Whenever I look down the list of Jazz artists birthdays for that day, I always keep a special eye out for guitarists. Today that eye landed on the name of Noel Lorica. Noel was born on this day in 1968 in Manila in the Philippines.. As an accomplished guitarist and Latin jazz artist he has received acclaim for his playing resulting in 21 Grammy Ballot entries!
So on Sunday while I was exploring the music and legacy of Lester Young, I also listened to the music of a new musician, Ben Paterson. His Trio’s new album Essential Elements is currently,number 4 on the Roots Music Reports Jazz Chart. On Sunday I put the album on while I was reading and I really didn’t notice the album as the first two songs went by, but then the songs and Paterson’s piano playing got stronger and stronger and by the end of the album I was a fan! I listened to the album again tonight and was more impressed the second time around! Now I’m listening to his second release Blues for Oscar, which is pretty good, too. Now, I only have to go and listen to his first album Breathing Spaces! From his biography at his website:
Lester Young died when I was 7 years old. His last performance was in Paris, at the tail end of an abbreviated European Tour in March of 1959 with drummer Kenny Clarke. During that tour, Young ate next to nothing and virtually drank himself to death. He died on March 15th, only hours after arriving back in New York. He was 49 years old!!. Yesterday, Lester’s name came up, as I surfed the web looking for music. When I saw the name, I said you know I really don’t know much about Lester other than he played the saxophone.When I went to Wikipedia here’s what I found.
Originally posted: May 23, 2o13 at Me, Myself,Music and Mysteries
Friday night on my way to work at Target, I had the iPod on random shuffle and Knght Area came on today would be a good morning to re-explore the day I first listen to their music!!
Ok so I can’t remember how I came across this band,but somehow I was surfing around looking for Osiris. I think it was from Progstreaming or maybe Just for You on MOG. Anyway the first thing that I found were two albums The Remnants of Life and Lost by a band that I thought was Osiris. I started to listen it was some good Prog Space Rock. When I went to Prog Archives and this is what I got when I typed in Osiris……
So the other day when I was listening to Hammond Heroes one of the tracks that I really liked was the Pat Martino Trio’s performance of “Oleo” After listening, I went and looked for the album that the track was on and I found it on Martino’s album Live at Yoshi’s. Live at Yoshi’s was released in 2001 a little over 20 years after Martino had brain surgery as a result of a nearly fatal brain aneurysm. The surgery left him with amnesia, that wiped out his memories of his career and how to play guitar!! With the help of friends and his old records he was able to learn to play again. An amazing story, that I had no clue about!!
So this evening I was searching for some new prog rock, and I went to New Prog Rock Releases and saw that an Italian Jazz-Rock, fusion band named Agora released their new album Ichinen on Monday of this week. So I traveled over to MOG to see if I could find it I found Agora and there was no Ichinen album. I did see however a 2011 release Regresa Al Vértigo. So I continued to search for some information on the band while I was listening. I went to the Prog Archives where I read about Agora….
On this date in 1943, the great vibraphonist and one of my favorites Gary Burton was born in Anderson, Indiana. Whenever I have “One of those days” it’s usually the vibes of Burton that bring me back to a happier and more relaxed place. Some background and information on Burton from Wikipedia:
at Amazon
So this morning started with a cold walk to my office. I left the car at the office yesterday and walked home during the snowstorm! While that may have been a good idea yesterday, it didn’t seem that good this morning, when I faced a ten minute walk to work with single digit wind chill temperatures. But like I always say when I struggle through a run “At least the music was good!” The music came from an album released back in November titled Hammond Heroes. The album somehow got accidentally downloaded on to the iPhone a while ago and I didn’t delete it because of the title! Well am I glad I didn’t, because it’s got some great tracks on it. It’s has tracks on it from guys like Jimmy and Dr Lonnie Smith, Larry Young, and Jimmy McGriff where they are the top dog and then it has tracks where the organist is a member of the band or trio, pairing with folks like Pat Metheny. John Scofield, Lou Donaldson and Pat Martino. I was constantly looking at the tracks as great ones kept coming on, to see who was playing this time. Well, one of the tracks I liked right away was “Bag of Jewels” from Lou Donaldson. Donaldson is one of those oh, too many jazz artists whose name I know but not their music. the other track that caught my attention was “Oleo” from Pat Martino. Pat was another artist like Lou, and after listening to him play a few weeks ago on that tribute to Wes, I tracked down his music and listened to his album El Hombre and he is that!!
