Short List with Bob Naujoks

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

The Short List: Jazz Clubs Live – Village Vanguard (NYC)

The Village Vanguard in New York

The Village Vanguard in New York is a celebrated jazz venue, and it should be; it’s been there eighty years plus. It was first opened in February 1935 and has been running ever since, except for one day following the death of its founder, Max Gordon, in 1989. The Village Vanguard is the oldest jazz club in New York City. It started out as a place for poets and folk singers, but soon jam sessions could be heard with the greatest swing players in the late 1930s. By 1957 the club featured jazz musicians almost exclusively. It still does.

Jazz Profiles with Nancy Wilson  

Monday at 6:00 PM

Carmen McRae: ‘Painter of Song’

Carmen McRae

Carmen McRae was an outstanding song stylist whose great strength was in her phrasing and interpretation of lyrics. She was also an excellent pianist, whose personal approach and musicianship developed during her occasional performances at Minton’s Playhouse during the early years of bebop.

Jazz Corner of the World with Craig Kessler

Monday, 7:00 PM – 11:00 PM (follows Jazz Profiles)

“The Birthdate Anniversary Celebration For Unheralded Jazz Master, Gigi Gryce” 

Craig celebrates the birthday of noted reedman, composer, arranger, and educator, George General “Gigi” Gryce (11/28/25 to 3/14/83) by spinning an impressive array of Gigi’s work as a leader, a sideman, and as a remarkable composer and arranger.  Gigi worked with many of the biggest names in jazz in the 50s and 60s — Clifford Brown, Thelonious Monk, Teddy Charles, Art Blakey, Lee Morgan, etc., but remains relatively unknown.  Tune in to catch a glimpse of why so many of his contemporaries thought so highly of him!!

New Orleans Calling with George Ingmire    

Tuesday at 6:00 PM 

“Bayou Road Blues”

Ernie Vincent

Ernie Vincent is one of four Bluesmen from New Orleans profiled this week on New Orleans Calling. Regardless of how long they have been part of the musical landscape of the Crescent City, New Orleans bluesmen draw upon the rich, multi-cultural fabric and tradition of blues, Soul, R&B, Funk, Gospel and Jazz to inform their individual style making New Orleans Bluesmen unique among the many greats of the genre.

Jazz Night in America with Christian McBride

Wednesday at 6:00 PM

Uncore: A Tribute to the Late Kenny Wheeler 

A young 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.

Wednesday Night Special               

7:00 PM (Follows Jazz Night in America)   

Iowa City Jazz Festival 2015: Dave Douglas & High Risk

Dave Douglas & High Risk at the 2015 Iowa City Jazz Festival

Dave Douglas is a prolific trumpeter, composer and educator from New York City. His unique contributions to improvised music have garnered distinguished recognition, including a Guggenheim Fellowship, an Aaron Copland award and two Grammy nominations.

High Risk is an exciting new electro-acoustic quartet led by Douglas. At the vanguard of modern jazz and electronic music, High Risk incorporates elements of improvisation into its sound, beat and song. On bass and drums, current scene leaders Jonathan Maron and Mark Guiliana explore new territory through groove and electronic manipulation. With the addition of up-and-coming DJ and remixer Shigeto, the group fuses melodic lyricism, stuttering, textured electronics, deep bass lines and driving drums. Building on the excitement of the pioneering ensemble Keystone, this quartet is the latest chapter in Douglas’ involvement in electronic jazz—an exciting and colorful new exposition of improvised possibilities.

Piano Jazz with Marian McPartland       

Thursday at 6:00 PM

Ingrid Jensen 

Ingrid Jensen

Trumpeter Ingrid Jensen has built a strong reputation among critics and peers, and McPartland praised the warmth and virtuosity of her playing. Her performances as a leader and featured soloist have taken her around the world, and she can be heard as a soloist with the Christine Jensen Orchestra, her own quartet and quintet formations, and a number of other New York-based bands. Jensen is McPartland’s guest on this 2000 Piano Jazz, with musical selections including “A Child Is Born” and “Chelsea Bridge.”

Jazz Corner of the World with Craig Kessler    

Saturday, Noon – 4:00 PM and Monday, 7:00 PM – 11:00 PM

“McCoy Tyner — His Impulse! Years”

McCoy Tyner (left) with John Coltrane

Back in May, Craig presented a program of McCoy’s years at MILESTONE RECORDS (1/72 to 11/94), and in July, a program of McCoy’s years with BLUE NOTE RECORDS (6/60 to 10/70 and 2/85 thru 1989). Today, as we close in on Mr. Tyner’s 77th birthday (12/11), Craig looks at Tyner’s years at IMPULSE! RECORDS (5/23/61 to 11/23/65 and 1995 – ’97). We’ll hear from Tyner’s seven Impulse! recording dates as a leader, as well as the his majestic piano work in the company of John Coltrane and others. Don’t miss the culmination of our 3 shows spotlighting the career of one of the great jazz pianists…MCCOY TYNER!

Riverwalk Jazz  

Sunday at 5:00 PM

Class of ‘26: Soundtrack of the Jazz Age                          

America was booming in 1926. The country enjoyed peace and prosperity— and the 20s roared. The Jim Cullum Jazz Band celebrates the soundtrack of the Jazz Age with music from the repertoires of Louis Armstrong, Bix Beiderbecke and Jelly Roll Morton with special guests: guitarist Marty Grosz, vocalist Nina Ferro and Vernel Bagneris, and more.

Tropical Heat with Kpoti Accoh      

Sunday, 6:00 PM – 8:00 PM

Featured Album: “Real Blues” by St. Germain         

http://www.last.fm/music/St.+Germain/Real+Blues

One of the few producers to pursue a real fusion of jazz and house music, Frenchman Ludovic Navarre began recording in the early ’90s using various aliases (Subsystem, Modus Vivendi, Deepside) for a range of French imprints. St. Germain debuted in 1994 for Laurent Garnier’s F Communications label and Navarre released his first album, Boulevard, in 1996. Featuring trumpeter Pascal Ohse, the album worked as a hybrid of American R&B and jazz with the growing French house scene exemplified by Garnier, la Funk Mob, and Dimitri From Paris. Tourist, issued at the turn of the century by Blue Note, took the concept further, with Navarre working post-production on a fuller complement of musicians. Navarre has also remixed such varying artists as Björk, Pierre Henry, and the Suburban Knight.

As St. Germain he signed with Nonesuch in early 2015. In May he announced a self-titled offering — his first album of new material in 15 years. Inspired by his longtime love of Malian music, the album was recorded in Navarre’s Paris studio. His stable of studio musicians included Brazilian percussionist Jorge Bezerra, Malian kora player Mamadou Cherif Soumano, Malian guitarist and n’goni player Guimba Kouyate, and longtime associate Martiniquais keyboardist Didier Davidas. St. Germain’s pre-release single “Real Blues” was issued in May, while the album was released that October.

KCCK’s Midnight CD

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

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

KCCK’s Special Thanksgiving Day Holiday Broadcast

Jazz Under the Stars 2015 – The complete Season

Thursday, November 26th 8:00am – 3:30pm (repeated 3:30pm-Midnight)

Shade of Blue at KCCK’s Jazz Under the Stars 2015

We have so much to be thankful for – including all the incredibly talented musicians who performed at KCCK’s Jazz Under the Stars concerts this past August. Join us when we bring you an entire season’s worth of awesome performances from Jazz Under the Stars 2015 on Thanksgiving Day beginning at 8:00am – over seven hours of some of the best live music that happened anywhere in the Cultural Corridor this year! Our line-up includes internationally known vibraphonist, composer, and UI professor of music Dan Moore performing as Dan Moore and Friends followed by Local on the 8s, a group of musicians from across Iowa with a compelling mixture of progressive rock, jazz, R&B, hip hop and funk music. Our holiday broadcast also features The Beaker Brothers who play alternative, progressive and ‘underground’ rock of Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, Santana, the Allman Brothers and the Grateful Dead. We’ll wrap up our Thanksgiving Day special with a real tasty treat – a rare reunion performance by Shade of Blue, with their compelling combination of Blues, R&B, gospel, and jazz featuring the sultry and soulful vocals of Simone Green and Joan Ruffin performing the music of Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder, Bill Withers and more.

Join Iowa’s Jazz Station for Jazz Under the Stars 2015 – the complete season, Thursday, November 26th at 8:00am for a terrific Thanksgiving Day and a splendid way to start the holiday season!

If you miss any of our performers, we’ll repeat all four concerts starting at 3:30pm during the second half of our special holiday broadcast.

Short List with Bob Naujoks

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

The Short List: Jazz Clubs Live – Rainbow Room / Basin Street East (NYC)

Basin Street East in NYC

This week two jazz venues are featured. First the posh Rainbow Room high atop the RCA building, and the long passed Basin Street East. Each had their heyday: The Rainbow Room in the big band era and beyond; Basin Street from the mid-50s to the mid-60s. There were a number of good recordings made at Basin Street East in its short tenure, but only a few exist from the Rainbow Room. Perhaps they are little known now, but both are part of jazz history in a small way.

Jazz Profiles with Nancy Wilson  

Monday at 6:00 PM

Duke Ellington: The Overview Part 2

Duke Ellington

Host Nancy Wilson picks up the Ellington story in the early 1930s. As America struggled through the depths of the Depression, Ellington’s star continued to rise. But his manager Irving Mills’s move to book Ellington and his band on a tour of the racially-segregated Deep South brought Duke to a career crossroads. Commentary includes biographer John Edward Hasse, former Ellington bandmates, and Ellington himself.

Jazz Corner of the World with Craig Kessler

Monday, 7:00 PM – 11:00 PM (follows Jazz Profiles)

“The Birthdate Anniversary Celebration for Tenor Sax Great, Coleman Randolph Hawkins”

Craig celebrates the 111th anniversary of the birth of the “father of the jazz tenor saxophone”, Coleman Hawkins (11/21/1904 to 5/19/1969), with a survey of “Hawk’s” pioneering career. We’ll hear him performing with Mamie Smith’s Jazz Hounds way back in 1921, all the way up to his final recordings in 1967. Craig will spin classic discs that feature Hawkins as a leader, as well as side-man performances with jazz giants like Thelonious Monk, Max Roach, Kenny Burrell, Randy Weston, and many others.

New Orleans Calling with George Ingmire    

Tuesday at 6:00 PM 

“NOCCA”

Ad for NOCCA

The New Orlean’s Center For the Creative Arts (NOCCA) was established in 1973 and has since served as a major educational resource for the area’s high school students aspiring to careers in the creative arts including music, writing, the visual arts, theater, digital media and more recently the culinary arts. Graduates of the NOCCA Jazz Studies Program include: Nicholas Payton, Donald Harrison, Jr., Terence Blanchard, Harry Connick, Jr., and Wynton, Branford, Delfeayo, and Jason Marsalis. 29 year old keyboarist/composer and singer Jon Batiste, who you see and hear lead the ”Stay Human” band on NBC’s The Late Show with Steven Colbert, is a NOCCA graduate. NOCCA has been instrumental in allowing these and other artists to travel the world and bring that unique New Orleans sound with them.

Jazz Night in America with Christian McBride

Wednesday at 6:00 PM

Sabertooth Saturday Night 

Sabertooth Organ Quartet

Every year for about 23 years, one group has held a midnight to 5 a.m. time slot on Saturday nights. It’s a quirky band, co-led by saxophonist Pat Mallinger and Cameron Pfiffner, which swings hard (and a little off-kilter) among the hardcore fans, the rowdy drunks, the musicians coming off their own gigs. And it happens in the jazz haven of Chicago, in a club called the Green Mill which doesn’t look to have changed much since its days as a Prohibition-era speakeasy. Jazz Night in America follows Pat and Cameron to the gig, then stays up all night with the Sabertooth Organ Quartet.

Wednesday Night Special               

7:00 PM (Follows Jazz Night in America)   

Rudresh Mahanthappa Bird Calls at the 2015 Iowa City Jazz Festival

Iowa City Jazz Festival 2015: Rudresh Mahanthappa Bird Calls                    

Few musicians share the ability of saxophonist/composer Rudresh Mahanthappa to embody the expansive possibilities of his music with his culture. What has materialized is a sound that hybridizes progressive jazz and South Indian classical music in a fluid and forward-looking form that reflects Mahanthappa’s own experience growing up a second-generation Indian-American. The manifestations of that trajectory include the latest version of his quartet setting, currently named Gamak.

Mahanthappa has been awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship, a New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship, and commissions from the Rockefeller Foundation MAP Fund, Chamber Music America and the American Composers Forum. He has been named alto saxophonist of the year for three years running in Downbeat Magazine’s International Critics Polls (2011-2013) and for five years running by the Jazz Journalists’ Association (2009-2013). In April 2013, he received a Doris Duke Performing Artist Award, one of the most prominent arts awards in the world. This summer, shortly before his appearance the ICJF, it was announced that Rudresh won the Downbeat International Critics Poll in 3 categories: Album of the Year for Bird Calls, Alto Saxophonist of the Year, and Rising Star Composer of the Year.

Piano Jazz with Marian McPartland       

Thursday at 6:00 PM

(Pre-empted this week for our special Thanksgiving Day Holiday broadcast – see above)

Jazz Corner of the World with Craig Kessler    

Saturday, Noon – 4:00 PM and Monday, 7:00 PM – 11:00 PM

“The Birthdate Anniversary Celebration For Unheralded Jazz Master, Gigi Gryce”   

Craig celebrates the birthday of noted reedman, composer, arranger, and educator, George General “Gigi” Gryce (11/28/25 to 3/14/83) by spinning an impressive array of Gigi’s work as a leader, a sideman, and as a remarkable composer and arranger.  Gigi worked with many of the biggest names in jazz in the 50s and 60s — Clifford Brown, Thelonious Monk, Teddy Charles, Art Blakey, Lee Morgan, etc., but remains relatively unknown.  Tune in to catch a glimpse of why so many of his contemporaries thought so highly of him!!

Riverwalk Jazz  

Sunday at 5:00 PM

Not Just Another Pretty Face: “Girl Singers” of the Big Band Era                         

In the 1930s and 40s they were called “girl singers.” Giant talents like Helen Humes, Ivie Anderson and Billie Holiday first made their mark as the only female on stage singing with bands led by Duke Ellington, Artie Shaw, and Count Basie, among others. They went on to break the “just another pretty face” stereotype by becoming legendary vocalists in their own right.

Tropical Heat with Kpoti Accoh      

Sunday, 6:00 PM – 8:00 PM

Featured Album: “Na Dre” by Dobet Gnahore        

http://www.allmusic.com/album/na-dre-mw0002623841/credits

Vocalist, dancer, and percussionist Dobet Gnahore has been hailed Africa’s leading star on the rise, compared to genre legends and cultural ambassadors like Miriam Makeba and Hugh Masakela by her mid-twenties. Brought up in a musical and artistic hot-house environment, Gnahore’s musical talent comes as no surprise. Her father, Boni Gnahore, a drummer, vocalist, and performer renown across the Ivory Coast, was a founding member of the artist colony Village Ki-Yi M’Bock, a community of more than 50 artists from multiple disciplines and backgrounds. Her first artistic turning point came when Gnahore was 12 and announced to her father that she wasn’t going to school anymore, but rather staying at the colony to learn.

KCCK’s Midnight CD

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

http://www.kcck.org/onair/midnight_cd.php