Search results for

NPR's Tavis Smiley talks with composer and saxophonist Joshua Redman, artistic director of the San Francisco Jazz Collective. Redman has chosen to highlight the work of "free jazz" pioneer Ornette Coleman for the Collective's inaugural season. He's recruited highly respected musicians for the venture: Bobby Hutcherson, Nicholas Payton, Miguel Zenon, Josh Roseman, Renee Rosnes, Robert Hurst and Brian Blade are all tapped to participate.

Today marks the 20th anniversary of the death of music legend Marvin Gaye, who was killed by his father in 1984. NPR's Tavis Smiley talks with David Ritz, an old friend of Gaye's, about the musician's life, tragic death and long-lasting legacy.

This past week, bassist and cellist Percy Heath was honored with a "Beacons in Jazz" award from the New School University in New York. NPR's Liane Hansen speaks with the longtime member of the Modern Jazz Quartet who still performs with the Heath Brothers, and has only now at the age of 80 released his first solo CD: A Love Song is on Daddy Jazz Records.

NPR's Liane Hansen chats with singer and songwriter Vienna Teng, who performs songs from her second CD, Warm Strangers. Since their first conversation in 2002 about her debut CD, Teng has toured the country, enjoying a bit of fame and recognition for her talent. She has no regrets about leaving her computer engineering job to pursue music.

Vijay Iyer and Mike Ladd created a new CD that weaves together interviews with people in airports around the world with jazz and hip hop music. NPR's Michele Norris talks with Iyer and Ladd.

On Susan Werner's newest CD, her sixth, the singer-songwriter moves distinctively away from folk and toward the jazzy American songbook style recently embraced by artists such as Rod Stewart and Norah Jones. NPR's Susan Stamberg reports. Hear three selections from Werner's I Can't Be New.

NPR's Karen Grigsby Bates talks with 21-year old piano prodigy Lang Lang, a featured performer at the Disney Music Hall in Los Angeles, Calif.

Watch the legendary jazz bassist and members of his trio perform from The Blue Note's prestigious stage.

NPR's Ned Wharton, music director for Weekend Edition Sunday, reviews three alternative Latin releases by Radio Mundial, Cordero, and Kinky.

For this month's issue of Texas Monthly, writers Jeff McCord and John Morthland took on an ambitious assignment: coming up with a list of the 100 best Texas songs. The task required the two to make agonizing decisions, between "On the Road Again," "Always on My Mind," "Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain" — and that's just music from Willie Nelson. McCord and Morthland discuss their choices with NPR's Melissa Block.