Mike Greenblatt’s Rant ‘n’ Roll Mike Greenblatt April 24, 2019 Albums, Reviews The Legend When Ray Charles inducted Nat King Cole into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2000, he admitted to copying Cole’s cool vocal style prior to developing his own. Starting out as a jazz pianist wi...
Rant ‘n’ Roll: Oz Noy, William Steffey, Professor Louie, and more! Mike Greenblatt April 17, 2019 Columns, Rant 'N' Roll In the nineteen-sixties, Latin audiences in New York City went wild for what was known as boogaloo, a hybrid dance sound of funk, salsa, jump blues, and mambo, that went national when Dick Clark introduced it o...
Rant ‘n’ Roll—Pete Seeger: Centennial of an American Hero Mike Greenblatt April 10, 2019 Columns, Rant 'N' Roll Pete Seeger should be celebrating his 100th birthday May 3. We lost him January 27, 2014 at the age of 94. Upon his death, President Barack Obama said, “Over the years, Pete used his voice—and his hammer—to str...
Rant ‘n’ Roll: Dina Hall — Ballad of a Singer-Songwriter Mike Greenblatt April 2, 2019 Columns, Rant 'N' Roll Dina Hall wears a lot of hats. Songwriter. Guitarist. Bandleader. Activist. Mentor. Graphic designer. Yet listen to her sing John Prine’s “Angel From Montgomery” or his “Speed of the Sound of Loneliness” and yo...
Rant ‘n’ Roll: Elvis Presley, Seth Walker, Larry Grenadier, and more! Mike Greenblatt March 27, 2019 Albums, Reviews By 1968, Elvis Presley had abdicated his throne to those British long-hairs whom he hated. The King just wasn’t relevant anymore and he knew it. Along came TV producer Steve Binder with an idea to restore Elvis...
Rant ‘n’ Roll — Charlie Faye & The Fayettes, John Fusco and the X-Road Riders, and more! Mike Greenblatt March 20, 2019 Albums, Reviews The Whole Shebang (Bigger Better More Records), by Charlie Faye & The Fayettes, feels good. An update on the girl groups of the ’60s, singer-songwriter Faye wrote or co-wrote 12 frilly retro-pop tunes, sing...
Rant ‘n’ Roll: Allison Miller’s Boom Tic Boom, David Dominique, Kalyn Fay, and more! Mike Greenblatt March 6, 2019 Albums, Columns, Rant 'N' Roll, Reviews This Glitter Wolf Bites Drummer/composer/educator Allison Miller has been busy. In New York City, she sits in with the band on Late Night with Seth Myers. In Washington D.C., she’s Musical Director for INK a...
Rant ‘n’ Roll: Clifford Lamb, Gurf Morlix, Miho Hazama, Colin Linden & Luther Dickinson, and Andy B. Mike Greenblatt February 27, 2019 Albums, Columns, Rant 'N' Roll, Reviews Mash-Up City Blues & Hues (Weber Works Entertainment Group) by San Francisco pianist-composer Clifford Lamb mashes up old and new to ingratiating effect. The brainchild of producer Jeffrey Weber, its eig...
Rant ‘n’ Roll Mike Greenblatt February 20, 2019 Albums, Columns, Rant 'N' Roll, Reviews Solo Piano Billy Joel once wrote “And the piano it sounds like a carnival....” Nowhere is that more applicable than on James Fernando’s solo piano debut, his self-released The Lonely Sailor, where he deconst...
Rant ‘n’ Roll: The Jazz Page Mike Greenblatt February 13, 2019 Columns, Rant 'N' Roll Good Vibes Vibraphonist Behn Gillece resides in a Parallel Universe on his fourth Posi-Tone album. The 11 originals feature his good vibes alongside a tenor sax/trumpet frontline, complete with piano/bass/dr...
