Sad news “Leon Breeden, the longtime director of jazz studies at the University of North Texas, who half a century ago transformed the program from a clandestine enterprise into the international Mecca for jazz training it remains today, died on Wednesday in Dallas. He was 88.” My college band got to do a concert with [Continue]

PGMusic just released Band In A Box 2010.5 for the Mac. Improvements? Yes, several. Here are a few that I think are noteworthy: Styles can now be made that are set to use Half-Time and Double-Time RealTracks. For example, you can make a Jazz Ballad style (tempo 65) that uses a Sax Soloist at tempo [Continue]

Hal Leonard is selling a CD set of backgrounds to ALL the songs in the Real Book Vol. 1. For about $100, you get 12 CDs of piano, bass and drums background that range in time from about 2 1/2 minutes to 6. Depends on the song. A couple of songs, like Wave, have guitar [Continue]

It has been really hard keeping the cat in the bag (I was a beta tester for the last 2 weeks or so), but tonight PG Music finally released Band in a Box 2010 for the Macintosh. As was the case in the previous version, this version is Intel only. So, you people with G5s [Continue]

I wanted to let you know about the new book of Bob Reynolds’ transcribed solos. The book features the melodies, chords, and solos to the unique and funky tunes on the acclaimed album “Can’t Wait For Perfect”. You can check it out here: http://www.kenyoncarter.com/Kenyon_Carter/Store.html [Continue]

Vasik sent in this great transcription of Miguel Zenon on Ulysses in Slow Motion. Great stuff and great work! [Continue]

Greg Fishman has a number of excellent books out. I’ve reviewed and highly recommend his Jazz Etudes Book Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 and his Saxophone Duets book. His latest book is Jazz Phrasing For Beginners, which is aimed at the beginning student. It contains 10 melodic tunes that great examples of idiomatic “classic” jazz [Continue]

The WSJ has an article up called “Can Jazz Be Saved?“. Basically, the article says that in 2002 10.8% of adults went to listen to jazz, and in 2008 that number fell to 7.8%. In the college market it fell from 19.4% in 1982 to 14.9% in 2008. I somehow think that there are more [Continue]

Kinda cool I guess… [Continue]

I recently transposed and modified 2 movements of the Bolling Suite for Flute and Trio for Oboe. It was a simple click of a button to make a version for Soprano Sax. Enjoy. [Continue]

Some more Podcasts I discovered. Yamaha Wind Instruments Podcast Sonny Rollins Podcast The Traneumentary Wynton Marsalis Podcast Christian McBride Podcast Jazzcorner The Jazz Session Jazz Inspired Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Club Legends Of Jazz Chicago Jazz Magazine The Night Passage Jazz Podcast [Continue]

George Garzone has a 2 DVD instructional set coming out next month. $89.95. Sounds interesting. “The Music of George Garzone & The Triadic Chromatic Approach”, is a Jazz Improvisation Instructional DVD and much, much more. MADE FOR ALL INSTRUMENTS Performances: Solo, Duos, Trios, an Sextet performances The Triadic Chromatic [Continue]

From the LATimes: Neal Hefti, a former big band trumpeter, arranger and composer who worked with Woody Herman and Count Basie and later composed the memorable themes for the movie “The Odd Couple” and the campy hit TV series “Batman,” has died. He was 85. [Continue]

Here are the ingredients of a great album and recording: 1. Great songs….Pink Floyd’s Dark Side Of The Moon…..check 2. Good arrangements of said songs…..check 3. Great players…..check 4. Record everything live, with a single microphone and no digital “wizardary” (not Pro Tools *gasp*)…..check The [Continue]

Sometimes on the internet, you find some great sites. This is one such site. “You Are What You Hear” is a great site that has concert recordings from great artists such as Dave Liebman, Michael Brecker, Chris Potter, John Scofield……to name a very few. Well worth spending some time getting some of the recording here. [Continue]