Jazz

Jordi Herold opened the Iron Horse in 1979, and for the better part of 25 years offered a comprehensive array of jazz, blues, folk, roots music, and rock on a virtual nightly basis. Even chamber music...

Lionel Hampton, Chuck Green, Sandman Sims, and Bunny Briggs in No Maps on My Taps “It’s Sand, Man!” Count Basie’s jump tune of that name has been on my mind since I took in two...

It’s Jack Sheldon’s 80th birthday today.  The trumpeter is unique among jazz musicians in having enjoyed a second career as an actor (Run Buddy Run), and as the iconic voice of “Conjunction Junction”...

[Ed. note: This post was originally published on August 20, 2015] My favorite version of the Louis Armstrong-Jack Teagarden staple “Rockin’ Chair” is from a 1957 television special. Armstrong had first...

Jackie Cain died on Tuesday at 86.  For over 50 years, she partnered with pianist Roy Kral in marriage and song. I loved the wit and warmth of their collaboration, the kick they seemed to give each...

Jackie McLean Steve Lehman The first time I met the saxophonist Jackie McLean he exclaimed, “I listen!” Then he pulled me in closer and said, “And we contribute.” I was aware...

Jackie McLean Jackie McLean, jazz legend and patron saint of the Hartford jazz community, was the subject of the 1979 documentary, “Jackie McLean on Mars.” I attended its Hartford premier...

I wrote several weeks ago about the jazz-deprived time I spent in 1977 in Eugene, Oregon where the only saving grace was the Prez Records shop.   When I flew into Boston for the Christmas...

I spent a horribly jazz-deprived time in Eugene, Oregon, in 1977, where the only saving grace was the Prez Records shop, which was named for Lester Young and operated by a true believer. But...

For Worcester-born acolytes like me and Chet Williamson, the devoted author of “Falling Rains of Life,” the online biography of Jaki Byard, it was inevitable that as teenaged converts to jazz...