02
Jul
2008
Any
description of Recapturing the
Banjo feels inaccurate.
It was released under the name of trance-blues artist Otis Taylor yet is more of an all-star collaboration, featuring Guy Davis, Corey Harris, Alvin Youngblood Hart, Keb' Mo', and Don Vappie on the titular instrument.
Yet that description would suggest an album dominated by the banjo, and overloaded with it, when the reality is that the instrument is merely an accent on some tracks, including "Hey Joe," with a ringing electric-guitar solo closer to Hendrix than anything traditional.
The
Great Black Music Ensemble, with almost 40 members, has long been an
avant-garde force in jazz. CDBaby.com asserted that the ensemble
brings "the excitement of new sounds and rhythms, while
incorporating the traditions of black music including funk, reggae,
bebop, swing, and more" to its music. The group is one of two bands
connected to the Association for the Advancement of Creative
Musicians (AACM), a group that has made "unparalleled contributions
to modern music," according to JazzPolice.com. Before 2005, the
ensemble was known as the AACM Big Band.
As
a young woman, Denise LaSalle began writing songs. "I thought that
I could do that. I started writing songs and writing songs," she
said in a recent phone interview. "They used to laugh at me on my
job. 'Is she crazy? What's wrong
with her? What is she doing?'
... They wanted to know, 'Writing songs for who?' I would write a
song as I think that someone would sing it. I would say, 'I'm
writing this for Jerry Butler; this is for so-and-so. This one's
for Aretha.' In my mind this is who I thought could sing those
songs."
When
Bo Diddley died on June 2, you might have heard a story about how
that name came to be.
"I
do some of my grandfather's stuff, but I up it a notch."
