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Grammys 2012 Nominees – Best Jazz Vocal Album

Posted in 2012 Grammys, The Jazz Continues..., Video Vault with tags 2012 Grammys, jazz, jazz vocalists, karrin allyson, kurt elling, roseanna vitro, terri lyne carrington, tierney sutton on February 10, 2012 by curtjazz

Okay Jazz Peeps, the Grammys do feel a bit empty this year, after the purge of many categories, including jazz.

However, there are still some fine artists, who did great work over the past year, and whose work has been nominated. These people had nothing to do with the shortsighted decision-making of the NARAS, so I want to take a few posts to recognize them, with a track from their nominated work. I’ll also include a few brief thoughts about each work.

We’ll start with Best Jazz Vocal Album

The nominees are:

Karrin Allyson – ‘Round Midnight (Concord Records): Track “Goodbye”

IMO this is not Ms. Allyson’s best work, but she is still one of the best around today. It’s well sung, as always but the Only The Lonely vibe wore thin after a while.

Terri Lyne Carrington – The Mosaic Project (Concord Records): Track “Transformation” [Vocal by Nona Hendryx]

My hands down favorite among the nominated albums, it’s a mostly vocal effort by Ms. Carrington and a number of other ladies. One of our picks for Best Jazz Albums of 2011.

Kurt Elling – The Gate (Concord Records): Track “Golden Lady”

Mr. Elling is a perennial nominee in this category, who finally won on his prior nomination for his strong Coltrane/Hartman tribute Dedicated To You. Though The Gate had some fine moments, I found it overall, to be just “okay”.

Tierney Sutton – American Road (BFM Jazz): Track “Wayfaring Stranger”

This album was a big favorite among the critics and it just may take home the prize on Sunday. Excellent musicianship; I just wished that it swung a little harder.

Roseanna Vitro – The Music of Randy Newman (Motéma): Track “Mama Told Me Not To Come

This is another personal favorite in this category. I’ve long been a fan of Randy Newman’s sardonic wit and wondered when a jazz vocalist would mine the Newman songbook to great extent. Ms. Vitro seemed at first like an unlikely choice, but she sings the songs as if they were written for her and the arrangements are first-rate. She is a longshot in this category but it would not be at all disappointing to see her win.

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A Video Tribute to Oscar Brown, Jr.

Posted in The Jazz Continues..., Video Vault with tags jazz videos, jazz vocalists, oscar brown jr on November 11, 2011 by curtjazz

Oscar Brown, Jr. (1926 – 2005)

This piece was originally intended as a birthday tribute to Oscar Brown, Jr. I couldn’t move fast enough to get it out last month, but the tracks were too good to languish in the draft file, so here it is a month later.

Many know Mr. Brown for “But I Was Cool”, one of his lighter pieces, which achieved some fame when a deodorant company used it (with Brown’s vocals) to advertise their product.

Oscar Brown was the natural predecessor to Gil Scott-Heron and other spoken word music poets. He composed over 1,000 songs, at least a dozen plays and recorded 12 albums, including the classic “Sin and Soul”; during his lifetime. He was also a political activist, who ran for the Illinois State Legislature and Congress.

I usually keep the text to a minimum during these video tribute posts and this one will be no exception, so here now are some great performances by a legendary griot.

Let’s start with this terrific overview:

Here he adds a heartfelt touch to Bobby Timmons’ “Dat Dere”

“The Snake” – with that irresistible refrain

And one of his best, IMHO, “Mr. Kicks”

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Birthday Video Tribute – Anita O’Day

Posted in The Jazz Continues..., Video Vault with tags anita o'day, jazz, jazz videos, jazz vocalists on October 18, 2011 by curtjazz

Anita O’Day was so cool, that she was hot.

In my book, she’s up there with Sarah, Ella, Billie, Nina and Carmen. Like those ladies, she was an original. You can recognize her within three notes. And her way of bending a long note (purportedly necessitated by a botched tonsillectomy), was pure artistry; others imitated it but they could never duplicate it.

Her life story is the stuff of a Hollywood movie. A great documentary has already been made, but man, a writer could have a field day on her without even having to bend the facts!

I asked myself, what made Anita O’Day so amazing? Then it hit me – like Wynton and Esperanza, Anita was born on October 18, which is also my birthday.

Here are a few familiar and not so familiar tracks from the great lady. Including, the unforgettable part of her set from Newport ’58 that was included in Jazz On A Summer’s Day.

After watching, you may understand how I feel.

Happy Birthday Anita, wherever you are…

Mother’s Day…Dinah’s Biggest Fan

Posted in In Memoriam, The Jazz Continues..., Video Vault with tags Dinah Washington, jazz videos, jazz vocalists on May 7, 2011 by curtjazz

My mother loved life and lived it joyously. She loved to be around people, she loved to laugh and though she didn’t do it very well, she loved to sing. I still remember the sound of Mom’s singing voice as she was in the kitchen or at her sewing machine. However, even when I was a child, her singing sounded unusual to me. It was a bit affected and nasal. It sounded nothing like her speaking voice. I often wondered, but never asked, where in the world did it come from?

I also knew from an early age that my mom was a fan of Dinah Washington. Though Mom was not a big LP buyer, I noticed that there were three Dinah Washington albums in the storage side of the stereo console; more than any other artist. Mom also spoke often of hearing Dinah live back when she lived in Chicago. I never bothered to listen to those records – they belonged to my parents, so they had to be corny. Besides, one of them was a “Memorial Album”, so this Dinah lady was dead. Why should I listen?

Mom died of breast cancer when I was 28. I was a nascent jazz fan by then, but I was yet to develop the love for the classic female vocalists (Sarah, Ella, Billie, Anita, etc.), that I now possess. Not too long after Mom’s death, I was on a therapeutic Tower Records run, with a good friend, Mike, who was/is a big fan of vocalists. One of the things he picked up was a 2-LP Dinah Verve Collection.

We got back to his place to have a few beers and listen to our spoils. The first thing he dropped on the turntable was the Dinah album. After the brief swinging horn line she began to sing:

“If they asked me; I could write a book…”

I stopped talking and I listened intently. All at once it hit me. That was the sound that Mom was looking for, but never quite achieved. Consciously, or not, each time my mother sang, she was paying tribute to her favorite vocalist: “Miss D”.

From that night on, Dinah Washington became my favorite jazz vocalist. The others are all great in their own way, but Dinah – well, she’s special…

Happy Mother’s Day y’all.

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