The New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival has announced its line-up for the 2017 edition. The two weekends of April 28th and May 7th will have a ton of local and regional acts again plus dozens of headliners sure to draw a lot of attention from music lovers the world over. On the first day,…
After almost three weeks abroad, Gina was excited and oh so happy to have me back earlier this week. It is now back to business as usual with up to four walks every day, playing ball, and watching cat videos. We are currently listening to each and every one of the 41 LPs I bought…
Twenty more quality soul gems from the Real Side Soul Coalition have come my way – numbers 3, 4, and 5 were also reviewed on these pages and the rare 1974 “Funny How We’ve Changed Places” by the great Debra Anderson opens up this great collection of songs which were recorded between 1969 and 1985….
When ACT founder Siggi Loch invited journalists over for a special luncheon during the 1992 Montreux Jazz Festival to celebrate the start of his new label, I didn’t expect this particular label to be where it is, 25 years later. Or that it still would be in existence even. I also remember that a young…
On my last day of this fabulous trip, I went to see two of my favorite artists: the queen of soul and jazz flute, Bobbi Humphrey, and the incredibly soulful Portland-based singer, songwriter, and pianist Jarrod Lawson. Ginny’s Supper Club at the Red Rooster on Lenox Avenue, right off the bubbling 125th Street in Harlem, was…
More record store visits on Thursday, like Solo Records & Tapes on Woodward Avenue in Royal Oak or Street Corner Music on Greenfield in Oak Park. Peggy Lee, Noel Pointer, Aretha Franklin, The Jones Girls, etc. I’ve also toured the Henry Ford Museum where they have a lot of artifacts from the American history, from…
So here I am in Detroit going to all these great record stores, like Peoples Records on Woodward Avenue or Found Sound on West 9 Mile in Ferndale. They even have this big guide list of all the record shops in Detroit and the metro region. I’m just trying to figure out how to schlep…
I had no idea that this would already be singer Natalie Douglas‘ 51st performance at Birdland and I never told anyone but I was originally scheduled to fly to Detroit on Monday and when I realized that she was singing at Birdland that night, I rescheduled and postponed my flight to Tuesday. Was it worth…
It was a double-bill last night at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center with the Whispers and Gladys Knight performing at the venue’s Prudential Hall. Celebrating 52 years in the business and still going strong, the three remaining founding members of the group, the Scott twins Walter and Wallace and Leaveil Degree, took us on…
A Rhodes keyboard and a Hohner D6 Clavinet is all it takes to make me happy. And of course someone who is able to play them. Nicholas Payton was introducing music from his forthcoming release “Afro-Caribbean Mixtape” (out on February 10th) at Dizzy’s Club Coca-Cola on Thursday night. And the continuous groove, sometimes swampy…