Discovering Jazz

On this latest episode I play more records (78rpm’s and lp’s) and cd’s that I bought (or in one case picked up off the street) as I travelled around Vancouver Island. The jazz you’ll hear is by Benny Goodman, Lee Ritenour, Manhatt

I stayed home mostly. But I did travel a bit up island and bought some records (including some 78rpm jazz records) and cd’s. On this episode, to introduce you to September and the new season, I’ll play some of the best ones for you. The Lp&#8

Most of the time my the new episodes of my podcasts generate 300-400 hits. Not viral……but I’m happy with that. But there was one that never made it over 100 hits for some reason. It’s episode 33, part 2 of my programs talking abou

On this program I play most of the entire Blue Train album of 1957 by John Coltrane. Why? well, most of those tunes are so often called out in jazz jams, and John Coltrane is certainly a jazz ‘legend’. As well as the fact that this is conside

Since Toronto singer Micah Barnes has been doing a ‘virtual tour’ of his new album, I thought this would be a good time to re-post a podcast of an interview I did with him in 2017—-where he talked about some of his favourite jazz singer

Dipping really early into the archives—an episode from three years ago, where jazz saxophonist, guitarist, and singer, Sean Hully, from Peterborough, Ontario talked about how he learned to play and appreciate jazz. We’ll also take you through

Hi folks! I accidentally posted the wrong episode….and I repeated Episode 56 rather than 57. Sorry about that. But I’ve corrected it. So give a listen to Episode 57—from the archives. A great show! One more from the archives on Cuban ja

Another summer re-run of some of my best Discovering Jazz Programs. I think the whole 4 part series on Cuban Jazz is well worth listening to, with lots of information and great music. Part 2 includes Geraldo Rubalcaba with Ron Carter, Ray Barretto, early

This is a ‘re-run’ of one of my favourite and in terms of the information presented, probably one of my most ‘dense’ episodes. Afro-Cuban Jazz, while the musicians were exported from Havana, actually began in New York. I’ll

I just saw the list of jazz artists involved in this year’s Juno Awards for the best Canadian jazz albums of 2019, including the list of winners. I listened to some of each nominated record—and decided to play a track from some of them that r

I moved from Peterborough, Ontario to Victoria B.C. on May 1st, 2019, and was able to become a volunteer for the TD Victoria International Jazz Festival. If COVID19 hadn’t stopped it in its tracks, I would have been involved in this year’s fe

Five more jazz standards today….with a few different versions of each and some interesting stories. Hilights? I’d give the #1 highlight to Mitchell Ruff Trio’s version of Gypsy in My Soul. What an under-rated group! Vancouver’s Ka

This week I play a couple different versions of five different jazz standards. The five are: I Want To Be Happy, Embraceable You, Milestones, God Bless the Child, and Impressions. One of those tunes came about after another tune by the same name was reco

It was Eldridge Cleaver who was best known for saying “You either have to be part of the solution, or you’re going to be part of the problem”. Jazz is music born of the African-American experience, and, in order to be part of the soluti

This program features jazz artists who started playing their primary instrument relatively late in life. ‘Relatively’ might be anything later than early childhood (considering how many were child prodigies). Others started playing early but d

I find that with jazz, like any genre of music, there might be one to five percent of the music that truly resonates with me. With the posts that reach me through facebook or gmail, I end up having to listen to a lot of them in order to find that 1 to 5

I’ll tell you the stories—-and you can figure out which tune I’m talking about. Or, better yet, listen to the podcast and find out :). #1: The primary writer was a member of the National Association for The Advancement of Colored People

Six more compositions jazz players like to play and a few tidbits of information about each one. You’ll hear some of the famous Miles Davis composition, Solar, under the name “Sonny”—written and recorded on an acetate 8 years befo

You’ll hear anywhere from one to three versions of each of these 6 jazz compositions. Two of those recordings are also a tribute to two jazz artists who recently died as a result of COVID19: Lee Konitz and Wallace Roney. The tunes are: East of the

Today is an exploration of my own jazz roots, a continuation of episode 100 where I first introduced you to some tunes that influenced me to discover more about this interesting musical genre. Most of those ‘root’s are old ones. But I’m

Even during the most trying times we deserve to have a bit of fun. This week we’ll make the best of a bad situation and hear some music that relates to what we are going through. I play recordings by the late Bucky Pizzarelli, as well as Karin Plat

A lot of jazz and classical music has been inspired by the singing of birds. Including a few Charlie ‘Yardbird’ Parker tunes. Today’s episode includes music of the veery thrush, a song thrush, a loon, and a northern mockingbird. And how

Starting with two drums and a fife providing the entertainment at New Orleans picnics and funerals, and finishing with Canadian drummer Claude Ranger. We talk about the development of the drum, and Kelby McNayr takes us through some of the components of

With a party! But maintaining distancing. I’m exploring my own jazz roots which I’m pretty sure are pretty different from how most jazz aficionados discovered jazz. It wasn’t the great works of Charlie Parker or Miles Davis that did it

The great and legendary jazz pianist, known for his recordings with John Coltrane and his original compositions, died March 6th of this year. He had one of the most powerful left hands in jazz–but he actually gained a reputation as a composer even