The Third Story with Leo Sidran

Alexis Cuadrado is on a quest for the ecstatic truth. It either started in Spain when he was a young boy, or it started 20,000 years ago, depending on how you look at it. The product of 1980s, post-Franco Spain, Alexis was drawn to a life in music despite his parents' desire for him to do anything he wanted to do "that was normal and not music". He paid his early dues as a bass player in the early...

For a such busy guy, Adam Schatz manages to watch more television than you might imagine. At least, that's what he says. Known to some as a music presenter, co-producer of the Winter Jazz Festival in New York (held every January in downtown Manhattan), saxophone player in an array of local bands ranging from free improvised ensembles to Afro Beat and dance music, and leader of the band Landlady. A...

Duchess is a three part close harmony vocal group comprised of Amy Cervini, Hilary Gardner and Melissa Stylianou. All three are accomplished jazz singers in their own right, who came together for a one off gig at the 55 Bar in New York's West Village several years ago, and realized that there was something there worth exploring. "Three fine singers...join together in swinging harmony to whip up mu...

Benji Rogers was an ex sound-man, bartender, and broke 34 year old musician who was sleeping on an air mattress in his mother's spare room, when he had a vision. Eight years later, he's one of the most innovative, outspoken leaders in the music business. As he tells it, he has led a "very full life" and he always had an extremely active mind. That's very clear in this conversation. In 2009 Benji l...

Saxophonist Ben Wendel grew up in a loud household and he had to fight to be heard. Maybe that's why it's so important to him to be heard clearly. Born in Vancouver and raised in Los Angeles, by the time he left the west coast to attend Eastman School of Music, he had already been informed by a community of players and mentors, along with his cohorts in the Leimert Park scene. He carried the openn...

When Michael Dorf was a teenager in Milwaukee, he told his parents he was going to Madison for the weekend to visit a camp counselor. Instead he snuck off to New York for a lost weekend with a long distance girlfriend. Although it was 35 years ago, he can recall every detail of the city he discovered on that trip and the music scene at the time. Little did he know, he would soon become one of the...

Pianist Spike Wilner belongs to the tradition of jazz musicians who also own and operate clubs. In his case it came by accident, or rather, a series of accidents. Spike owns and operates Smalls and Mezzrow, two of the most vibrant, hip and important clubs on the jazz scene. Along with his partner Mitch Borden, Spike has cultivated and curated a community of musicians and fans whose influence reach...

I woke up on the road in Paris the morning after the American Presidential election and saw the results. Then my father and I had this brief conversation. Nearly one year to the day after we lived through a terror attack in Paris, we found ourselves back in the same place. Only this time it was not our personal safety that had been placed at risk. It was something that felt somehow much larger. La...

Singer Kurt Elling has been one of the most influential, respected and popular jazz singers on the scene for 2 decades. As the New York Times puts it, "Elling is the standout male vocalist of our time." The Washington Post agrees: "Since the mid-1990s, no singer in jazz has been as daring, dynamic or interesting as Kurt Elling. With his soaring vocal flights, his edgy lyrics and sense of being on...

Singer, songwriter, actor, and independent music writer Ari Herstand on finding an audience. Ari's forthcoming book, How to make it in the new music business (coming this December), has the potential to serve as the definitive guide for independent musicians as they navigate the constantly shifting landscape of the business today. Here he discusses why he feels this is a great time in the music bu...

For over 30 years, Michael Feldman hosted the nationally syndicated radio show "Whad'ya Know". He built the show and his audience from his home base in Madison, Wisconsin. He loved his audience, and he loved his show. When it was taken off the air earlier this year, he suffered it as a great loss. This week he launches WYK 2.0 – the radio show in podcast form. Here he talks about a life in radio,...

Singer songwriter Pat MacDonald grew up in a working class family in Green Bay, Wisconsin with no thought of going to college, but he came of age just as the students were marching on campuses all across the country. He was a gifted songwriter early on. By the time he showed up in the post 60s hippy haze of Madison as a 19 year old musician, he was writing world class songs. He refers to himself a...

Engineer and producer Al Schmitt is the embodiment of recorded music in America. He started out as a recording engineer in New York in the late 1940s and has consistently delivered some of the finest music since then. He worked with some of the greatest artists ever to record –Charlie Parker, Thelonious Monk, Frank Sinatra, Ray Charles, Duke Ellington, Michael Jackson, Elvis Presley – and he's sti...

Guitarist Adam Levy is probably best known for his work with Norah Jones. He played with her for years, wrote songs for her, and really transformed from an instrumentalist to a songwriter through his tenure in her band. But by the time he met Norah, he was already well into a career as a sideman and jazz player in San Francisco. Here he talks about his journey from coast to coast and back again, t...

Writer Clifford Irving has lived a lot of life and had many loves, but he says his "one true love" was the Island of Ibiza, where he made his life for 20 years starting in the early 1950s.  I spent an afternoon with Irving in Mexico talking about his childhood in New York, traveling the world in the 1950s, becoming a writer, Ibiza in the 1960s, and the elaborate hoax (sometimes called the "Hughes...

Larry Goldings has been one of the most respected, versatile and working jazz pianists and organists around since he moved to New York in 1986 to attend the (then) brand new New School jazz program. His career has been varied,   working with his own trio with drummer Bill Stewart and guitarist Peter Bernstein (a project that started nearly 30 years ago), stints as a sideman with Jon Hendricks, Jim...

With nearly 100 people moving to Nashville every day, it has become one of the hot hipster cities in America. Why is this? What does this mean? Does this mean that I should move there too? On a recent weekend trip to Music City USA, I raised this question repeatedly and I got a variety of answers. Uber drivers, bartenders, music managers and restaurant patrons answer the question: should I move to...

How Minneapolis influenced Prince, and how Prince reframed Minneapolis. Paul Peterson (The Time, The Family), Ricky Peterson (Paisley Park producer) and Monte Moir (The Time) tell of their time in the Prince camp. 

For this 50th Episode special, bassist and composer Michael Thurber turns the tables on Third Story host Leo Sidran. They explore Leo's musical career (which includes writing songs for the Steve Miller Band as a teenager, co-producing an Oscar winning song, and surviving in the jingle jungle of commercial music), the Third Story podcast, and finding his own path.

Before director Marc Webb was handed the keys to the Spider Man franchise (he directed both Amazing Spider Man movies), he made the 500 Days Of Summer – a film that wove music and image together in a deeply compelling way.  Before he made his first feature film, he directed nearly 150 music videos.  And before he did any of that, he went to high school with Third Story host Leo Sidran in Madison,...

As a young girl living in Mexico City, Gabriela Quintero dreamed of living by the beach, playing guitar and taking responsibility for herself.  Many years, albums, concerts and collaborations have happened since then, and her band Rodrigo y Gabriela is one of the most highly regarded projects to emerge out of Mexico in the recent past. Her unique guitar technique has inspired guitarists around the...

How did it feel to produce one of the biggest records of all time (Nirvana's Nevermind )? What is the key to great production? How does he listen to new music and what is he looking for in a band? How much of his job is in the interpersonal interactions with people? How much is technical? How did computers change the way he makes records? How has being in a band impacted the way he works with othe...

Composer Maria Schneider, Arranger Rob Mounsey, Producer Michael Leonhart, Engineer Al Schmitt, Drummer Bill Stewart, Organist Larry Goldings, Engineer James Farber, and Singer Alex Cuba - all Grammy nominated in 2016 - on the intersection between music and life.