New Music Monday for April 10, 2017

Listen to this week’s playlist on YouTube and Spotify

Motown has had a tremendous impact on popular music. Although it was founded over 55 years ago, Motown’s music and artists are still relevant and popular today, and many of the songs that came out of their Hitsville offices in Detroit have been covered by jazz artists over the years. When baritone saxophonist Claire Daly took on the challenge of making a jazz CD of Motown music, “2648 West Grand Boulevard,” she set out a couple of rules for the arrangements: the music had to stay true to the harmonies of the original songs while transforming them into the jazz idiom, and the songs had to be fun without being corny. With nine previous releases as a leader and an extensive performing schedule, the veteran New York City-based musician was certainly up to the task.

 

The Chicago Jazz Orchestra, under artistic director Jeff Lindberg, celebrates the release of its new CD, “Live from Space,” a special project marking the CJO’s first concert recording in over 25 years. It was recorded last summer and highlights the writing, arranging and playing talents of some of Chicago’s finest musicians, including Tom Garling, Eric Schneider, Mark Colby, Victor Garcia, George Fludas and Dennis Carroll.

 

 

 

 

Also this week, pianist Christian Sands traverses from the straight ahead zone into fresh-sounding music influenced by Afro-Cuban rhythms, hip-hop beats and edgy blues on “Reach”.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Singer Jenna Mammina teams up with veteran guitarist Rolf Sturm on the duo release, “Begin to Dance”.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Saxophonist Josh Lawrence unveils a new set of original compositions on “Color Theory.”

 

 

 

 

 

Culture Crawl 241 “Evil, Evil, Evil”

RHCR Theatre of Cedar Rapids presents “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” April 28 – May 6.

Amy Restroom plays Nurse Ratched, one of the all-time villain characters in literature and movies. Amy says that one of the things that makes the character chilling (and complicated to play) is that she takes her heinous actions while coming off as calm and emotionless, even reasonable.

Producer Matt Ford also talks about the play going up in a new space, in the former Artisans Sanctuary in Czech Village.

Tickets at www.rhcrtheatre.com.

Clean Up Your Act 5-8-17

A habitat restoration project at Lake Odessa aims to improve navigation on the Mississippi River while helping wildlife at the same time.

KCCK IOS App Updated

The latest update to IOS from Apple broke the KCCK app on many people’s phones. We’re happy to say that the app has been updated and now works fine.

If your app still doesn’t work, head to the iTunes App Store and get the updated version.

And for both IOS and Android, check out the app’s new look!

Clean Up Your Act 5-3-17

Author Kaz Makabe discusses the future of energy.

Talking Pictures 4-6-17

Boss Baby and Ghost in the Shell with Hollis Monroe, Denny Lynch and Phil Brown.

Kirkwood Board of Trustees to meet April 13, 2017

The regular meeting of the Kirkwood Board of Trustees will take place April 13, 2017.

Time, place, and meeting agenda can be found at this link.

Special Programs: Week of April 3 – 9

Short List with Bob Naujoks    

Monday – Friday at 8:35 AM and Saturday at 7 AM  

Short List: Jazz Women – The Instrumentalists (Emily Remler)

Emily Remler

On the Short List this week we start a new series on significant – but not necessarily well-known – women jazz instrumentalists. Up first is guitarist Emily Remler who died much too young – at age 32 in 1990 – from a heart attack brought on by her drug habit. Still, in her short career she was marked as a great talent early on by none other than Herb Ellis who brought her to the Concord Jazz Festival Stage in 1978. In a few years she had a recording contract with Concord Records. Her first real professional work was in New Orleans, and along the way she toured with Nancy Wilson and Astrud Gilberto.

 

Jazz Corner of the World with Craig Kessler

Monday, 6:00 PM – 10:00 PM

“The Birth Date Anniversary of Pianist ‘Duke’ Jordan”                          

Craig celebrates the career of Irving Sidney “Duke” Jordan (4/1/22 to 8/8/2006) by spinning a tasteful variety of Duke’s amazing jazz recordings. We’ll hear from the dozens of records released under Jordan’s name, as well as examples from the dozens of releases that feature Jordan as a sideman…records from Charlie Parker, Stan Getz, Art Blakey, Kenny Burrell and many others.  Duke Jordan was a fantastic pianist who certainly deserves another look!      

 

Night Lights (Classic Jazz) with David Brent Johnson

Monday, 10:00 PM – 11:00 PM (follows Jazz Corner the World) 

Night Lights, is a weekly one-hour jazz radio program hosted by David Brent Johnson, focusing on jazz from the 1945-1990 era—covering artists such as Jackie McLean, Charles Mingus, and Nina Simone and themes ranging from jazz recordings of spirituals to avant-garde interpretations of the Great American Songbook. Night Lights also features many lesser-known talents of post-1945 jazz. Every program is archived after broadcast for online listening. This week: “Dorothy Ashby – Hip Harpist”. www.indianapublicmedia.org/nightlights/archives/2017

 

Jazz Profiles with Nancy Wilson    

Monday at 11:00 PM (follows Nightlights)

Sun Ra: ‘Cosmic Swing’ 

Sun Ra

Pianist and bandleader Sun Ra has been both ridiculed as a charlatan and revered as an innovator of jazz theater and collective improvisation. This show travels the spaceways to find the meaning and magic behind an artist who arranged and played in a big band, cut R&B doo-wop sides, and ushered in an era of free improvisation and experimentation with his own band Arkestra.

 

 

Wednesday Night Special               

6:00 PM   

Jazz Appreciation Month: United Jazz Ensemble at the 2016 Iowa City Jazz Festival

United Jazz Ensemble at the 2016 Iowa City Jazz Festival

During April the Wednesday Night Special will showcase some of our area’s finest student musicians. Every May, the United Jazz Ensemble, a collaborative high school venture, comes together to prepare for the Jazz Festival.  Directed by Rich Medd and Ryan Arp, the band is composed of students from Iowa City High School and West High School in Iowa City. For 20 years, this group has served as of one of signature elements of the Iowa City Jazz Festival’s commitment to education outreach. The deep immersion of students in jazz over the summer not only strengthens their musical growth, but builds a strong bond between the programs at the two schools.  Their sound swings so hard that you can’t help but agree about the bright future of the music!   

 

Jazz Night in America with Christian McBride

Thursday at 11:00 PM

Ingrid Jensen Plays Kenny Wheeler

Ingrid Jensen

Kenny Wheeler

Kenny Wheeler’s stunning compositions and imaginative improvisations on trumpet and flugelhorn left deep impressions on generations of musicians. Two such devotees — trumpeter Ingrid Jensen and saxophonist Steve Treseler — revisited Wheeler’s compositions after his death in 2014 at age 84. And in doing so, they realized they wanted to record their arrangements, paying tribute to the man who catalyzed their own careers. So Jensen, raised in Vancouver and now based in New York, traveled back across North America to meet Treseler, who resides in Seattle, to make the album and play a gig while they were there.

Jazz Night in America explores the legacy of Kenny Wheeler through the music that Jensen and Treseler arranged and performed live at the Royal Room in Seattle. They’re accompanied by Jensen’s working rhythm section — pianist Geoffrey Keezer, bassist Martin Wind, drummer Jon Wikan — and local vocalist Katie Jacobson.Wheeler.

 

Jazz Corner of the World with Craig Kessler     

Saturday, Noon – 4:00 PM and Monday, 6:00 PM – 10:00 PM

“Larry Coryell Tribute”

Larry Coryell

Craig pays a heartfelt tribute to the recently departed, exceptional guitarist Lorenz Albert Van DeLinder III, a.k.a. Larry Coryell (4/2/43 to 2/19/2017). We’ll hear a variety of mid-60s classic recordings with Coryell as a pioneering “fusion style” guitarist…right up to his last recording from 2016! Coryell was a terrific guitarist, on both electric and acoustic guitars, and will continue to be an inspiration to all guitarists for many years to come.

 

Tropical Heat (hosted by Kpoti Senam Accoh)

Sunday, 5:00 PM – 8:00 PM

Featured Album: “Terma-yana” by Sonam Dorji   

https://itunes.apple.com/lk/album/terma-yana/id152334791  

The Tibetan word ‘Terma’ means hidden treasure and the word ‘Yana’ a path, way or vehicle. The Sound Meditation recorded herein was created with the multi-tonal voice of a large ‘Earth’ Gong tuned to the vibrational signature of Ghia’s, nearly eternal, dance with Sol. Her weaving overtones will carry the listener down corridors and through portals into the domain of transcendence. It is a journey of profound reverberation – for within the sound ‘mandala’ are conduits which penetrate the realms of physical, mental and spiritual healing.     

 

KCCK’s Midnight CD

The Monday – Sunday Midnight CD for this week can be found at:

http://www.kcck.org/midnight-cd/