Bassist Liz Draper has been running a residency at Berlin for October and she’s wrapping it up on Sunday, October 27 with her friend Ava Mendoza. Mendoza is a celebrated guitarist and composer based in Brooklyn and her friendship with Draper goes back almost 25 years. Liz spoke about her approach to improvising on the bass, her recent experience with...Read More
Chris Botti is renowned trumpeter with lots of crossover appeal and a penchant for recording ballads. In this conversation with Jazz88’s Peter Solomon, Botti discusses his musical inspirations, discusses studying with legendary post-bop trumpeter Woody Shaw, recalls his days touring with the temperamental drum legend and bandleader Buddy Rich, and speaks on the varying approaches...Read More
L.A. Buckner and BiG HOMiE – Vengeance is Mine Saith The Lord Julius Rodriguez – Love Everlasting feat. Keyon Harrold Khruangbin – Ada Jean Lakecia Benjamin – New Mornings Laufey – It Could Happen to You Take That Back – Playhouse Bats Joel Shapira – Sleepless Montage Orrin Evans and the Captain Black Big...Read More
Guitar phenom Cory Wong connected with the Metropole Orkest for his latest effort Starship Syncopation and the sound is rich, full and at times hypnotic. On the tune “305” Wong also tapped in saxophonist Chris Potter and the Miami mainstay quartet Electric Kif. The tune is six minutes full of groove with the band luxuriating in the...Read More
Mike Lewis, the celebrated multi-instrumentalist known for his work with Happy Apple, Fat Kid Wednesdays and Alpha Consumer, connected with Jazz88 to discuss the run of shows he’ll be doing in November at Icehouse. Lewis highlighted some of the artists he’ll be collaborating with like Anthony Cox, S. Carey and Jeremy Yvilsaker. He also discussed...Read More
Jazz88 celebrates the birthday of Clare Fischer, born on October 22, 1928. Fischer was an innovative arranger and an accomplished keyboardist and composer. His tunes Pensativa and Morning have become jazz standards. He worked with the vocal group the Hi-Los, trumpeter Donald Byrd, Dizzy Gillespie, and made several recordings of latin jazz and bossa nova under his own name as well. Herbie Hancock cited Fischer...Read More
Mere days away from releasing their sophomore album NORFSIDE drummer L.A. Buckner and his bandmates from BiG HOMiE are ready to celebrate an album that’s been years in the making. Buckner, alongside David Smith and percussionist Jamani Buckner, spoke about the songwriting process, the importance of releasing the album at an iconic venue (the Capri...Read More
Celebrated Danish vocalist Sinne Eeg is making her way to the Twin Cities for a show at Crooners on Thursday, October 17. Eeg was nice enough to hop on the phone with Sean from the Afternoon Cruise to talk about her upcoming performance at Crooners and about how she approaches singing with different size groups!...Read More
L.A. Buckner and BiG HOMiE – Fireflies Take That Back – Lake Rousseau 1980 Laufey – From the Start Judy Carmichael – I Don’t Know Enough About You Lakecia Benjamin – Phoenix Reimagined Yussef Dayes – Rust feat. Tom Misch Lizz Wright – Sweet Feeling Shelly Berg – Home With You Julian Lage –...Read More
Guitarist, Joel Shapira, is back at it with a quartet he last recorded with almost two decades ago. The new record is called Sleepless Montage and the band sounds really comfortable diving back into a new set of tunes penned by Shapira. I was first drawn to the title track at first cause of the...Read More
