93 articles
Louis Prima
Louis Prima (1910–1978), New Orleans-born Sicilian-American trumpeter, singer, and bandleader, composer of "Sing, Sing, Sing"; his 1950s Sahara Hotel Las Vegas act with Keely Smith and Sam Butera won a Grammy and shaped lounge entertainment.
Love for Sale (Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga album)
Love for Sale (2021) is Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga's second and final duet album, a Cole Porter tribute recorded 2018-2020 at Electric Lady Studios; it won the 2022 Grammy for Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album and debuted at #1 on the jazz charts.
Maceo Parker
Maceo Parker (born 1943, Kinston, North Carolina) is an American funk and soul-jazz saxophonist, James Brown's featured horn soloist from 1964, later of Parliament-Funkadelic and Prince's bands, known for "2% jazz, 98% funky stuff" and albums Roots Revisited and Life on Planet Groove.
Mahavishnu Orchestra
Mahavishnu Orchestra: jazz-rock fusion band formed 1970–71 by guitarist John McLaughlin with Billy Cobham, Jan Hammer, Jerry Goodman, and Rick Laird; albums The Inner Mounting Flame (1971) and Birds of Fire (1973), the latter reaching #15 on Billboard.
Max Roach
Max Roach (1924–2007), American jazz drummer, composer, and bandleader; bebop pioneer with Kenny Clarke who moved the pulse to the ride cymbal, led the Clifford Brown quintet, recorded Freedom Now Suite, founded M'Boom, and taught at UMass Amherst.
McCoy Tyner
McCoy Tyner (1938-2020), American jazz pianist and composer, pianist of the John Coltrane Quartet 1960-1965; known for quartal harmony, percussive left hand, The Real McCoy, five Grammys, NEA Jazz Master 2002.
Modal jazz
Modal jazz: jazz style improvising on modes rather than chord progressions, defined by slow harmonic rhythm. Pioneered via George Russell's 1953 theory, Miles Davis's "Milestones" (1958) and Kind of Blue (1959), then Coltrane's 1960s work.
Music of New Orleans
Music of New Orleans: the city's jazz, brass band, R&B, funk, gospel, and bounce traditions, rooted in Congo Square, Storyville, Buddy Bolden's 1895 band, second line parades, and a live-music economy of about 28,000 gigs a year.
National Jazz Museum in Harlem
The National Jazz Museum in Harlem is a Smithsonian-affiliated museum in New York City founded in 1997, known for the Savory Collection of live jazz recordings.
Ornette Coleman
Ornette Coleman (1930–2015), Fort Worth-born alto saxophonist and composer, father of free jazz; creator of harmolodics; Atlantic albums, Prime Time, 2007 Pulitzer for Sound Grammar.
Pat Metheny
Pat Metheny, born Patrick Bruce Metheny in 1954, is an American jazz guitarist and composer who leads the Pat Metheny Group and has won 20 Grammy Awards.
Peter Erskine
Peter Erskine, born 1954 in Somers Point, New Jersey, is an American jazz drummer, Kenton and Weather Report alumnus (five albums, Grammy for 8:30), Steps Ahead and ECM recording artist, two-time Grammy winner, USC professor, and Fuzzy Music label owner.
Ragtime
Ragtime is a syncopated American piano music genre popular c. 1890-1917, originating in African American communities; led by Scott Joplin's Maple Leaf Rag, it preceded jazz and also names Doctorow's 1975 novel and the 1998 and 2025 Broadway musical.
Return to Forever
Return to Forever: American jazz fusion band founded 1971 in New York by Chick Corea; first Latin-flavored ECM edition with Flora Purim, Airto Moreira, Joe Farrell, Stanley Clarke; classic electric quartet with Clarke, Lenny White, Al Di Meola; four Top 40 albums 1974-1977; distinct from the Amsterdam record label of the same name.
Rhythm changes
Rhythm changes: the 32-bar AABA jazz chord progression derived from Gershwin's 1930 song "I Got Rhythm" (I Got Rhythm changes), with I–vi–ii–V A sections and a III7–VI7–II7–V7 bridge, usually in B-flat, the second-most-played jazz form after the 12-bar blues.
Robert Glasper
Robert Glasper (born 1978, Houston, Texas) is an American jazz pianist, keyboardist, and producer known for fusing jazz with hip-hop, R&B, and neo-soul; his Black Radio albums won Grammys for Best R&B Album, and he holds five Grammy wins and an Emmy.
Ronnie Scott's Jazz Club
Ronnie Scott's Jazz Club, founded by Ronnie Scott and Pete King on 30 October 1959 at 39 Gerrard Street, Soho, moved to 47 Frith Street in 1965; the first UK club to host American jazz musicians regularly.
Roy Hargrove
Roy Hargrove (1969–2018), American jazz trumpeter and flugelhornist from Waco, Texas; two-time Grammy winner (Habana, Directions In Music), neo-soul collaborator with D'Angelo, Badu, and Common, and leader of the RH Factor.
Scat singing
Scat singing: jazz vocal improvisation using nonsense syllables (vocables) instead of lyrics, treating the voice as an instrument. Key figures Louis Armstrong, Cab Calloway, Ella Fitzgerald; term first recorded 1925-30.
Sketches of Spain
Sketches of Spain: 1960 Columbia album by Miles Davis, arranged by Gil Evans, third of their collaborations; adapts Rodrigo's Concierto de Aranjuez adagio and Falla; RIAA Platinum, Grammy Hall of Fame.
Smooth jazz
Smooth jazz, also called lite jazz or contemporary jazz, is a radio-created genre blending jazz fusion, R&B, and pop into melodic instrumentals; named by Broadcast Architecture focus groups in the late 1980s, it peaked at 200+ US stations and $190 million annual ad revenue before the 2007 Portable People Meter collapse.
Sonny Rollins
Sonny Rollins (Walter Theodore Rollins, born September 7, 1930), the 'Saxophone Colossus,' was an American jazz tenor saxophonist known for Saxophone Colossus, St. Thomas, the Williamsburg Bridge practice sabbatical, pianoless trios, and honors including the Kennedy Center Honor and Polar Music Prize.
Stan Getz
Stan Getz (1927-1991), American jazz tenor saxophonist from Philadelphia, nicknamed "The Sound"; Four Brothers soloist with Woody Herman whose Jazz Samba and Getz/Gilberto (first jazz Grammy Album of the Year winner) launched the American bossa nova craze.
Stride (music)
Stride (Harlem stride piano) is a jazz piano style from 1910s-1930s New York, growing out of ragtime. Its left hand strides between bass notes or tenths and chords; James P. Johnson was its father.
Take Five
Take Five is a 1959 jazz standard by Paul Desmond, recorded by the Dave Brubeck Quartet on Time Out in 5/4 time and E-flat minor; the 1961 single became the first million-selling modern jazz hit.
The Cinematic Orchestra
The Cinematic Orchestra: British nu-jazz/electronic group founded by Jason Swinscoe in London in 1999 on Ninja Tune, known for Motion, Every Day, Ma Fleur, To Believe, the Dziga Vertov score Man With a Movie Camera, and the song To Build a Home.
The Entertainer (rag)
The Entertainer (A Rag Time Two Step) is a 1902 Scott Joplin piano rag published by John Stark & Son in St. Louis, revived by the 1973 film The Sting via Marvin Hamlisch's Oscar-winning adaptation, reaching Billboard's Hot 100 top three.
The Köln Concert
The Köln Concert is Keith Jarrett's 1975 ECM double album of a fully improvised solo piano recital at the Cologne Opera House, played on a faulty rehearsal piano; the best-selling solo jazz and piano album ever.
Time Out (album)
Time Out, 1959 Dave Brubeck Quartet album (Columbia), all-original jazz in odd meters: Blue Rondo a la Turk in 9/8, Take Five in 5/4; first jazz album and single to sell a million, RIAA double platinum.
Tony Williams (drummer)
Tony Williams (Anthony Tillmon Williams, 1945–1997), American jazz drummer with Miles Davis's Second Great Quintet from 1963 and founder of the fusion band Lifetime, whose Emergency! (1969) pioneered jazz-rock drumming.