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The History of Jazz. When the Smooth Jazz format began disappearing from the dial, radio veteran Larry “Doc” Elliott who won the NAB’s coveted Marconi Award with WJZZ-Detroit as Operations Manager of the nations highest rated Jazz outlet saw Jazz formatted stations being plucked from the dial in markets like Miami, Columbus, Chicago, DC, Detroit and Atlanta. Adult audiences were being ignored and left in the void. Doc and webmaster partner Frank Lovejoy decided to give Jazz loyalists an outlet. The History of Jazz Music www.thehistoryofjazzmusic.ning.com was launched at the beginning of 2010 and is coming upon it’s one year anniversary this January 2011. “We decided to give the music's ethusiasts an alternative...so we went to the web”, says Elliott. Internet viewers are loving what they do providing the Jazz Music in the form of videos that can be viewed or by minimizing our video screen and streaming just the audio at work, you can get through the workday and get into the right frame of mind for your commute home from the job. Once home reconnect online for THOJM “Quiet Storm” programming to take you smoothly through your evening hours! Members also receive weekly “THOJM History Highlights” information on Jazz greats from the past as well as bios and formation on current and newly discovered talent. At The History of Jazz Music we are “Promoting the Past and Presenting The Future” of the music. Sign up for membership today at no cost. www.thehistoryofjazzmusic.ning.com.

    Jazz is... (Spring Sweet)

 Althea Rene

This unparalleled artist, born December 25 in Detroit, Michigan, began her musical career at age four as a classical flautist. She studied classical music while attending Howard University in Washington D.C. and later she gained further musical inspiration from the accomplishments of Hubert Laws , Yusef Lateef and Dave Valentine. She has since developed her own creative style.

With three solo projects to her credit, her forth project “ No Restrictions “ is scheduled for a national release in September 2008. “ No Restrictions “ is an assortment of urban contemporary tunes with an R&B twist.

Althea René has worked more than 10 years as a Wayne County Deputy Sheriff (Detroit, Michigan). Today, Ms. René is a full-time performing artist and is regarded among musicians and enthusiasts as one of the nation’s most exciting solo improvisational flautists. She’s become so popular that was invited, as a featured artist, on Brian Culbertson’s prestigious 2007 and Norman Brown’s 2008 Smooth Jazz All-Star Cruises. Black Entertainment Television (BET) even invited Ms. Rene to write and record along side other jazz powerhouses for their hit show “Studio Jams”. Her performances emphasize her exceptional skill, soul, and artistic versatility. She puts on a fantastic show.

Please enjoy the link provided by Phatsak1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CzTaSUualMM

For more information on Althea Rene please contact us at: thehistoryofjazzmusic@gmail.com

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Who will be the next winner? Stay tuned in 2 THOJM!

Paulette A. DeSuzia
If you've been in the record business at least two months or thirty years, it's almost certain that you've heard the name, or communicated with, or received correspondence from or even been called on the phone by Paulette De Suzia. Awhspr2scrm@aol.com
http://www.peepinthescene.com/index.html

                      Ndugu  Chancler

Ndugu  Chancler  is  a  Drummer, Percussionist, Producer, Composer, Clinician,  and  Educator.

 As  a  studio  musician, Ndugu  has  recorded  with  such  greats  as  Frank Sinatra , Herbie  Hancock, Weather  Report, John  Lee  Hooker,  Kenny Rogers,  and  Michael  Jackson.  Working  on  “Thriller”  and  “Bad”, Ndugu  was  the  drummer  on  the  hit  single  “Billie  Jean”. Ndugu has also played on a number of Movie Soundtracks  including , “An  Officer  and  a Gentleman”, “Indecent  Proposal”,  and “The  Color  Purple” 

As  a  songwriter  Ndugu  co- wrote  hits  for  Santana  including  “Dance  Sister

Dance”, ”Reach  For  It”  for  George  Duke,  and  “Let  It  Whip”  for  the  Dazz  Band. His  production  credits  include Flora  Purim,  Bill  Summers,  Toki,  along  with  his  own  solo  recordings; Ndugu  and  the  Chocolate  Jam  Co.,  and  Ndugu  Chancler. Ndugu  has  co-produced  recordings  for  Santana,  George  Duke,  The  Crusaders,  Joe  Sample,  Wilton  Felder,  Tina  Turner, and  a  group

he  co-leads  with  Patrice  Rushen,  and  Ernie  Watts,  The  Meeting. These  associations  have  brought  many  Gold  and  Platinum  albums  and  Grammy

Awards.

As an educator, Ndugu has worked with the Jazz Mentorship Program in Los Angeles, Faculty Advisor to the U.S.C. JazzReach, Faculty of the Stanford Jazz Workshop and the Diaz Music Institute. Ndugu  does clinics all over the world for Yamaha, Paiste, Remo, Toca, Vic Firth, and Shure Bros. 

Ndugu Chancler is an Adjunct Professor of Jazz Studies at The University of Southern California, Flora L. Thornton School of Music.

Brenda Russell

Born Brenda Gordon, Russell is a soul singer, composer, and keyboardist. Her family moved to Toronto when she was 12. Eventually, she and her husband, Brian Russell, hosted the Canadian TV series Music Machine. They moved to Los Angeles in 1973 where they both worked as session musicians. They recorded together under the name Brian & Brenda in 1978, but their music was not received well. After the couple's divorce, Brenda embarked on a solo career. She signed with A&M and released two albums, Brenda Russell (1979) and Love Life (1981). Then she switched to Warner Bros. and put out Two Eyes in 1983. Returning to A&M, she released her most popular album, Get Here (1988), which featured the Top Ten single "Piano in the Dark" sung with Joe Esposito of Brooklyn Dreams. She received 1988 Grammy nominations for Song of the Year and Best Pop Duo Performance (for "Piano in the Dark"), as well as best Pop Female Vocal (for Get Here). After a final A&M album, 1990's Kiss Me With the Wind, she signed with EMI in 1991 and released Soul Talkin' in 1993. But the association lasted for only one album, and she went without a recording contract for the next seven years, re-emerging in July 2000 with Paris Rain on Hidden Beach. She has done session work for Barbra Streisand, Elton John, and Bette Midler, and her songs have been recorded by Streisand, Luther Vandross, and Donna Summer, among others. Please enjoy the link provided by Phatsak1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SNeyF1khFA8&feature=player_embedded

Boney James

A solid saxophonist whose style falls on the R&B-ish and pop side of jazz, Boney James (who is heavily influenced by Grover Washington, Jr.) is a consistent best-seller who can always be relied upon to put on a colorful live show. Born James Oppenheim, he grew up in New Rochelle, NY. The future Boney James studied clarinet when he was eight, switching to saxophone two years later. When he was 15, his family moved to Los Angeles. James was soon playing in a fusion band (Line One) which was strong enough to open for Flora Purim and the Yellowjackets. After a year attending U.C. Berkeley, he transferred to U.C.L.A. so he could continue playing with the band. He earned a degree in history but became a full-time musician after graduation, doubling on keyboards. James went on the road as a keyboardist with Morris Day in 1985 and eventually convinced Day that he should be playing saxophone instead. He spent four years with Day and became in-demand for guest spots on tenor, alto, soprano, and flute, playing with Randy Crawford, Sheena Easton, the Isley Brothers, Bobby Caldwell, and others. He picked up his nickname while on tour with Crawford. After mentioning to a keyboardist that he was running out of food money, the musician replied that if he ate any less, he would have to be called Boney James. The popular saxophonist made his debut as a leader with Trust in 1992 (Spindletop) and then in 1994 was signed by Warner Bros., where he recorded dates including Backbone, Seduction, Boney's Funky Christmas, Sweet Thing, Shake It Up, Ride, and Pure. In 2006, Boney made the move to Concord Records and released Shine. Send One Your Love followed in 2009. Scott Yanow, Rovi

Please enjoy the link provided by Phatsak1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xSdwVvBZFks

For more information on Boney James please contact us at: thehistoryofjazzmusic@gmail.com

The Jazz Messengers
In the '60s, when John Coltrane and Ornette Coleman were defining the concept of a jazz avant-garde, few knowledgeable observers would have guessed that in another 30 years the music's mainstream would virtually bypass their innovations, in favor of the hard bop style that free jazz had apparently supplanted. As it turned out, many listeners who had come to love jazz as a sophisticated manifestation of popular music were unable to accept the extreme esotericism of the avant-garde; their tastes were rooted in the core elements of "swing" and "blues," characteristics found in abundance in the music of the Jazz Messengers, the quintessential hard bop ensemble led by drummer Art Blakey. In the '60s, '70s, and '80s, when artists on the cutting edge were attempting to transform the music, Blakey continued to play in more or less the same bag he had since the '40s, when his cohorts included the likes of Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, and Fats Navarro. By the '80s, the evolving mainstream consensus had reached a point of overwhelming approval in regard to hard bop: this is what jazz is, and Art Blakey — as its longest-lived and most eloquent exponent — was its master.

The Jazz Messengers had always been an incubator for young talent. A list of the band's alumni is a who's who of straight-ahead jazz from the '50s on — Lee Morgan, Wayne Shorter, Freddie Hubbard, Johnny Griffin, Jackie McLean, Donald Byrd, Bobby Timmons, Cedar Walton, Benny Golson, Joanne Brackeen, Billy Harper, Valery Ponomarev, Bill Pierce, Branford Marsalis, James Williams, Keith Jarrett, and Chuck Mangione, to name several of the most well-known. In the '80s, precocious graduates of Blakey's School for Swing would continue to number among jazz's movers and shakers, foremost among them being trumpeter Wynton Marsalis. Marsalis became the most visible symbol of the '80s jazz mainstream; through him, Blakey's conservative ideals came to dominate the public's perception of the music. At the time of his death in 1990, the Messenger aesthetic dominated jazz, and Blakey himself had arguably become the most influential jazz musician of the past 20 years.

Blakey's first musical education came in the form of piano lessons; he was playing professionally as a seventh grader, leading his own commercial band. He switched to drums shortly thereafter, learning to play in the hard-swinging style of Chick Webb and Sid Catlett. In 1942, he played with pianist Mary Lou Williams in New York. He toured the South with Fletcher Henderson's band in 1943-1944. From there, he briefly led a Boston-based big band before joining Billy Eckstine's new group, with which he would remain from 1944-1947. Eckstine's big band was the famous "cradle of modern jazz," and included (at different times) such major figures of the forthcoming bebop revolution as Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis, and Charlie Parker. When Eckstine's group disbanded, Blakey started a rehearsal ensemble called the Seventeen Messengers. He also recorded with an octet, the first of his bands to be called the Jazz Messengers. In the early '50s, Blakey began an association with Horace Silver, a particularly likeminded pianist with whom he recorded several times. In 1955, they formed a group with Hank Mobley and Kenny Dorham, calling themselves "Horace Silver and the Jazz Messengers." The Messengers typified the growing hard bop movement — hard, funky, and bluesy, the band emphasized the music's primal rhythmic and harmonic essence. A year later, Silver left the band, and Blakey became its leader. From that point, the Messengers were Blakey's primary vehicle, though he would continue to freelance in various contexts. Notable was a 1963 Impulse record date with McCoy Tyner, Sonny Stitt, and Art Davis; a 1971-1972 world tour with "the Giants of Jazz," an all-star venture with Thelonious Monk, Dizzy Gillespie, Sonny Stitt, and Al McKibbon; and an epochal drum battle with Max Roach, Elvin Jones, and Buddy Rich at the 1964 Newport Jazz Festival. Blakey also frequently recorded as a sideman under the leadership of ex-Messengers.

Blakey's influence as a bandleader could not have been nearly so great had he not been such a skilled instrumentalist. No drummer ever drove a band harder; none could generate more sheer momentum in the course of a tune; and probably no drummer had a lower boiling point — Blakey started every performance full-bore and went from there. His accompaniment style was relentless, and woe to the young saxophonist who couldn't keep up, for Blakey would run him over like a fullback. Blakey differed from other bop drummers in that his style was almost wholly about the music's physical attributes. Where his contemporary Max Roach dealt extensively with the drummer's relationship to melody and timbre, for example, Blakey showed little interest in such matters. To him, jazz percussion wasn't about tone color; it was about rhythm — first, last, and in between. Blakey's drum set was the engine that propelled the music. To the extent that he exhibited little conceptual development over the course of his long career, either as a player or as a bandleader, Blakey was limited. He was no visionary by any means. But Blakey did one thing exceedingly well, and he did it with genius, spirit, and generosity until the very end of his life.
Please enjoy the link provided by Phatsak1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EfGDTGBHM9M&feature=player_embedded
For more information on The Jazz Messengers please contact us at: thehistoryofjazzmusic@gmail.com