“Songbook” is the very first Kenny Barron album with vocals. Can you imagine? There have been individual vocal tracks here and there on past albums, but this is actually the first all-vocal album. And it’s out on double vinyl too! And it features a great crew of contemporary vocalists, both established and at the start…
So here we are again. North Sea Jazz in Rotterdam has started on a sweltering day. My first show of the festival was a classic: pianist Kenny Barron, who recently turned 80 and who remembered the days at The Hague and couldn’t really tell when he first started to play at North Sea, played a…
One of my favorite pianists, Kenny Barron, now 72, has finally recorded his own trio with Kiyoshi Kitagawa, with whom he has worked for the past 20 years, and drummer Jonathan Blake, in his trio since about 10 years. And “Book Of Intuition” starts off with a piece from his ever-evolving list of original compositions,…
Kenny Barron, one of my all-time favorite pianists, and Mark Sherman, a highly respected vibraphonist who started his own label Miles High Records in the late 90s and who has recorded with a lot of vocalists, most notably with Peggy Lee, but also with Gloria Lynne, Ann Hampton Callaway, Lena Horne, Laverne Butler, and Ruth…