THE JAZZ CHILL CORNER LEDISI - THE TRUTH

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1. LEDISI - THE TRUTH
2. NICK VAYENAS - SOME OTHER TIME
3. BLUE NOTE RECORDS CELEBRATES 75TH ANNIVERSARY
4. THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND LIVE AT THE BEACON THEATRE 1992: PLAY ALL NIGHT

LEDISI - THE TRUTH Posted: 08 Jan 2014 08:02 AM PST You can tell when a woman has finally come into her own. It's in the swivel of her hips, the growl in her voice and the joy that brightens her face when she smiles. A woman filled with confidence is a force to be reckoned with. For singer songwriter Ledisi, that exuberance rings through on every track of her new album The Truth. "I changed my life!" Ledisi says with a laugh. "With every album I grow, and with The Truth I am really starting to accept myself fully. I mean, I've always felt great about myself, but this time I've gone to a new level." The result is an album filled not only with Ledisi's trademark soaring ballads but also something unexpected: a generous collection of up-tempo, beat-driven celebrations of love and lust. Ledisi describes the effort as "vibrant, sensual and fun. Of all of my recordings, this is definitely my favorite album ever." Her first single, I Blame You, is a joyful reflection on that new-found love. "This other person made me feel beautiful," she says. "And that made me look at myself and see myself in a different light." Her friend and collaborator, Claude Kelly (Britney Spears, Kelly Clarkson, Christina Aguilera) came up with title. "I came into the studio and Claude asked me how I was feeling and I said, 'I feel excited about myself,'" she recalls. "I told him someone was making me smile and he thought of the idea of blaming the other person for building me up. But of course, that only works if you are open to it." "That song was the beginning of me letting go," she continues. "I realized, it's okay for you to leave something that's not working. Of course, it's scary to realize the truth and then go ahead and make a move. But that's what you have to do. Basically it comes down to, are you going to stay here and be miserable or are you going to leap and go for what you want?" Ledisi says while creating Lose Control, which she co-wrote with long-time producer Rex Rideout (Luther Vandross, Angie Stone, Will Downing), she drew on the experiences of people around her. "I asked Rex, how does it feel to feel to be married?" she recalls. "And I asked another producer, how does it feel to be single? And I thought to myself, wouldn't it be nice if people started getting excited about getting intimate? We don't have enough songs like that, songs that describe romance. Wouldn't it be good to describe what we are going to do in a classy intimate and aggressive way? Why can't women lead?"    Ledisi explains that her new music is a reflection of her journey of self-discovery. "There was a time when I felt like I had to please everybody," she says. "Now I'm like 'I don't care anymore,' I just want to be fully out there and be the person I really am, which is someone who loves being open and fun." But all this self love didn't enter Ledisi's life without her shedding some baggage. In 88 Boxes, Ledisi tells an intimate tale of a failed relationship. "If you would have said 'I loved you,' I would have turned around and stayed. But you said nothing. Did you really love me?" Ledisi sings on the hauntingly beautiful track that is as mournful as it is memorable.    "88 Boxes is about me letting go," she explains. "I was moving out and had to count how many boxes I had for the moving truck. For women, it's hard for us to leave things and people that we love. We stay in situations almost like martyrs to ourselves. At the same time I was leaving, I am recognizing that the other person didn't want me to leave but didn't know how to say the words, 'Don't go.' In 88 Boxes, I am being somewhat sympathetic to that...but I am also focusing on the reality of what is...the end of a love affair." The track, which Ledisi had originally penned as a poem, was recorded in a single take. "I laid it down in the dark," she remembers. "Everyone had been telling me how I should record the song, but my vocal producer, Roland Jack, who is like a brother to me, said, "Led I want you to do what you wrote. Forget all these people. Get your butt in that booth and sing the truth. When I came out the room everybody had their mouths open like, "Oh my God!" It was one of the hardest songs to record and it's honest."    Ledisi's courage to be so vulnerable isn't the only positive byproduct of her transformation. "Over the past few years, I've really had to ask myself, 'Who are you and what do you want to be,'" she reflects. "I did some mediation and I started working out hard. Not like how I used to where I would do a couple of crunches and then drink a soda! Now I'm really challenging myself. And I love this girl! She's free and uninhibited and having fun with life. I've learned that when you really love who you are, it radiates! It all starts from the within. It all starts from accepting The Truth." ~ vervemusicgroup.com

NICK VAYENAS - SOME OTHER TIME Posted: 08 Jan 2014 07:41 AM PST Trombonist, trumpeter and vocalist Nick Vayenas is a forward-thinking musician who incorporates different styles of music into the jazz idiom. Born in Boston, Massachusetts, Vayenas started his music studies with trombone and piano at age 12. He has since become an accomplished trumpeter and vocalist. Since 2003, Nick Vayenas has been a long-standing touring band member for Grammy® Award-winning recording artist Michael Bublé. Vayenas has performed on several Bublé recordings, including Crazy Love and the Grammy® Award- winning Michael Bublé Meets Madison Square Garden. In 2009, Vayenas became a leader in his own right, releasing his critically acclaimed debut album, Synesthesia, on drummer Kendrick Scott's World Culture Music label.  "A well conceived album and more than casually ambitious", wrote Nate Chinen of the New York Times.  In 2012, he returned with his sophomore release, Nick Vayenas, on Whirlwind Recordings. The recording displayed his astonishing breadth of skills on vocals, trumpet and trombone, as well as his unique composing and arranging style.  "One of the most impressive of Whirlwind issues, showcasing a multi-talented individual likely to appeal to a wide constituency of jazz fans, 4 stars", said Jazz Journal. Vayenas earned scholarships to attend Berklee College of Music, the Manhattan School of Music and the Thelonious Monk Institute, which were key to his technical development as a musician and composer. His musical influences range from Louis Armstong, Duke Ellington, Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, J.J. Johnson, Frank Rosolino, Miles Davis, Clifford Brown, Freddie Hubbard, John Coltrane, Herbie Hancock and Chet Baker to Stevie Wonder, The Beatles, Donny Hathaway, Paul Simon, Joao Gilberto, Frank Sinatra, Nat King Cole, Beethoven and Debussy. Along the way, Vayenas studied with such jazz luminaries as trombonists Hal Crook, Conrad Herwig, Bill Watrous, David Taylor and Steve Turre, trumpeter Terence Blanchard, and pianist Herbie Hancock. His new 2013 release, Some Other Time takes the concept used on his previous album and expands upon it.  Some Other Time is a balance of instrumental and vocal, originals and covers.  The recording features guitarist Doug Wamble, pianist Dan Kaufman, alto saxophonist Patrick Cornelius, bassists Michael Janisch and Peter Slavov, and drummers Rudy Royston and Joe Saylor.    A quintessential sideman as well as a leader, Nick Vayenas has appeared on many albums, including works by Patrick Cornelius and Dayna Stephens. He has worked with prominent artists such as Josh Groban, Bryan Adams, David Foster, Mariah Carey, Mary J. Blige, Kendrick Scott, Aaron Parks, Dayna Stephens, Lionel Loueke, Vicente Archer, Patrick Cornelius, Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter, Terence Blanchard and Gretchen Parlato. Television performances include the Tonight Show, Late Show with David Letterman, Today Show, Oprah, Ellen and Saturday Night Live. He has performed at the Umbria Jazz, Montreal Jazz, and St. Lucia Jazz Festivals, and at venues such as Madison Square Garden, Radio City Music Hall, Sydney Opera House, Royal Albert Hall, Blue Note Jazz Club and Ronnie Scott's. The album setlist features a number of classic blues, spanning obscurities to staples such as "Hoochie Coochie Man," here marked by Haynes' lead vocals and snarling slide work. Furthermore, Play All Night sees the Brothers unplug for a three-song acoustic interlude encompassing bare-boned renditions of Betts' "Seven Turns" and Allman's "Midnight Rider," as well as a buoyant take on the Robert Johnson standard, "Come On In My Kitchen." ~ nickvayenas.com

BLUE NOTE RECORDS CELEBRATES 75TH ANNIVERSARY Posted: 08 Jan 2014 07:33 AM PST January 6, 2014 marked the 75th Anniversary of Blue Note Records, the most-respected and longest-running Jazz label in the world, which was founded when a German immigrant and passionate Jazz fan named Alfred Lion produced his first recording session on January 6, 1939 in New York City. Blue Note has gone on to represent The Finest In Jazz, tracing the entire history of the music from Hot Jazz, Boogie Woogie, and Swing, through Bebop, Hard Bop, Post Bop, Soul Jazz, Avant-Garde, and Fusion, and into Jazz's numerous modern day incarnations under the leadership of Bruce Lundvall, who revived Blue Note in 1984, and the label's current President Don Was, who took the helm in 2012. Blue Note will celebrate its 75th Anniversary throughout 2014 with a series of live events beginning with a concert on January 8 as part of NYC Winter Jazzfest at The Town Hall in New York featuring two of the label's leading artists: Robert Glasper and Jason Moran. The label will also be honored with a GRAMMY Museum exhibition, book releases, and various vinyl, CD, and digital catalog initiatives, as well as new releases from the label's current artists. Blue Note has also launched a Facebook app that allows fans to put their own face into classic Blue Note cover artwork designs by Reid Miles. ROBERT GLASPER & JASON MORAN AT THE TOWN HALL On January 6, 1939, Blue Note founder Alfred Lion brought two Boogie Woogie pianists – Albert Ammons and Meade "Lux" Lewis – into a studio in New York City to produce the very first Blue Note recording session. On January 8, 2014, two of Blue Note's current pianists – Robert Glasper and Jason Moran – will celebrate the label's 75 year history by beginning with Ammons and Lewis and presenting their personal Blue Note touchstones as well as their music from their own considerable catalogs. The concert – which is being presented by NYC Winter Jazzfest – will also feature bassist Alan Hampton and drummer Eric Harland, as well as special guests vocalist Bilal and saxophonist and Blue Note artist Ravi Coltrane. Tickets are available at http://smarturl.it/bn75-townhall. OTHER LIVE EVENTS January 9 – NYC Winter Jazzfest & Summerstage present the Revive Big Band at (le) poisson rouge celebrating Blue Note Records 75th Anniversary featuring special guests. Click here for more info. February 20-March 1 – Portland Jazz Festival presents Blue Note @ 75 featuring Brian Blade & The Fellowship Band, Eliane Elias, Dave Frishberg & Bob Dorough, and Bobby Watson & Horizon. Click here for more info. May 11 – Jason Moran, who also serves as the Artistic Advisor for Jazz at the Kennedy Center in Washington DC will present Blue Note At 75, The Concert. As the culminating event of a celebration of the 75th Anniversary of Blue Note Records, artists from the label's present and past roster perform including Moran, Norah Jones, Wayne Shorter, and surprise special guests. Click here for more info. **Additional live events will be announced throughout the year. GRAMMY MUSEUM EXHIBITION The GRAMMY Museum in Los Angeles will honor Blue Note's 75 year legacy with an exhibition that is set to open in March. The exhibit will present the label's iconic artwork and photography, as well as artifacts and music. BRUCE LUNDVALL'S BIOGRAPHY Blue Note's former President and current Chairman Emeritus Bruce Lundvall – who re-launched Blue Note in 1984 and presided over the label's flourishing for over 25 years – will release his biography Playing By Ear (written with author Dan Ouellette) through ArtistShare this month. Click here for more info. CATALOG RELEASES Blue Note will commence an extensive vinyl reissue initiative on March 25 with the release of five classic titles (Art Blakey Free For All, John Coltrane Blue Train, Eric Dolphy Out To Lunch, Wayne Shorter Speak No Evil, and Larry Young Unity). The vinyl releases are set to continue monthly and will also include modern classics from Blue Note's recent catalog such as Joe Lovano Quartets: Live At The Vanguard, Jason Moran Soundtrack To Human Motion, and Terence Blanchard Flow. For Record Store Day in April, Blue Note will also reissue the label's first two releases as limited edition 12" vinyl:  Meade "Lux" Lewis "Melancholy"/"Solitude" (BN1) and Albert Ammons "Boogie Woogie Stomp"/"Boogie Woogie Blues" (BN2). Other catalog releases including a 75 track digital bundle spanning Blue Note's entire history will be announced shortly. NEW RELEASES Blue Note continues to maintain an incomparable roster of current talent, and 2014 will see new releases from trumpeters Takuya Kuroda (Rising Son, February 18) and Ambrose Akinmusire (the imagined savior is far easier to paint, March 11), as well as artists beyond Jazz such as Rosanne Cash (The River & The Thread, January 14) and Benmont Tench (You Should Be So Lucky, February 18). Further new releases will soon be announced from Brian Blade & The Fellowship Band, Jason Moran, Joe Lovano/Dave Douglas Soundprints Quintet, José James, and two Blue Note legends: Bobby Hutcherson in a quartet with David Sanborn, Joey DeFrancesco and Billy Hart, and Wayne Shorter whose return to Blue Note Without A Net figured prominently in several Best of 2013 lists. BLUE NOTE APPS Blue Note has proved itself to be an innovator not only musically but also technologically, most notably with the 2012 release of our much-heralded Blue Note Spotify App, which created a space within the popular streaming service to explore and discover music spanning the entire history of the label, as well as the Blue Note by Groovebug App which is available for iPad, iPhone and iPod touch users. Now Blue Note has introduced a fun Facebook App that allows fans to insert their own face into classic Blue Note covers. Choose between six cover artwork designs by influential designer Reid Miles and see how you would look on the cover of your own Blue Note record!  It took the joining of many natural forces to create and define one of the greatest Jazz labels there has ever been: Jazz-loving German immigrants on the run from Nazism (Alfred Lion & Francis Wolff), a New Jersey optometrist moonlighting as a recording engineer (Rudy Van Gelder), a classical music-loving commercial designer (Reid Miles), and slews of the most incredible musicians that have ever walked the earth (too many to name them all here). The elements that each brought to the table—impeccable A&R instincts, elegant and insightful photography, sterling sound quality, strikingly original cover artwork, and consistently transcendent music—were all essential to the label's early success. Together they created a vivid Blue Note identity. The whole could not have existed without each of the parts. Blue Note's legendary catalog traces the entire history of the music from Hot Jazz, Boogie Woogie, and Swing, through Bebop, Hard Bop, Post Bop, Soul Jazz, Avant-Garde, Fusion, and on. The label's stars from the early years form a true Who's Who: Thelonious Monk, Bud Powell, Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Cannonball Adderley, Horace Silver, Art Blakey, Jimmy Smith, Grant Green, Lee Morgan, Freddie Hubbard, Joe Henderson, Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter, McCoy Tyner, Donald Byrd, Andrew Hill, Ornette Coleman. After a brief dormancy from 1981-1984 during which producer/historian Michael Cuscuna kept the label's legacy alive with a series of reissues on EMI, Blue Note returned reinvigorated by the leadership of Bruce Lundvall and has since established itself as the most respected Jazz label in the world. Blue Note is still home to some of the most prominent stars and cutting-edge innovators in Jazz today, and at the same time has broadened its horizons to include quality music in many genres. Under Lundvall's stewardship, Blue Note had its share of commercial successes from Bobby McFerrin, Dianne Reeves, Cassandra Wilson, Us3, Medeski Martin & Wood, Norah Jones, Al Green, Anita Baker, Amos Lee, Willie Nelson and Wynton Marsalis. The label also remained a haven for the most creative voices in Jazz including Ambrose Akinmusire, Patricia Barber, Brian Blade, Terence Blanchard, Don Byron, Kurt Elling, Robert Glasper, Stefon Harris, Charlie Hunter, Lionel Loueke, Joe Lovano, Jason Moran, Greg Osby, Gonzalo Rubalcaba, John Scofield, Jacky Terrasson, Chucho Valdes, and many more. In 2011, veteran record producer and musician Don Was joined Blue Note as Chief Creative Officer and soon became President of the label with Lundvall continuing to provide guidance as Chairman Emeritus. With Was at the helm, Blue Note has renewed its dedication to Lion's original vision that "any particular style of playing which represents an authentic way of musical feeling is genuine expression." In the 21st century Lion's words still ring true and provide a blueprint that includes Robert Glasper Experiment's visionary melding of Jazz, R&B, and Hip-Hop and Elvis Costello's funky collaboration with The Roots, as well as bringing the legendary saxophonist Wayne Shorter back to the label where he made his early classic albums, and continuing to sign singular voices in Jazz such as saxophonist Ravi Coltrane and vocalist Gregory Porter. Blue Note Records is one of the flagship labels of the Capitol Music Group. ~ www.bluenote.com

THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND LIVE AT THE BEACON THEATRE 1992: PLAY ALL NIGHT Posted: 08 Jan 2014 07:25 AM PST Epic/Legacy Recordings is releasing Play All Night: Live At The Beacon Theatre 1992, a new two-disc set from the one and only Allman Brothers Band. The collection highlights the Rock & Roll Hall of Famers' first-ever extended run at the venerable New York City venue, an annual residency that has since become a certifiable rock 'n' roll tradition. Play All Night: Live At The Beacon Theatre 1992 arrives on February 18th.  Celebrating their 45th anniversary this year, the band will return to the venue for ten dates beginning March 7.   Epic/Legacy Recordings will also release on February 18 Live At Great Woods, a feature-length concert DVD filmed at Massachusetts' Great Woods Center for the Performing Arts in September of 1991. Long requested by fans, the upcoming reissue showcases the original long form video version of the concert, previously only available on DVD with band interviews edited into the main feature. The band's 1989 reunion revivified the Allman Brothers Band, leading to a pair of acclaimed studio albums and a full-fledged return to the road. The addition of percussionist Marc Quinones in 1990 finally brought to life the triple percussion ensemble Duane had envisioned when first uniting the band and by 1992, The Allman Brothers Band were definitely in an unstoppable groove. The Brothers' 1992 spring itinerary saw the band carry on its special relationship with New York City by settling into the landmark Beacon Theatre for an extended 10-night run. Specifically selected for coming closest in spirit to Bill Graham's long gone Fillmore East, the beloved Upper West Side venue had previously hosted the ABB during their 1989 reunion tour and felt to the band like a place they could call home. Kicking off on March 10th, the Beacon shows blended recent fan favorites like "Get On With Your Life," "End Of The Line," and "Nobody Knows" with such stone cold classics as "Statesboro Blues," "Blue Sky," "Jessica," "Revival," and of course, "Whipping Post," all played with the distinctive invention and muscularity that defined this particular ABB line-up. Highlights include an elongated "In Memory Of Elizabeth Reed" – complete with incendiary Betts and Haynes solos, roaring Woody bass and a thunderous percussive break by Jaimoe, Trucks, and Quinones – as well as a stunning "Dreams," Gregg's immediately identifiable voice infusing every lyric with history, nuance, and soulful emotion. As ever, the setlist features a number of classic blues, spanning obscurities to staples such as "Hoochie Coochie Man," here marked by Haynes' lead vocals and snarling slide work. Furthermore, Play All Night sees the Brothers unplug for a three-song acoustic interlude encompassing bare-boned renditions of Betts' "Seven Turns" and Allman's "Midnight Rider," as well as a buoyant take on the Robert Johnson standard, "Come On In My Kitchen." "1991-92 was a period of great creativity for that configuration of the Allman Brothers," Haynes says, "and these shows capture a true moment in time for the group. It's cool that the acoustic set is included, because it gives the fans a chance to hear some rare versions of particular songs. All in all, I think Play All Night represents how on fire that band could be on any given night at that point in their history." Play All Night: Live At The Beacon Theatre 1992 was produced for release by Warren Haynes; originally captured by legendary producer Tom Dowd. The collection will feature liner notes by John Lynskey (editor of the official ABB magazine, Hittin' The Note) as well as never-before-seen photos by longtime band photographer Kirk West.