band in London playing Blues for Eileen... Here's Lambert, Hendricks & Ross in 1961 singing 'Lil Darlin'... Here's Shirley Bassey in London on a 1967 BBC TV special, Bassey and Basie. Basie's portion ...
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Backgrounder: Johnny Alf: Rapaz de Bem, 1961
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
For those in the know, Johnny Alf has long been thought of as the father of the bossa nova. Whether that statement is completely accurate or whether he was merely a significant influence has been hotly debated over the years. Even if the Brazilian singer-songwriter wasn't the bossa's earliest pure exponent, his softly romantic, Johnny Mathis-like vocal style, his jazzy sense of swing and his rich melodies certainly held sway over many of the artists who would become identified with ...
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Shorty Rogers: Centennial
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
Sunday, April 14, will mark the 100th anniversary of Shorty Rogers' birth. The trumpeter, flugelhornist, composer and arranger who was a founding father of West Coast jazz died in 1994 from melanoma at age 70. Today, in celebration of Rogers' contribution to jazz, I've assembled 10 of my favorite clips plus three bonus clips: Here's one of Rogers' first recorded arrangements, on Heads Up for Woody Herman's Woodchoppers combo performed in March 1946 at Carnegie Hall, featuring Sonny Berman (tp), ...
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Backgrounder: Quincy Jones - Twilight Time
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
Early in March, I posted a Backgrounder on a 1957 album arranged by Quincy Jones in Paris. In the U.S., the LP was released by United Artists and was called Americans in Paris. In France, it came out on Barclay and was known as Et Voila! The album was recorded with Eddie Barclay, the owner of the Barclay label and its music director at the time who hired most of the French musicians in the band. He soon would offer ...
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12 YouTube Clips of Anita O'Day
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
Anita O'Day was one of jazz's first “slick chicks." Born Anita Colton in 1919, O'Day was raised in Chicago. She left home during the Depression at age 14 to become a walk-a-thon contestant—the last person standing after sleepless hours won a cash prize. Dance-a-thons would soon follow. In 1936, O'Day began singing professionally and fronted her fist big band two years later. In 1941, she joined Gene Krupa's band and revolutionized the term girl singer, opening the door to attitude. ...
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Backgrounder: Quincy Jones - Americans in Paris
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JazzWax by Marc Myers
In 1957, Quincy Jones moved to Paris to study composition and theory with Nadia Boulanger and Olivier Messiaen. In his spare time, the producer, composer, arranger, bandleader and conductor became music director at Barclay, a French record company owned by Eddie Barclay, a composer-arranger and contractor. Barclay also was the licensee for Mercury in France. Jones's first album for the label was Et Voila!, which was released on United Artists in the U.S. as Americans in Paris. In addition to ...
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