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Part 1 - The Return of Red Mitchell - Gene Lees
© Copyright ® Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.“My father who was at Stevens, a tough engineering school in Hoboken, NJ, was able to explain to me that Mother Nature never...
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Bordeaux Concert’ by Keith Jarrett Review: An Ode to Spontaneity
© Copyright ® Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.“There are some simple virtues in his playing which any listener can surely respond to: gorgeous melodies, patiently evocative...
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Part 2 - The Return of Red Mitchell - Gene Lees
© Copyright ® Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.“The book received many reviews in praise. The one that meant the most to me was by Bob Cranshaw, which appeared in Allegro, the...
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Jimmy Crawford - the Engine Room for the Jimmie Lunceford Harlem Express
© Copyright ® Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.“The drummer situation is unbelievable. There are not many big-band drummers around. The young guys don't know how to assert...
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Ronnie Cuber - In A New York Minute
© Copyright ® Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.“Ronnie Cuber, R.I.P., 12/25/41-10/8/22The baritone saxophone summit convened by Gary Smulyan on Saturday [10/8/2022] underscores...
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Nat Hentoff "Presenting Red Mitchell" - Liner Notes as Jazz Education
© Copyright ® Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.In today’s tech-enabled world, streaming music services are ubiquitous and as such provide a handy means to listen to Jazz or other...
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Dave McKenna [1930-2008] - The Ted Panken Interview [From The Archives]
© -Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.“Dave McKenna was simply one of the legends of the jazz piano. He, of course, would probably have disagreed. "I don't know if I qualify as a...
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Toots Thielemans Meets Rob Franken, Studio Sessions 1973-1983, Nederlands...
© Copyright ® Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.Toots Thielemans (1922-2016) would have turned one hundred years old on April 29, 2022. In collaboration with the Private...
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Woody Herman: The Early Herds [From the Archives}
© -Steven A. Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.I think one of the great tragedies in the field of writings about Jazz is that Gunther Schuller never completed his promised third volume...
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Ronnie Cuber - Boffo Baritone Saxophonist
Ronnie Cuber, Master Jazz baritone saxophonist, left us on October 7, 2022 and I am re-posting this piece from the archives to his memory.As both my Jazz buddy and Scott Yanow have noted [see below],...
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Chico Hamilton Quintet - The Robert Gordon/Mosaic Records Notes [From the...
© - Steven A. Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.Robert “Bob” Gordon is an authority on what he prefers to label “Jazz on the West Coast.” Bob is also a friend of mine and an all-around...
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Theodore "Fats" Navarro: 1923-1950 - A Career Retrospective
© - Steven A. Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.“Fats was a spectacular musician because, in a time when cats arrived on the scene with nothing, he came on with everything: he could...
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College Goes to Jazz - Westlake College Quintet [From the Archives with...
© Copyright ® Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.The introductory paragraphs of this feature on Jazz at Westlake College are drawn from Michael T. Spencer’s Jazz Education at the...
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Ronnie Cuber Obituary - Gordon Jack
© Copyright ® Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.“Cuber has become increasingly in demand as a clinician and guest artist at university and college music programs across North...
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Mingus Big Band - In the Beginning
© Copyright ® Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.The passing of Sue Mingus [September 24, 2022] and baritone saxophonist Ronnie Cuber [October 7, 2002] in less than a month of one...
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Duke's Drummers
© Copyright ® Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.“These drummers performed for others, for the band. We neglect drummers of that kind. We don’t seem to know what a drummer really...
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The M-Squad and TV Jazz - 60 Years Ago!
© -Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.I never knew that I had anything in common with the late movie, television and stage actor, Lee Marvin [1924–1987], that is until I undertook...
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Ahmad Jamal - Emerald City Nights
© Copyright ® Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.“The first time I heard Ahmad, I was in high school, I was getting ready to go to bed and I had the jazz station on. This was in...
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Billy Mitchell: 1926-2000 - A Tribute [from the Archives with Revisions]
© -Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.Billy Mitchell’s musical story is a tale of two cities: Kansas City, Missouri where he was born and Detroit, Michigan where he grew up.What...
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