Monthly Archives: February 2016

2016 Grammys – Jazz Vocals & More

Last week I covered some fine jazz instrumental winners from the 2016 Grammy Awards, and this week I’ll add the winner for Best Jazz Vocal Album. “For One to Love” is the third album by 26-year-old Cécile McLorin Salvant.  Her second album, “WomanChild” was nominated for the same Grammy in 2014.

Half of the songs on “For One to Love” were composed by McLorin Salvant, and the other half are by a raft of famous composers.  First listen to her composition “Look at Me”. Could this become a jazz standard some day?

One of the more interesting covers on the album is “Wives and Lovers”. The lyrics of this Burt Bacharach / Hal David tune are viewed as a bit sexist these days, but in McLorin Salvant’s hands the song gets a fresh feel that is anything but. And the dance moves of Storyboard P make for a super video. By the way, this song won the 1963 Grammy for Best Male Vocal Performance for crooner, Jack Jones. And in the 60’s it was covered by Nancy Wilson, Ella Fitzgerald, Lena Horne and Dionne Warwick (of course), as well as Frank Sinatra, Billy Eckstine and Vic Damone.

If you are not one of the lucky ones to have seen the hit musical “Hamilton” on Broadway, you got a small taste on the Grammy Awards show. The cast performed the opening number via telecast to celebrate the Grammy for Best Musical Theater Album. To hear a bit more from the show, the a cappella group Range fit in snippets of all 27 of the show’s songs in this 7-minute video. If you’d like to hear more from Range, here is a link to more videos on their website.

2016 Grammys – Instrumental Jazz

As I write, the Grammy results are not all in yet, but winners in a number of jazz categories have been announced. It’s great to know the musical form is still going strong.

Thrilled to report that Snarky Puppy won Best Contemporary Instrumental Album for “Sylva”. I wrote about the band a bit over a year ago, a few months before the April release of “Sylva”. For this album the group teamed up with Holland’s Metropole Orkest. Enjoy this video performance of the album’s first three tracks. It’s 15 minutes long, but well worth it.

A couple of weeks ago you read about young Joey Alexander, who was nominated for two Grammy awards. Well, he didn’t win either, but no shame in that when we look at the winners (and since he’s just 12, Joey will have plenty more chances).

Bassist Christian McBride won Best Improvised Jazz Solo for “Cherokee” from “Live at the Village Vanguard”. It’s hard to find someone in the world of jazz whom McBride hasn’t played with over the years, from Wynton Marsalis to Chick Corea to Herbie Hancock. And he’s played with the likes of Paul McCartney, James Brown and The Roots as well. There is plenty of great soloing by all three musicians on this track by the Christian McBride Trio, but that is some fine base work.

In the category of Best Jazz Instrumental Album, young Joey was bested by legendary guitarist John Schofield for his latest release, “Past Present”. Schofield’s jazz resume may be even more amazing than McBride’s, having played with George Duke, Charles Mingus, and Gary Burton, before a long stint with Miles Davis.  For “Past Present” he teams up with saxophonist Joe Lovano, a bandmate from the 80’s.  Here’s “Get Proud”.