News & Updates — out-jazz

Happy birthday to the boisterous Clifford Jarvis, stylish drummer of post-bop and free jazz who also worked well with other percussionists. He was from Boston and came from a family of trumpeters. He started playing drums at 10 and studied with Alan Dawson. Early professional experience with Chet Baker and Randy Weston set him up for some gigs with heavy hitters of the '60s & '70s. Operating out of NYC and Chicago, he played or recorded with a host of amazing musicians: Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Grant Green, John Coltrane, Coleman Hawkins, Big John Patton, Barry Harris, Yusef Lateef, Curtis Fuller, Elmo...

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...

Yes, I know it's the birthday today of a more famous pianist, Bill Evans, but I want to highlight Mal Waldron because I like his music better (it's just a matter of personal taste, pal) and I feel that he is underrated, despite a much-longer career than Evans. Born to West Indian parents in NYC, Mal grew up in Jamaica, Queens and took piano lessons before also playing alto sax in bands as a teenager. In the '40s he was witness to the bebop explosion and after college switched permanently to piano. Turning pro in '50, he cut first record...

Happy birthday to the underrated saxophonist/composer/activist/author Fred Wei-han Houn aka Fred Ho. His ambitious operas, ballets and multi-art compositions brought a radical, questioning temperament and a cross-mingling of improvised music and folk art to his fiery and political works. With his many groups (Asian-American Art Ensemble, Green Monster Big Band, Saxophone Liberation Front, Afro Asian Music Ensemble) he created several brilliantly charged records on labels like Innova, Mutable, Asian Improv, Soul Note and others. His concepts were informed by not just radical politics and feminism but also dance, martial arts and literary influence. A Chinese-American who grew up in Western...

One of the greats, happy birthday to jazz bassist/composer/activist Charlie Haden. He was part of the revolutionary Ornette Coleman Quartet that took the jazz world by storm when they arrived in NYC in the late '50s. He grew up in Iowa from a professional country music family, singing with them until polio messed up his voice. After seeing Charlie Parker and Stan Kenton live in '54 he started playing jazz as a bassist. In '57 he moved to Los Angeles and started playing with Paul Bley, Art Pepper and Hampton Hawes. He was roommate for awhile with bass legend Scott...