Jazz

Before Ponty came to the States, he already had his concept. Fresh Air critic Kevin Whitehead reviews the digital reissue of Sunday Walk.

On The Late Show, a set of previously unheard solo music from 1979, the jazz pianist employs techniques like suspenseful dropouts. He had a rare ability to sound archaic — and way ahead of his time.

The virtuoso jazz musicians perform from their new album of duets. It features hymns based on a tradition called shape-note singing, which dates to the early 1800s.

Between 1917 and 1932, the label released thousands of records. Jack White's Third Man Records has joined with the reissue label Revenant to release the first of two packages documenting Paramount.

"You have to see your unimportance before you can see your importance and your significance to the wold," Haden told Fresh Air's Terry Gross in 1992. The bassist died on July 11.

Fred Hersch pulls together jazz piano traditions that have little in common. Kevin Whitehead says the classic piano, bass and drums trio format suits Hersch best of all in a review of Floating.

The brass players' debut album is a set of pieces by Seattle-based composer and improviser Wayne Horvitz.

Jazz pianist, bandleader and composer Horace Silver died Wednesday at age 85. Fresh Air critic Kevin Whitehead says that Silver had been off the scene awhile, but his influence is as strong as ever. Hear an appreciation.

Famed jazz pianist Horace Silver died yesterday. He spoke with Terry Gross in 1984.

Two fine albums by drummer Ronald Shannon Jackson and the Decoding Society, Man Dance and its sequel Barbeque Dog, are now available again as downloads, after being out of print for ages. Fresh Air critic Kevin Whitehead says they're prime examples of the 1980s' so-called "free-funk" movement.