The KCCK Featured Album for April is “Live from Vienna 1967” — a newly discovered recording of the extraordinary evening when the iconic Dave Brubeck Quartet was forced to take the stage as a trio. After going out on the town for one last evening to explore Hamburg, saxophonist Paul Desmond got distracted and missed …
Celebrated pianist Joyce Yang returns to Iowa to perform one of the most difficult piano pieces ever written, Rachmaninoff’s Third Piano Concerto with Orchestra Iowa, April 2 and 3. Tim Hankewich, a pianist himself, knows full well the challenge of performing this monumental piece, and says that coming to the pre-concert talks (6:45 in Cedar …
Violinist and composer Josh Henderson is wrapping up a year at the University of Iowa as a Grant Wood Fellow with a brand-new composition inspired by the memory of Buddy Holly, The Big Bopper, Richie Valens, and pilot Ralph Peterson, who died in the 1959 Clear Lake plane crash later tagged by singer Don MacLean …
Jazz Corner of the World Encore Mondays at 6:00 PM Classic JCOTW Host Craig Kessler is on hiatus, so this week tune in for an encore broadcast of one of Craig’s favorite episodes. We’ll hear classic jazz from legendary performances, with a few artists rarely heard. The …
This week as we celebrate the birthdays of the unforgettable Billie Holiday, bassist Gene Ramey, percussionists Stan Levey, Jake Hanna, Mongo Santamaria, Art Taylor, and more!!! We’ll also mark the recording anniversaries of Art Blakey’s “The Jazz Messengers” (1956), Booker Little’s “Out Front” (1961), Donald Byrd’s “Black Byrd” (1972), Hank Crawford & Jimmy McGriff’s “On the …
Michael Bornstein is one of the very youngest survivors of Auschwitz, and through his life was reluctant to talk about what he remembered of the experience until he saw a picture of his liberation from the camp on a Holocaust Denyer website, purported to be proof that the Nazis didn’t kill children. After opening up …
The Cedar Rapids Independent Film Festival returns April 1 & 2 after the pandemic layoff, with the original slate of films from the cancelled 2020 festival. Documentaries on Iowa’s real-life Monuments Man, Collins Radio and the Apollo program will be screened along with a huge variety of short and feature-length films. Daily and all-festival passes, …
Hey, Jazz fans! Be sure to tune in this week as we celebrate the birthdays of guitarists George Benson and Melvin Sparks, pianist/singer/songwriter Dave Frishberg, bassists Paul Motian and Larry Gales, vibists Dave Pike and Stefon Harris and more. We’ll also mark the recording anniversaries of Duke Ellington’s “1952 Seattle Concert”, Miles Davis and John …
