News & Updates — Chicago

One of the three great Kings of blues guitar, along with BB and Albert, Freddie King was a commanding singer and an awesome electric guitarist with fast fingers. He was a huge influence on Eric Clapton, Stevie Ray Vaughan and other pale-faced blues-rockers. Originally from Dallas, he started playing guitar at six. He moved to Chicago as a teenager and started absorbing all the killer blues happening in the city. He started playing in bands in the early '50s and worked with Willie Dixon, Little Walter, Jimmy Rogers, Robert Lockwood Jr and others. When King got the call to cut...

A self-taught tenor saxophonist (and activist) from Chicago, Clifford Jordan was underrated and not a flashy type but he enjoyed a long career in jazz, traveling all over the world and lending his hand to various non-profits. While still in Chicago he played R&B, as well as bop with Max Roach and Sonny Stitt. In '57 he moved to NYC, and cut his first of three albums for Blue Note, the classic Blowing In From Chicago, co-led with Sun Ra's tenor man John Gilmore and featuring members of the Jazz Messengers. In the late '50s he worked in groups led...

The original Flying Luttenbacher, Hal Russell was a Chicago icon. A multi-instrumentalist, he played tenor sax, c-melody, soprano, drums, trumpet, vibes, marimba, musette, congas and keyboards. One of the most surreal jazz characters of the second half of the twentieth-century jazz scene, this guy brought humor, theater and playfulness into his artform. Harold Luttenbacher was born in Detroit, played drums in Dixieland and swing bands (Woody Herman, etc) before discovering bebop. Moving with his family to Chi-town as a teenager, he started playing trumpet as a second instrument in college. In 1950 he played drums with Miles Davis and did...

Happy earth arrival day to one of my favorite bassists, Malachi Favors Maghostut. Most famous for playing in my all time favorite group, the highly theatrical and musical Art Ensemble of Chicago, he's also played and recorded with all of the Art Ensemble members, as well as Kahil El'Zabar's Ritual Trio, Archie Shepp, Cheikh Tidiane Fall, Andrew Hill, Wadada Leo Smith, Sunny Murray, Dennis Gonzalez, Fred Anderson, Muhal Richard Abrams, Dewey Redman and many, many more. Born in Mississippi, he started playing bass as a teenager and in '53 made his recording debut with Paul Bascomb after which he found...

Happy birthday to James Ramey aka Baby Huey. He cut a great album with his Babysitters band (produced by Curtis Mayfield) but died at only 26. From Richmond, IN he moved to Chicago after high school and formed Baby Huey & his Babysitters in 1963. They played a mixture of rock and R&B and cut some singles before the classic sampladelic full length album, The Baby Huey Story, which actually came out after he passed. He rapped & rhymed during the well-remembered live shows back in the late '60s. Curtis Mayfield and Donny Hathaway took notice and agreed to put...