Photo by Walter Atkins SPRINGS RISING From her current tour and album to her latest muscle car, things are looking up for Kandace Springs. by CRISTOFER GROSS andace Springs has always acknowledged those who have contributed to her rise within the jazz world. Now the gifted 31-year-old singer-songwriter-musician is putting it on the record. Though […]
PREVIEW SFJazz Honors Miles, Stone Milestones Vibraphonist Warren Wolf previews octet’s October 25 Segerstrom Center concert. In 1969, Miles Davis and Sylvester Stone had milestone years. SFJAZZ Collective, which by design has a milestone year every year, is marking the half-century anniversaries of those artists’ landmarks with fresh arrangements of music from Davis’s In a
SFJAZZ COLLECTIVE 2019 Read More »
HISTORIES Hobnobbing with Obsession A chronicle of my immersion into Sondheim’s ‘Sweeney Todd’ and and a healing luncheon with the show’s star, George Hearn. by Cristofer Gross, from AirCal Magazine, June 1981 his is not a review: it’s an exorcism. A year ago, through the original cast album of 1979’s Best Musical, I began to
SWEENEY TODD | George Hearn Encounter (1981) Read More »
LEVELING FANS AND PLAYING FIELDS After flooring a jazz concert crowd with her celebration of legendary women at UCLA Terri Lyne Carrington launches a new Jazz and Gender Justice program at Berklee. by CRISTOFER GROSS n 1998, Terri Lyne Carrington was the second musician to arrive for one of Herbie Hancock’s Gershwin’s World recording sessions.
AFTERTHOUGHTS: JAZZ AND GENDER JUSTICE | November 2018 Read More »
PHOTO: ARNIE GOODMAN JOHN MAYALL’S BLUES LONG PLAYER: The 82-year-old ‘Godfather of British Blues’ has new recordings and tours as the Blues Hall of Fame inducts him. by CRISTOFER GROSS hile rock n’ roll of the 1950s has long been filed under oldies and the once mighty music of the Sixties and Seventies are hobbled
JOHN MAYALL’S BLUES Read More »
INTERMISSION | 15 minutes with … Kenny Barron or two months in Spring 2010, four headliners from the 2009 Monterey Jazz Festival are touring the U.S., supported by one headliner’s rhythm section. Before the tour began, Cristofer Gross conducted two interviews with two of the musicians – vocalist
INTERMISSION | 15 minutes with … Kurt Elling Moving Ahead: Meet the man Jazztimes calls the ‘thinking man’s vocalist’. Vocalist Kurt Elling has earned extraordinary acclaim for his recordings and live performances. Although he has remained uncompromising in his artistic exploration of both music and language, he has been riding atop the jazz polls for
VIDEOS Shorter Time ACS (Carrington, drums; Geri Allen, piano; Esperanza Spalding, bass, Weather Report’s ‘Mysterious Traveler,’ at Montreux, celebrating Wayne Shorter’s 80th birthday (June 2013) • WATCH _______ ACS, July 2013 A beautiful piece from Geri Allen, Terri Lyne Carrington and Esperanza Spalding. WATCH _______ Hancock Carrington in a familiar setting, drumming for a Herbie
TERRI LYNE CARRINGTON Read More »
INTERMISSION | 15 minutes with … Dianne Reeves Chatting with the jazz vocalist before her concert with Gregory Porter. n 2016, Dianne Reeves was the veteran and Gregory Porter the up-and-coming artist on a bill at the Segerstrom Center for the Performing Arts in Costa Mesa, California. Several months before the concert – which was
ALL ORIGINAL Karrin Allyson With the 2018 release of her first recording of originals, a look back. Two qualities that distinguish enduring jazz vocalists, beyond the ability to sing in tune, are the character of the voice and phrasing. A great contemporary example is Karrin Allyson. Allyson’s current tour, which comes to Catalina’s Jazz Club
