The latest Apple gadget made its way around our office, amid oohs and ahhs and whatevers, triggering comments ranging from, “It’s making me carsick” to “It’s really awesome.”
Zinio, the company that brings you the outstanding digital edition of Stereophile, is also responsible for bringing to life our iPad edition; and, while I’ll probably always prefer good, old-fashioned paper, the iPad offers some obvious advantages, such as its high-resolution,…
So I hasten to take note of The Royal Toast (on the Cuneiform label), the 5th and latest album by…
That is to say, it’s one of the best piano-bass duet albums since the ones that Haden made in the ‘90s with Kenny Barron (Night and the City) and Hank Jones (Steal Away)—which begs the question: What is it about Charlie Haden’s bass playing that takes pianists to a different level?
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I didn’t make it down the shore this weekend, but I did manage to listen to lots of Bruce. I sat there on the orange couch with the sun coming through the windows, coffee and a newspaper at my side, listening to Greetings From Asbury Park, reading about the Gulf of Mexico and feeling a little helpless.
The hi-fi sounded great and the music made me feel better. But the music couldn’t do a thing about the oil.
The paper says the oil is spewing into our ocean at a rate of one Exxon Valdez…
Lots of “free” pianists have copied Hancock’s Ravelian tone-clusters, pounded out Tyner’s block chords, or mad-dashed about the keyboard like Taylor. But few (any?) have captured the balletic limber—the acrobatic joy—of this music, much less transmuted it into his or her own voice and…
“Steve,” I had asked him, “why’s it always gotta be in Brooklyn, though? Why not Jersey City?”
Steve had been wondering the same thing. And I’m now happy to report that the first Jersey City Record Riot will take place this Saturday, June 5, from 10am to 5pm at Parlay Studios (161 2nd Street), just a…
These are the things I sometimes wonder while listening to cassettes and vinyl records. This never happens while listening to compact discs; CDs just don’t inspire me in the same way, I guess. Tapes and records remind me of my mortality,…
I had no idea. I wondered if it might be better to hate him.
My uncles tell me that my parents had an old-fashioned sort of love. Childhood sweethearts, my mother and father were equally quiet, shy, and sensitive, and were only truly at ease when they were together. So you can imagine the heartache, fear, and pain felt when my father’s parents separated the young couple, moving the family from the housing projects of Newark back to the green hills of Puerto Rico.
My uncles tell me that this is when…
So let me announce that my book, 1959: The Year Everything Changed, is now out in paperback from Wiley & Sons.
As the subtitle suggests, the book covers everything about the era’s transformations—in politics, society, culture, science, and sex. But readers of this space may be especially interested in the chapters on music: the origins of Miles Davis’ Kind of Blue, the rise of Ornette Coleman, the globalization of Dave Brubeck, the roots of Motown.
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