CiTR -- The Jazz Show

Jerome Richardson was one of the most prolific and respected men of Jazz and appeared on hundreds, if not thousands of record dates....pop, r&b, funk, country and western and classical too! He played with Lionel Hampton's band for years and was a charter member of the modern Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra as well as appearing in many large groups put together by bassist/composer Charles Mingus. As...

Duke Pearson only lived until he was 47 as be died young from Multiple Sclerosis. He is the musical pride of Atlanta, Georgia and there will be soon a day dedicated to Duke. Duke Pearson Day! He was a pianist, bandleader, arranger/composer and a record producer. A man for all musical seasons. He recorded everything from piano trio dates to big band dates and appeared as a sideman on many recording...

This album is The Jazz Show's final tribute to Black History Month. Judging from the album title: "Feelin' The Spirit"; this may give you more than a clue as to the album's content. It is an instrumental interpretation of what are traditionally known as "Negro Spirituals". Most of these songs were written before the abolition of slavery in the USA and provided Black people some solace and hope for...

This album is one of bassist/pianist/composer Charles Mingus' great musical triumphs. Mr. Mingus was finally able to put out a recording of all original music and had full control of the production. The cover, the notes, the editing and post-production and of course the music. It was everything he wanted and this album is arguably one of his very best. He was able to get this band into shape via a...

Tonight's Jazz Feature pays once again tribute to Black History Month with this classic by Miles Davis and Gil Evans. This is their personal and instrumental tribute and interpretation of the Gershwin's music for the famous folk opera "Porgy and Bess". The story is essentially about the love found and lost and found again between a poor black fisherman, Porgy and the town's most beautiful and desi...

Drummer/composer and Modern Jazz pioneer Max Roach did two wonderful albums for the Impulse label and as second tribute to Black History Month we present the first of these two recordings called "Percussion: Bitter Sweet". As is common knowledge, Max Roach's music became more political in about 1959 when he stated that he would never play or record anything that didn't have political or social sig...

Drummer Roy Brooks had a long career in Jazz music as he began playing drums as a small child in Detroit, where he was born on March 9, 1938. However he never really became well known until 1959 when he came to New York to join pianist Horace Silver's Quintet. Roy replaced another Detroiter, Louis Hayes who left Silver to join Cannonball Adderley's band. Brooks went on after Silver to play with so...

This is a Birthday celebration to one of our great living Jazz Masters. Today (January 25) marks the 87th Birthday of tenor saxophonist/composer/arranger and Jazz Master Benny Golson. Golson has been a part of Jazz history since breaking into the bands of Tadd Dameron, Dizzy Gillespie and Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers and then forming his own groups along with his important band The Jazztet with tr...

Donald Winston Thompson is one of Canada's national treasures. He is internationally recognized and has played with so many important movers and shakers in Jazz that it would take more space than this to mention everybody. Not only has he worked with every major musician in Canada but with Jazz super stars like saxophonists, John Handy, Lee Konitz, Paul Desmond, Zoot Sims, Charlie Rouse, Stan Getz...

This session is very rare and never heard before as it was unissued and forgotten in the Blue Note vaults and just recently discovered. The reason why is was lost and forgotten in the vaults wasn't because of the music but because a month later the very same band had a two week engagement at New York's leading Jazz club, Birdland. It was decided to record there and the records were released by Blu...

This fine recording is a minor classic. It was recorded for a 10"LP for Blue Note Records in June of 1953. Ironically Mr. Johnson was not even employed as a full-time musician then. He had to take a job as a draughtsman at the Sperry Gyroscope Factory to support his growing family. You would never know this when you hear this well-planned and well organized recording. Johnson selected all these pl...

This album is a fine example of a young group of New York based musicians who can be called true "keepers of the Jazz flame" They are advancing the Jazz tradition and contributing to it's evolution without moving far away from that grand tradition. They are not trying to re-create a past era and be fashionably "retro". These players are all very much in the present and play with a genuine energy a...

This famous Christmas Eve session has for years been our Christmas Jazz feature and 2015 is no different. This all-star record date by a band nominally led by trumpeter and Jazz icon Miles Davis contains Jazz that will live forever and has influenced countless players over the years. A true musical landmark. Mr. Davis is paired with three members of the Modern Jazz Quartet which included Milt Jack...

J.R. Monterose is certainly not a household name in Jazz music but he is one of the important tenor saxophonists who was in New York in the md-50s during the Jazz boom. Monterose was born in Detroit but raised in upstate New York in Utica and paid his dues in various big bands and by the mid-50s was heard on recordings by vibist Teddy Charles and bass master Charles Mingus. Monterose worked off an...

The Gramercy Five was actually a sextet as it was Artie Shaw AND his Gramercy Five. Mr. Shaw was one of the great bandleaders in the "swing era" when big bands ruled and Jazz music was very popular with the masses in the 1930s and 40s. Like many bandleaders, Benny Goodman, Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Bob Crosby, Tommy Dorsey and others had small groups formed with select members of their orchestr...

That title really sums up tonight's Jazz Feature. This was Wes Montgomery's second album for Riverside's head honcho Orrin Keepnews and the one that really put Wes on the national Jazz map. The first was excellent with Wes' working organ-based group from his home town of Indianapolis but this was different. Orrin Keepnews and Wes put their heads together and came up with an all-star New York based...

Some of Monk's best live music is the subject of tonight's Jazz Feature This was all recorded at the legendary Five Spot Cafe in New York in August of 1958 and originally came out on two LPs then was re-issued on CD with more material. This band included "The Chicago Fire", tenor saxophone monster Johnny Griffin, who replaced John Coltrane as Monk's tenor saxophonist of choice. These are Monk's on...

When you hear this music, it's hard the believe that it's 53 years old. The date was done in February of 1962 by drummer Max Roach and his group plus a 16 voice choir,. The combination was innovative and very new to the world of Jazz and demonstrates the advanced thinking of Max Roach. Roach as most people are aware was a pioneer of Modern Jazz and it's major drummer. We have Charlie Parker, Dizzy...

The legendary recording is in so many people's collections and even though it was recorded on September 19,1955 and released on Columbia later that year it remains to this day the all-time best selling Jazz record. The concert took place in the Sunset Theater in Carmel, California. Piano master Erroll Garner was in top form with his tight Trio with the reliable Eddie Calhoun on bass and the brush...

During his years in Europe from 1968 to 1973, alto saxophone master was at his happiest and most creative. He had left the USA in 1968 discouraged by the political and social unrest and was greeted with open arms in Europe. He was a recognized artist and acknowledged as such. He was able to form The European Rhythm Machine and it was a perfect vehicle for where Woods was at in his musical quest. T...

Warne Marsh was an uncompromising artist and always stuck to playing only music he believed in. From 1948 on he studied with the great pianist/teacher/guru Lennie Tristano. He appeared on Tristano's ground breaking 1949/50 recordings and many thereafter. Marsh had a unique sound, acerbic and cerebral to be sure but still warm and full. His melodic ideas were all his own and his place since his dea...

This wonderful edition of Woody Herman's Band scores in a complete set of great tunes played before a responsive audience at this great Jazz club. The band was youthful and full of great soloists like trumpeters Don Rader, Dusko Goykovich, Bill Chase and Bobby Shew. Trombone virtuoso Harry Southall is also featured. The great tenor saxophonist Sal Nistico was really a star in this band and heard e...

This Jazz Feature tonight is a once-in-a-lifetime meeting between pianist Thelonious Monk and drum master Art Blakey and his Jazz Messengers. It all took place in New York for Atlantic Records on May 14 and 15th, 1957. Monk and Blakey were best of friends and frequent musical associates and Blakey had been Monk's drummer on many of his important recordings but here the situation was reversed. This...

This date which took place in New York or Brooklyn to be specific at the Putnam Central Club was put together by bassist/composer Charles Mingus. It's not a Mingus styled date but more of an informal jam. Mingus who along with drummer Max Roach owned Debut Records decided to record this special evening and put it out. Mingus picked his four favourite Modern Jazz trombonists. Mingus loved the tromb...