Dee Daniels makes an impact as a singer, whether accompanying herself at the piano, or fronting a big band, trio, or symphony. Her hypnotic tone, paired with her four-octave range, amazing improvisation capabilities, and emotional intensity, have been capturing attention all over the world for more than three decades.
The roots of her sound come from [...]

On Sunday, February 19, the Robert Glasper Experiment is hitting Winnipeg. Nine days later, they’ll release their much-anticipated album on Blue Note Records, Black Radio. This will mark the Experiment’s first full-length album, and it will feature many high profile guests, including Lalah Hathaway, Erykah Badu, Musiq Soulchild, and Stokley Williams of Mint Condition.
Glasper is [...]

by Derrick Gardner
When I was in high school back in the early 1980s, I remember hearing a tune called “Straphangin” on our local jazz radio station. The artists performing this tune were the Brecker Brothers and it was the title track of the album that was released in 1980. This was my introduction to Randy [...]

On Saturday, July 30, Babs (Ruth) Asper died suddenly and unexpectedly, and Winnipeg’s jazz community lost a quiet leader. Like her husband Izzy, Babs was a great lover of jazz music, attending and hosting concerts, and offering all kinds of support to many of this city’s artists.
I knew very soon after arriving here in Winnipeg [...]

Trumpeter Derrick Gardner has an impressive resume. Among his many accomplishments: he’s played with Count Basie, he was a protégé of Frank Foster, he’s toured with Harry Connick Jr, and he’s performed with Wynton Marsalis’s Jazz at Lincoln Center orchestra. (You may have heard his acrobatic improvising and incredible trumpet sound when he did a [...]

Wynton Marsalis is easily the most artistically and politically successful jazz musician in history. He’s among the most popular—perhaps not more than Duke Ellington or Louis Armstrong, but he’s up in their ranks. He’s the gold standard by which trumpet players are measured. You might be as good as Wynton, but I don’t know if [...]

Winnipeg’s music lovers are getting excited. On March 20, the Winnipeg Jazz Orchestra welcomes one of brightest luminaries of our time, bassist Rufus Reid. For more than 35 years, this powerhouse artist has been injecting life into all aspects of the music scene, his creativity extending beyond all labels and boundaries. He teams up with [...]

Pianist and composer David Braid is one of Canada’s most creative and prolific young musicians. His own compositions combine a harmonic intricacy gleaned from his study of Western classical music with the improvisational tradition of American jazz. He has recorded seven albums with five different ensembles, garnering four Juno nominations. Currently, he is focusing on [...]

This year marks the inception of Tarbut: Festival of Jewish Culture, a week of concerts, lectures, and films at the Rady Jewish Community Centre that runs from November 13 through 21. Two of the concerts will be of particular interest to jazz lovers.

The first is the headliner concert, “The 3 Cohens,” featuring siblings Avishai on [...]

The New York Times calls Allan Harris “an extremely relaxed and tasteful crooner in the Nat ‘King’ Cole tradition,” and that lineage is strong for him: he performed a concert tribute, “Unforgettable: The Songs of Nat ‘King’ Cole” at the Kennedy Center, and released a live recording, Long Live the King. He has the [...]

Hank Jones is one of the most ubiquitous personalities in jazz history. His recordings number in the thousands, and range from sides with Hot Lips Page and Lucky Thompson in his early days all the way to contemporaries like Diana Krall and Christian McBride. He’s been on special projects with avant garde artists like Charlie [...]

Considered by many to be the most proficient improviser in jazz history, Sonny Rollins is the last remaining true jazz giant of his era. A contemporary of Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Clifford Brown and Thelonious Monk, Rollins performed with all of these luminaries whilst shaping his own legendary career as a bandleader.

Sonny Rollins [...]

A seasoned master of the piano and a leading voice in modern jazz, Mulgrew Miller continues to advance the tradition of swinging improvised music. From stints with Art Blakey, Woody Shaw, Betty Carter and Tony Williams to recording sessions with Dave Holland and Kenny Garrett to his dozen releases as a leader, Miller consistently delights [...]

Pianist Kenny Barron is a bona fide jazz master. Over his fifty-year career he has played with many of the best in the business, from apprenticing with legends such as Dizzy Gillespie and James Moody, to more recent collaborations with the likes of Charlie Haden and Regina Carter. His discography is a mile long, with [...]

I’m a fan of the drums and the people who play them. When I hear a song, the first thing I listen to is the drum part. I’ll watch the drummer more than anyone else in the band. Drums have the power in modern-day music, whether hard rock or country ballads, to drive and give structure [...]

When guitarist and singer John Pizzarelli takes to the stage in November as part of this season’s Izzy Asper Jazz Performances, audiences can settle in for a feast of classics from the American Songbook, delivered with panache.
Born in 1960, Pizzarelli began to play guitar at the age of six, following in the footsteps of his [...]

One day this past year, our jazz history class was studying Horace Silver, one of the great jazz pianists and composers. Our guest lecturer laid out about what you’d expect from a good, informative lecture, and then he began recalling things he learned when he played with Horace…
With the faculty appointment of saxophonist Jimmy Greene, [...]

Steve Turre is the real deal. He has performed with more jazz luminaries than I can name. He played with Woody Shaw. He was part of Art Blakey’s band. He recorded with Ray Charles. Add Dizzy Gillespie, McCoy Tyner, Herbie Hancock, Tito Puente, Pharoah Sanders, Horace Silver, Max Roach, Rahsaan Roland Kirk, and a whole [...]

Have you had this conversation?
You: Like jazz? Other Human: No, not really, but I love Kind of Blue.
I’ve had it so many times that I’ll venture Miles Davis’ 1959 album is the one jazz record you know if you know no others. And for those who do know others, it’s the singularity just before the [...]

Sophie Milman is a new jazz singer who is making waves across Canada and in other countries around the world. Her first self-titled disc, Sophie Milman, sold over 100,000 copies and gained her wide critical attention. Her second CD, the 2007 recording Make Someone Happy, won her a Juno for Vocal Jazz Album of the [...]