Undead Music Festival (May 9-12, 2012) Win Tickets to May 9 LPR Show | Buy Tickets Lovers of eclectic jazz music rejoice, the 2012 Undead Music Festival is almost upon us. The festival runs from May 9-12 and kicks off on Wednesday with a marathon night of concerts in the village. FOUR NIGHTS celebrating the incredible, dynamic, explosively creative jazz, instrumental, and adventurous music being made in New York City. May 9th: [...]
Today's Top Tune features an unusual pairing -- the incomparable voice of Antony Hegarty, of Antony and the Johnsons, and Steven Bernstein's Millennial Territory Orchestra.
The snow is falling at heavy pace this evening in Woodstock, New York, where Levon Helm and his band and crew are preparing for a special "Nightmare on Helm Street" Ramble at the legendary The Band drummer's home studio. Unfortunately there's no power on Plochmann Lane, but "the show must go on," so the concert will start at 8PM as scheduled. In other Midnight Ramble news, Helm will welcome guest openers Dr. Ralph Stanley (Dec. 2), Dawes (Dec. 3), Steven Bernstein's MTO plays Sly (Dec. 10) and The Mastersons (Dec. [...]
We've introduced our listeners to Steven Bernstein's incredible trumpet playing and arranging skills last month, with a 40mn eclectic jazz mix . We've also published an interview (in english or french ) and went to see him play his Sly Stone tribute show in Paris on sept 11 , opening for Medeski, Martin and Wood; it was really amazing, the best double-bill of the year in the French capital so far!! His new album MTO plays Sly is out today and here's the second part of our A Trumpet's Life mix to celebrate [...]
I distinctly remember discovering Steven Bernstein's incredible trumpet playing and arranging through one of his bands, Sex Mob and their album Din of Inequity, which included some John Medeski featurings and hard-to-believe covers of Prince, John Barry, Paul McCartney and a few others. It was the end of the 90s and France was as lost musically as it is today, with musical ignorance reigning supreme. Things have been slowly evolving thanks to independent medias such as Paris DJs (and djouls.com before) who always had the will to defend incredible artists you've quite never heard of. So here's the first part [...]
The other day I began to describe the origins of the Sunday Mix Tape feature. Today, I'll describe the end of an era. The second fifty mix tapes, which commenced on January 28th, 2007, saw an increased amount of attention paid to marginalized artists. It was almost as if the first few dozen installments were my way of convincing people to come along for the ride, and the second fifty mix tapes were my way of introducing people to the really good shit. Three years ago, before the reissue and the recent Pitchfork review, you'd never see an [...]
Back in early 2008, Marco Benevento set-up a Thursday night residency at Sullivan Hall that featured a series of killer combos and collaborations including: Andrew Barr, Billy Martin, Bobby Previte, Brad Barr, DJ Olive, G. Calvin Weston, Reed Mathis, Joe Russo, John Ellis, Kaki King, Marc Friedman, Skerik, Stanton Moore, and Steven Bernstein. Shine A Light Productions captured it all on film and just recently completed a DVD of the events entitled "Marco Benevento (& Friends): Live In NYC: The Sullivan Hall Residency." Here's a little video teaser they put together for the [...]
Prior to discovering Steven Issachar's Diaspora Suite album, I had only known him as the bandleader of the irreverent avant-jazz band Sex Mob. There's a world of difference between the delightfully cacophonous James Bond film cover versions of the latter and Issachar . Seeing as how Diaspora Suite was released on Tzadik records, you can probably guess the overall flavour of the music, but there's something special at work here. Issachar features Bernstein's fondness for the slow, sultry build and combines it with terrifically elongated melodic lines that are such [...]
From the moment the string quartet began sawing away during "Introduction", the beginning track to PT Walkley 's new album, Mr. Macy Walks Alone , it is blatant that this is not your usual acoustic sing-a-long. Although Walkley is far from unbeknown to the music industry, this album is ultimately definitive of his excellence as a singer, songwriter, and recording artist. Characterized by a sophisticated array of instruments (string quartet, brass, flutes, bells, choir, saws, etc.) and [...]
This year, the '80s turn old. Three of the biggest artists of that decade turn 50 this summer: Madonna (August 16), Michael Jackson (August 29) and, today, Prince. Back in the day, everyone thought he was the weird one, but while Madonna peddles kid's books and lukewarm disco and Michael, well, whatever, Prince is the one whose grown up distinguished. He's fashioned himself an R&B statesman, and his work is as good as ever, despite the popular idea that he's "over." The Rainbow Children (2001), Musicology (2004) and 3121 (2006) stand up to his [...]
Steven Bernstein may be the most important slide trumpeter in the history of jazz. Maybe because he is about the only slide trumpeter. A prolific composer, performer and arranger, Steven can be heard/found just about everywhere. He has played in the studio for Rufus Wainwright , Marianne Faithful , Linda Thompson and Darlene Love . Joined these musicians on stage: Lou Reed , Jarvis Cocker , Ben E. King , Shane McGowan , Beth Orton and Pete Doherty. [...]
Getting through today's Mix Tape without making a complete ass of myself is going to take a portion of my cunning. No, wait... all of my cunning. Let me explain. RULES for uninitiated noobs : With 100MB of webspace, I give birth to a weekly Mix Tape to be deposited on your iPods or Zunes or Kingklangs or whatever the industry is currently pushing on you. Sometimes there will be themes that link all the songs together, other times I'll just throw songs at a wall (not literally) and see what sticks. [...]
MTO -- Signed, Sealed, Delivered In last week's post on Johnny Otis, I wrote that he got his start in the "territorial orchestras" of the 1930s. Of course, to write that, I first had to look up what a territorial orchestra was. Then, this morning, I was listening to the news on NPR when they did a piece on a band called Millenial Territory Orchestra, or MTO. Naturally enough, I turned up the volume and listened in. As Steven Bernstein explains on the NPR segment [...]
Bumpershine.com
Today's Top Tune from KCRW
Hidden Track
DEEPGOA's Electronic Sessions
Swan Fungus
Live Music Blog
Doklands
PopWreck(oning)
WFMU's Beware of the Blog
The Late Greats
Tuwa's Shanty
The Corner Laughers “Poppy Seeds”
Pictures Of Andre 3000 As Jimi Hendrix
Sasquatch Day Three: The Day Many Men Cried for the First Time In Their Lives…
