LINER NOTES

LAINI MATAKA Wanda Robinson better known as Laini Mataka was born and raised in Baltimore, Md., one of 10 children, and was raised by her Grandmother. She's been writing poetry since the age of thirteen. Her first paid writing gig was composing letters, at a quarter apiece, for girls whose boyfriends were being sent to Vietnam. She wrote about, she says, "things I knew nothing about": "it was all about love- 'oh, he broke my heart!'" As the war progressed and she entered college, her work became more political. After hearing R&B singer Arthur Prysock's poetry-based 1969 album, "This Is My Beloved," she decided to set some of her poems to music. She read poems into a tape recorder with a stereo playing in the background, then she played the finished product for her classmates at the Community College of Baltimore. A local DJ, Anthony Davis played some of her work on his show. Soon after, she got a call from Perception Records which invited the 20 year old if she would like to come to NYC to cut a record. When Laini (named for a settlement in Kenya's central Province) was picking music for her album, the label opened it's library up to her. "They said to use any music I wanted - they owned the rights to everything," she remembers. She selected a great deal of material from Black Ivory, a soul trio from Harlem- and then walked into what she describes as a sort of disorganized, never-ending party. She remembers label folks keeping artists working however they could. "Whatever you wanted, they would get it for you," Mataka says. Laini wanted nothing was what she told them! After recording her album "Black Ivory" in 1971, performing doggedly to promote the record - at a beauty pagent, on an episode of Soul Train she never saw - Laini fled, feeling overworked and underpaid. "I hid," she says. "I said i'd never give my work to white people again to exploit me, and I didn't." She went home to Baltimore, where she put in time at the CSX railroad, in libraries and in a warehouse. She didn't want to deal with labels, agents or producers anymore, but, encouraged by friends, met with a guy who'd worked with Maya Angelou. They took a cab ride, he disrespected her, she got out and didn't take any more meetings. In the meantime, Laini says, "Me And A Friend," was cobbled together from tracks she recorded for Black Ivory. Although she's never listened to the whole recording, she did once read the lyric sheet. "They didn't know what I was saying," she says. "They misspelled a lot of words." Still the disc has done a lot to maintain her profile among crate-diggers. DJ Shadow, the British electronica duo Pressure Drop and New York house producer Floppy Sounds have all sampled Laini's work. And those are just the "Credited uses." No doubt since Perception records went bankrupt and the catalog was purchased, she probably could regain some of the ownership of her work. In the mid - 70s, Mataka met Paul Coates, owner of Baltimore's Black Classic Press. Once he began the process of starting a publishing house, he told her that is she waited for him that his company would publish everything she wrote. Coates made good on that promise. In 1988 "Never As Strangers, In 1994 "Restoring The Queen." And, in 2000 Bein A Strong Black Woman Could Get You Killed," were all published by Black Classic Press. Laini Mataka is the real deal. Even 30 years ago her voice was uniquely original and still is even today! She would even like to sing. "I want to mix it up," she says, "start a song, then stop in the middle, like a jazz musician (her favorite music) run a poem, then pick up on the other side." But for now, she's continuing to work with young writers, constantly composing poems and trying to finish up a novel about a childhood boyfriend who was killed. That last project, she admits, is giving her some trouble. "It needs a happy ending," she says, "and I don't know anyone who's having one right now." To purchase the work of Laini Mataka CLICK HERE To catch La

ILLUMINATION  McCoy Alfred Tyner is best remembered from the John Coltrane Quartet. In the past decades since he has become one of the major pianists and composers, expanding the vocabulary of color and harmony. His lusty piano is richly percussive and hammering, while full of cascading and romantic sounds. His unique and forceful style has inspired and influenced a whole new generation of musicians.  Tyner was born in Philadelphia on December 11, 1938, the oldest of three children. He was encouraged to study piano by his mother. He finally began studying the piano at age 13 and within two years, music had become the focal point in his life.  In the beginning McCoy practiced on a neighbour's piano. When his family bought one, he began hosting jam sessions. Among his friends and neighbours were a number of young musicians who would go on to make their marks in jazz, such as trumpeter Lee Morgan, saxophonist Archie Shepp, pianist Bobby Timmons, and bassist Regie Workman. "Bud and Richie Powell moved into my neighbourhood. Bud was a major influence on me during my early teens. He was very dynamic." In addition, Thelonious Monk and Art Tatum were young McCoy's major influences. McCoy studied at the West Philadelphia Music School and later at Granoff School of Music.  At age 17, while playing at a local club called the Red Rooster, he first met JOHN COLTRANE. Coltrane was in Philadelphia between gigs with Miles Davis. The saxophonist, whose style was still in its formative stages and whose reputation was on the rise, had no working group of his own, but secured a few engagements in and around Philadelphia, with McCoy often in his rhythm section. The rapport between the two was so apparent, that Coltrane made it clear that he hoped to eventually have a regular band with McCoy Tyner in it. His first main exposure came with BENNY GOLSON being the first pianist in Golson's and Art Farmer's legendary Jazztet (1959). By 1960, when John Coltrane finally left Miles Davis to form his own group, McCoy left Art Farmer. Tyner continued with Coltrane through 1965, participating in all the major recording sessions. The pianist participated in numerous historical recording sessions with Coltrane, including for instance Africa Brass, A Love Supreme, and My Favorite Things. While with Coltrane, Tyner also recorded many of his own albums for Impulse!, including such classics as "Inception", "Night of Ballads and Blues", and "Live at Newport", and later for Blue Note, which enabled him to feature his densely rich piano sound to great effect. Upon Leaving Coltrane (1965), there was a lull in Tyner's popularity. The future looked bright and the trio he formed seemed to have a big future. In fact he spent the next five years playing superbly but getting more and more disillusioned due to lack of acceptance. But he rebounded in the 1970's. Due to groups featuring Sonny Fortune and Azar Lawrence and recordings for Milestone like "Sahara", which received two Grammy nominations and was named 'Album of the year' in the Down Beat Critics Poll, Tyner gained recognition. He toured and recorded with SONNY ROLLINS, Ron Carter and Al Foster as the Milestone Jazzstars in 1978, and in the mid-1980s led a quintet that included Gary Bartz and violinist John Blake.  Since 1980, he has also arranged his lavishly textured harmonies for a big band that performs and records when possible. In the late 1980s, he mainly focussed on his regular piano trio featuring Avery Sharpe on bass and Aarron Scott on drums. As of today, this trio is still in great demand. He returned to Impulse in 1995, with a superb album featuring MICHAEL BRECKER. In 1996 he recorded a special album with the music of BURT BACHARACH. In 1998 he changed labels again and recorded a interesting latin album and an album featuring STANLEY CLARKE for TelArc. While he avoids modern conventions and the trappings of the moment, Tyner's sound remain

"AUTHENTIC SOUL" Christopher L. Fields is a Spoken Word Artist out of Washington D.C. His wordplay, passionate delivery and his love for Poetic Expression earned him the moniker of “The Poetry Man” A natural born Poet, with no formal training, Christopher wrote his first poem when he was 7 years old – An Anniversary gift to his Parents; Charles & Dorothy Fields. Although he was a shy child, he continued to write, but he didn't share his poems with anyone around him. That all changed the day that his Mother discovered some of Christopher’s Poems hidden away in a box, and told him; “You need to write”. It would be a few years down the line before Christopher fully embraced the role of Poet, but the rise of “Hip Hop” gave him yet another platform to display his lyrical skills on. Ghost Writing for a friend, until that same friend convinced him to step out of the shadows and stand center stage. Now armed with the sophisticated elegance of Poetry, and the Raw guttural expression of Hip Hop, Christopher developed his own style of writing and performance. Christopher doesn't recite poetry; he is Poetry - in motion, in the stillness of your heart, in the recesses of your mind and down into the wells of your soul. Christopher’s strong belief in thepower of collective works leads him to coin the phrase: "WE" are Greater Than "i". Welcome to The Poetry Man Experience. Memberships: Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity Inc. E-mail: [email protected]

Tribute To George Duke The keyboard-player, composer and producer George Duke enjoyed a multi-faceted career that lasted close to five decades and tapped into the collective consciousness from a variety of directions. His résumé read like a who's who of jazz, funk and soul and included collaborations with Cannonball Adderley, Frank Zappa and Miles Davis, as well as Al Jarreau, Anita Baker, Quincy Jones and Michael Jackson – particularly on the title track for the superstar's Off the Wall album in 1979. Duke produced hit records for Jeffrey Osborne – the ballad "On the Wings of Love" in 1982, the floorfiller "Stay with Me Tonight" in 1983 – and Deniece Williams's ebullient US No 1 "Let's Hear It for the Boy", from the Footloose soundtrack in 1984. He also scored films and was musical director for myriad events, including 11 Soul Train Music Awards and Nelson Mandela: An International Tribute for a Free South Africa at Wembley Stadium in 1990. Both as leader of his own jazz-fusion band and in partnership with the virtuoso bassist Stanley Clarke, he was a crossover colossus, making the most of his multi-instrumental skills as well as his affecting falsetto on the synth-led disco smash "Reach for It" (1978), the smooth ballad "Sweet Baby" (1981) and the irrepressible "Shine On" (1982), which all charted in the US and across Continental Europe. In the UK, his most popular album was A Brazilian Love Affair, reflecting his passion for the country and its music. It was recorded in Rio de Janeiro in 1979 with the vocalists Milton Nascimento and Flora Purim and the percussionist Airto Moreira. The versatile and prolific Duke was also a mainstay of the Montreux Jazz Festival, where he performed over a dozen times and debuted his ambitious Muir Woods Suite for orchestra and small jazz band – subsequently released in 1995. "Serious black orchestral writers don't often have the opportunity to have their works performed, so I realise I was blessed to have this chance. Besides, I've always liked breaking down barriers," he remarked. "I used to call my music Multi-Stylistic. I grew up listening to all kinds of music, and I didn't see why I should be kept in a box musically. I felt that there is intrinsic worth in all forms of music, even the simpler forms. I've always wanted to bring cultures and music together – you know, make a nice stew." George Duke was born in San Rafael, California, in 1946, he grew up in Marin City, located a few miles north of San Francisco. He demanded a piano after his mother took him to see Duke Ellington in concert when he was four, and he began taking lessons a couple of years later. He was already absorbing influences like the gospel he heard in his local Baptist church. "That's where I first began to play funky," he said. "I saw how music could trigger emotions in a cause-and-effect relationship." By the early Sixties, he was playing jazz with fellow pupils at Tamalpais High School, and developing a style influenced by the West Coast luminaries Les McCann and Cal Tjader, as well as Davis. He would eventually collaborate with the trumpeter as composer, arranger and multi-instrumentalist on a brace of tracks on the Eighties albums Tutu and Amandla. While studying trombone and composition at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, he gigged with his own trio, and sometimes with Jarreau – then working as a rehabilitation counselor in the city, but soon to emerge as one of the preeminent jazz vocalists of the era. They reunited in the early Eighties when Duke played on Jarreau's Breakin' Away album and in 1988 when he produced the vocalist's Grammy-nominated Heart's Horizon album. After depping for McCann on a quiet Monday night at The Jazz Workshop in San Francisco in 1966, Duke was approached by SABA Records to cut an album he felt didn't reflect his potential. "For some reason, I thought all I had to do was play the head of a tune real nice and then proceed to rattle off myriads of notes at high velocity. This di

MAGNETIZED Terence Blanchard (trumpet) is one of the most important musician/composer/band leaders of his generation. His emotionally moving and technically refined playing is considered by many jazz aficionados to recall earlier jazz trumpet styles.  Born March 13, 1962, in New Orleans, the only child to parents Wilhelmina and Joseph Oliver Blanchard, a part-time opera singer and insurance company manager, the young Blanchard was encouraged by his father, Joseph Oliver, to learn to play the piano. In the third grade he discovered jazz trumpet when a big band, featuring Alvin Alcorn on trumpet, played at a school assembly. In his teens Blanchard attended the New Orleans Center of Creative Arts, where he studied and played with saxophonist Donald Harrison. While performing with Lionel Hampton's big band, he studied for two years at Rutgers University under the tutelage of Paul Jeffrey and Bill Fielder. In 1982 Blanchard replaced Wynton Marsalis under his recommendation in Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers, working in that band up to 1986 as lead soloist and musical director. He then co-led a prominent quintet with saxophonist Donald Harrison, recording seven albums for the Concord, Columbia, and Evidence record labels in five years, including a stirring in-concert tribute to the Eric Dolphy/Booker Little ensemble.  In the '90s, Blanchard became a leader in his own right, recording for the Columbia label, performing on the soundtracks to Spike Lee's Do the Right Thing and Mo' Better Blues, and composing the music for Lee's film Jungle Fever. In fact, Blanchard has written the score for every Spike Lee film since 1991, including Malcolm X, Clockers, Summer of Sam, 25th Hour, Inside Man, and the Hurricane Katrina documentary When the Levees Broke for HBO. With over 40 scores to his credit, Blanchard and Mark Isham are the most sought-after jazz musicians to ever compose for film. In the fall of 2000, Blanchard was named artistic director of the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. Keeping up with his love of live performance and touring, Blanchard also maintains a regular studio presence, recording his own original music for the Columbia, Sony Classical, and Blue Note labels. Albums include The Billie Holiday Songbook (1994), Romantic Defiance (1995), The Heart Speaks (1996), the acclaimed Wandering Moon (2000), Let's Get Lost (2001), Bounce (2003), and especially Flow (2005), which was produced by pianist Herbie Hancock and received two Grammy nominations. Blanchard has been nominated for 11 Grammys and has won four in total, including awards for New York Scene with Blakey (1984) and the soundtrack A Tale of God's Will in 2007. In 2005, Blanchard was part of McCoy Tyner's ensemble that won the Grammy in the Best Jazz Instrumental Album category for Illuminations.  A quintessential sideman as well as leader, he has worked with prominent jazz players including Cedar Walton, Abbey Lincoln, Joanne Brackeen, Jay McShann, Ralph Peterson, Ed Thigpen, J.J. Johnson, Toots Thielemans, the Olympia Brass Band, Stevie Wonder, Bill Lee, Ray Brown, Poncho Sanchez, Dr. Billy Taylor, Dr. John, Lionel Loueke, Jeff Watts, and many others. Scarecrow Press published his autobiography, Contemporary Cat. By April of 2007, the Monk Institute announced its Commitment to New Orleans initiative, which included the relocation of the program to the campus of Loyola University in New Orleans, spearheaded by Blanchard. During 2007, the Monterey Jazz Festival named Blanchard Artist-in-Residence, and the festival formed a 50th Anniversary All-Stars ensemble featuring trumpeter James Moody, Benny Green, Derrick Hodge, Kendrick Scott, and Nnenna Freelon. In 2008, Blanchard helped scored the hit film Cadillac Records. Signing with Concord Jazz in 2009, he released Choices -- recorded at the Ogden Museum of Art in Blanchard's hometown of New Orleans -- at the end of that summer. In 2011, he p

"POETIC MESSENGERS" The Unknown Poet and his musical soul-mate Queen have built a solid reputation as two of the premier spoken word artists and lyrical hook masters on the artistic scene today. Through countless live performances, their CD's, radio interviews and video presentations,  they shine! This duo's smooth jazzy style and heartfelt delivery are legendary on the poetry and jazz scene and beyond. They have been writing and reciting poetry for over 25 years, coming forth with a style and delivery that is totally their own. These are two spiritual jazzy magnets, touched with poetic genius, delivering thought provoking words that stir the listeners heart, mind and soul, as they share their insightful message of musical truth,..with a historical cultural flavor.  Anyone who is blessed with an opportunity to listen to or experience the live or recorded presentations of these wordsmiths will be moved by their Jazzy spoken style like you never would have imagined.    Both TUP and Queen were born in Atlantic City, New Jersey. They were children of the 50's. They have been together for 36 years. The Unknown Poet in particular was exposed to a diverse array of live music at a very young age. He also had music lessons and was a member of the drum line in high school. At the impressionable age of 9 years old he was introduced to the sounds of the jazz legends such as Coltrane, Miles, Monk, Sarah, Lady Day and Art Blakey just to name a few. He spent most weekends with his uncle Tex and his cousin Tex jr. listening to jazz,..playing checkers and trying to play the stand up bass that stood in the corner of the apartment. The summers on the North Side of Atlantic City came alive with all kinds of music playing in the numerous black owned clubs, two of which LiL' Rossi Lee aka the Unknown Poet spent a lot of time in, absorbing a diverse range of music. One was the famous Club Harlem which his grand-pop had an interest in, and the Wonder Garden which his uncle Bobby Bell owned.  From the age of 13 to 25  he spent every summer night on the strip around Kentucky and Arctic Avenues in Atlantic City. He first shined shoes..then worked at Sapps Barbecue, until he eventually landed a job at the place he loved, Club Harlem washing dishes, waiting tables, taking pictures, to eventually being in the audience, backstage and sometimes even at the daytime rehearsals running errands for the artists and absorbing the musical vibration. He says that he is blessed to have witnessed first hand some of those legendary artists of that era   and that they've all left a great impression on him and have helped shape him as a,.. poet/vocalist/spoken word/jazz artist. He is forever grateful for this exposure,..for it surely has shaped him musically, poetically and personally. Queen has been rolling with the Poet for 36 years _We Blessed...~     0 0 1 550 3136 Spotlight On Jazz And Poetry LLC. 26 7 3679 14.0 Normal 0 false false false EN-US JA X-NONE /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;}

POIGNANT EXPRESSIONS Quickly becoming one of the most buzzed about jazz singers on the New York scene, Marianne Solivan does not remember an “ah-ha” moment that brought her to the music she has devoted herself to: “I don’t recall having a big moment that made me like jazz.  I just dug it.” It is that same simplicity of statement with its intrinsic honesty that characterizes Solivan’s style. The infallible swing of Ella, the daring of Betty Carter, the matter-of factness of Carmen McCrae…They can all be found in the voice of Marianne Solivan, whom trumpeter Jeremy Pelt has called “the modern-day paradigm to which all singers should aspire.” It is no coincidence that the 2009 Jazzmobile Vocal Competition finalist has graced recital halls, jam sessions and club stages with such noted musicians as Roy Hargrove, Steve Lacy, Jeremy Pelt, Ray Gallon (Ron Carter, Lionel Hampton, T.S. Monk), Ugonna Ukegwo (Tom Harrell, Jacky Terrason) and Jane Monheit’s sidemen Neal Minor and Michael Kanan. Born in Queens, New York, Solivan’s family lived in Venezuela and New Jersey before settling in Massachusetts, where she attended high school. Already an alto sax student, it was in secondary school that she began singing seriously, studying classical voice and appearing in musical theater productions. Upon graduating, she entered The Boston Conservatory with a concentration in musical theater. After her first year in college, Solivan took time off from school and drifted away from singing, not returning for three years. The urge to resume studying voice and go back to school coincided with her discovery of the voice that would become her greatest influence:  Ella Fitzgerald. She recalls, “I purchased the four oddest recordings for a jazz newcomer:  one of those Ella Fitzgerald songbook compilations, a Dominique Eade recording, Nina Simone Sings The Blues and At the Village Vanguard: Betty Carter.  Fitzgerald, especially, made a great impression on her: “There’s such tremendous hopefulness in all her music. No matter how sad the ballad, no matter how bad the break-up song, there’s always a silver lining. “ Solivan was singing pop when she entered Berklee College of Music, but quickly decided she wanted to learn this music called jazz. Earning a dual degree in Music Performance and Education, she taught music for a year before entering New England Conservatory and earning a Master’s degree in Jazz Studies. Armed with two prestigious degrees and formidable talent, Solivan moved back to the city of her birth in 2007, placing in the Jazzmobile Vocal Competition, appearing as the only featured vocalist on clarinetist Darryl Harper’s The C3 project recording, Stories in Real Time, and touring France as the lead vocalist in an innovative staging of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar. 0 0 1 465 2656 Spotlight On Jazz And Poetry LLC. 22 6 3115 14.0 Normal 0 false false false EN-US JA X-NONE /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman";} Solivan is as likely to pop up at jazz institution Smalls Jazz Club with a full band as she is an intimate restaurant with only a piano accompanist. Regardless, jazz lovers and musicians alike are captivated by her sound and her style. Not all are able to articulate what attracts them as well as Pelt. Ultimately, they just dig it. To visit Marrianne Solivan's website CLICK HERE

Pure Improvisation Betty Carter was born Lillie Mae Jones in Flint, Michigan on May 16, 1929. At a young age, she began the study of piano at the Detroit Conservatory of Music, and by the time she was a teenager she was already sitting in with Charlie Parker and other bop musicians when they performed in Detroit. After winning a local amateur contest, she turned professional at age 16, hooking up with the Lionel Hampton band by 1948, billed as Lorraine Carter. Hampton was the man who hung the nickname 'Betty Be-Bop' on her (a nickname she hated, as she found bebop limiting and wanted to do more than just scat), but it stuck, and ultimately she changed her stage name to Betty Carter. At the age of 21, she traveled to New York with the Hampton band and set up home there. Betty spent the early 1950s as a singer with different groups. She did several shows at the Apollo, playing with such notables as Max Roach and Dizzy Gillespie, toured with Miles Davis in 1958 and 1959, and spent much of the rest of the time on the outskirts of the jazz scene. Her refusal to adopt a more "mainstream" jazz style led to difficulty in finding bookings and making recordings. She made her first recordings in 1955 with a then-unknown piano player named Ray Bryant. The album, Meet Betty Carter and Ray Bryant, was little received, and her second set of recordings, with the Gigi Gryce band in 1956, languished unpublished until 1980. By 1958, she was ready to record again, and another little known album, I Can't Help It, was the result, followed closely by a recording on the Peacock label (a Texas gospel label), Out There. She was developing a reputation as a fiercely independent woman (an attitude she developed based in part on her interactions with Gladys Hampton, Lionel's no-nonsense wife) and a devoted jazz singer, and her popularity among the inner jazz circles was high, but critical and popular acclaim eluded her. She was becoming well-known for her signature style that combined off-beat interpretations of classic tunes and wild scat-singing that never seemed to find the right beat. Even a move to the ABC label for her 1960 album The Modern Sound of Betty Carter did little to help that. She needed a break, and it came in the form of Ray Charles. Ray Charles, on a recommendation from Miles Davis, agreed to take Betty on tour with him in the late 1950s. Enchanted by her voice and looking for a partner to record a series of duets, he enlisted Ms. Carter in a project that became Ray Charles and Betty Carter. The album, recorded in 1961, became an instant critical and popular smash; the single Baby It's Cold Outside gave Betty her first introduction into the popular music scene (indeed, at the 1997 White House ceremony where President Clinton presented Ms. Carter with a National Medal of Arts, the President said, "Hearing her sing 'Baby, It's Cold Outside' makes you want to curl up in front of the fire, even in summertime."). The sessions took on almost legendary status; after fifteen years in the business, fame had finally found Betty Carter. And Betty Carter chose her family. She was raising two sons at the time, Myles and Kagle Redding, and chose to concentrate on that rather than capitalize on her recent success. Other than the 1963 Atco album Round Midnight (which showcased a different side of Betty that many critics strongly disliked), and a very short 1964 United Artists album called Inside Betty Carter, she made no recordings between 1961 and 1968. She still performed, doing club dates mostly around the New York area, but the name of Betty Carter eventually faded back into obscurity again. By 1969, though, Betty was ready to get back into music. The problem was - no one seemed to want her. She started her road back with a live recording on the Roulette album. Finally - Betty Carter (an apt title) is considered one of her finest works, but it didn't garner much interest at the time. A second live recording, again titled 'Round Midnight, met with t

Conversation with MULGREW MILLER This week on Spotlight On Jazz and Poetry Mulgrew Miller takes the time, from his busy schedule, to talk about his craft with your host Bigtrigger.Mulgrew Miller is an American jazz pianist born in 1955 in Greenwood, Mississippi. In a childhood filled with early musical experiences and constant meddling in jazz piano, Miller is said to have set his mind definitely to becoming a jazz pianist after hearing a record by Oscar Peterson (a first for Mulgrew). “It was a life changing event. I knew right then that I would be a jazz pianist”. Mulgrew did indeed become a jazz pianist, and has adopted more from Peterson than his profession. Much of Mulgrew's playing has the same technical prowess so often connected with Peterson. Currently, Mulgrew maintains a working trio with Derrick Hodge on bass, and Karriem Riggins on drums. With this trio he has released two albums to date (both on the label Max Jazz Records): Live At Yoshi's Vol. 1 (2004), Live At Yoshi's Vol. 2 (2005). Mr. Miller, has been hired as the new director of the jazz studies program at William Paterson University, in Wayne, N.J. On May 20, 2006, Miller was awarded the honorary degree of Doctor of Performing Arts at Lafayette College's 171st Commencement

 EVENING IN PARADISE The life of Jimmy Scott is not one of meteoric stardom but a journey that has taken nearly seventy years to find its much deserved success. James Victor Scott, one of ten children, was born in Cleveland, Ohio on July 17, 1925. He's known for his high haunting soprano voice & poignant balladeering. His up & down recording career, started in the early 1950's, saw a resurgence in the 1990's when he was signed to Sire Records and received a Grammy nomination after a long period of commercial inactivity. Soon after coming out of retirement, he was seen on stages around the world, performing magical & heart breaking interpretations of old torch songs, Broadway standards and even a smattering of choice modern rock tunes done with generally sparse jazz arrangements. Almost strangled by the umbilical cord at birth, then orphaned as a boy in depression era Cleveland, the odds against Jimmy Scott ever suceeding were further stacked by an abnormal genetic pituitary hormonal defect known as "Kallman's Syndrome" which accounts for his somewhat effeminate looks & unnaturally high singing voice. Finding solace onstage, he sang in combos of the post war R&B era, notably as a featured singer with band leader Lionel Hampton, with whom he made his recorded debut in 1950(although his name did not appear on the label). He was finally signed to a steady record deal when he was almost 30, when Herman Lubinsky of Newark's Savoy Records offered Cleveland's finest balladeer a shot circa 1954. Lubinsky, whose label was a great repository of jazz & blues recordings, was also a notorious shyster. In David Ritz's 2002 bio of Jimmy Scott "Faith In Time", Seymour Stein of Sire Records recalls past colleagues at the time calling Savoy Record's Newark HQ the "Slave Barracks". Savoy recorded some well received Little Jimmy Scott sides, but due to Lubinsky's malfeasance, Scott went mostly uncompensated. As time wore on, he grew discontent, started retreating into booze and left the label's fold by the beginning of the 1960's. Over the years the Lubinsky/Savoy contract would stifle Scott in numerous ways, particularly when he tried to break free and record for Ray Charles' Tangerine label in the early 1960's and another time with Atlantic in the late 1960's. Lubinsky would battle to have the records withdrawn, keeping Scott's music from ever hitting the streets en masse. 1969's attempt at a comeback LP "The Source" was produced by Joel Dorn for Atlantic, featuring backing from a hot group of players including David Fathead Newman on tenor sax, Eric Gale on guitar and Ron Carter on bass...The record was withdrawn due to lawsuit after the first pressing, for a longtme making it a rare and often bootleged masterpiece. Jimmy's numerous shots at stardom were so hampered by the fiscal mismanagement & bad business dealings, it lead him to frustration, failed relationships, drinking and drugging, and a career ending downward spiral that took him away from the limelight. His talent was never in doubt, but his successes were measured at best. A favorite of performers ranging from Billie Holiday & Dinah Washington, to Frankie Valli, Stevie Wonder, and John Lennon, all whom knew of and expressed respect of his work. Said Quincy Jones once,'Jimmy would tear my heart out every night with his soul-penetrating style"... Even Madonna has said "Jimmy Scott is the only singer who makes me cry," Strangely enough, it appears death that actually the catalyst that brought Scott's career back to life... By the late 70's and early 80's some of his only gigs were occasional charity appearances at senior citizen homes. Scott's day jobs at Bob's Big Boy and in a Cleveland Sheraton hotel gave him a mindset that was set far from keeping abreast of the changing tastes of a fickle record buying public at the tail end of the 20th century. In 1985, at age 60, he returned to the eastern seaboard, and for the first time in over a decade star