Jazz

Guitarist and singer Marty Grosz and cornet player Randy Reinhart join us for a special in-studio performance in honor of the 100th birthday of Thomas "Fats" Waller. He would have been 100 on May 21. Grosz and Reinhart will perform songs composed by the great pianist and vocalist. Waller wrote many hit songs, appeared in films in the 1930s and 1940s, and wrote Broadway musicals.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews Give (Columbia) the latest by the trio The Bad Plus.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews a new box set of Dave Brubeck's Time Out albums.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews The Complete Verve Roy Eldridge Sessions on the mail-order Mosaic label. The box set includes seven CDs.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews Jones' second album, Feels Like Home, on the jazz label Blue Note.

Ed Ward reviews the career of almost unknown soul singer Bobby Paterson.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews the new reissue Black Christ of the Andes (Smithsonian label) by pianist Mary Lou Williams.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews the new CD by German Pianist and free jazz pioneer Alexander von Schlippenbach. His quartet's new CD is called Broomriding.

We present two interviews from the archives: a 1987 concert featuring ballads and popular songs, and a 1988 Christmas concert performed by the jazz vocalist. She considered Billie Holliday her main influence. McCorkle died in May of 2001, of an apparent suicide.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead provides holiday gift suggestions. He reviews two CDs: Count Basie’s America’s #1 Band and MJQ, The Complete Modern Jazz Quartet Prestige and Pablo Recordings, and one combo CD/DVD, Monk in Paris: Live at the Olympia.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews the new reissue of Blossom Dearie's 1959 album, My Gentleman Friend, on Verve records.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews the new release by tenor sax player Johnny Griffin and pianist Horace Parlan, Close Your Eyes.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews two new CDs by the Art Ensemble of Chicago, The Meeting and Tribute to Lester.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews Extended Play — Live at Birdland, a new, live double album from the Dave Holland Quintet.

Kevin Whitehead reviews Thelonious Monk's classic 1962 album Criss Cross, recently reissued on Columbia Records.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews the long-awaited reissue of trombonist Rod Levitt's octet's first album: The Dynamic Sound Patterns of The Rod Levitt Orchestra.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews a new compilation of Bob Hope's singing, Best of Bob Hope (Capitol).

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews New Beginnings (MaxJazz) the new CD by trumpeter Terell Stafford.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews Phantoms, the new CD from tenor saxophonist Virginia Mayhew.

Veteran producer, pianist, singer, club owner George Wein. He's the founder of the Newport Jazz Festival, the Newport Folk Festival, and the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival. In the early 1950s he founded the jazz clubs Storyville and Mahogany Hall in Boston where jazz giants Art Tatum, Sidney Bechet, Charlie Parker, Stan Getz and Miles Davis played. In 1954 he launched the Newport Jazz Festival where he presented Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughn, Dave Brubeck and others.