Tom Harrell
Tom Harrell has been an active musician for over 50 years. After stints with a wide range of prominent bands including those of Horace Silver, Lee Konitz and George Russell, he came to maturity with the Phil Woods Quintet from 1983 – 1989. For the past three decades he has released a series of discs on roughly an annual basis that are consistently well-received. In 2018 he was the Jazz Journalists Association Trumpeter of the Year. In this next hour of Jazz at 100 Today!, we will begin our series on trumpet masters with Tom Harrell.
In 2006, Harrell formed a quintet with Wayne Escoffery on tenor, Danny Grissett on piano, Ugonna Okegwo on bass, and Johnathan Blake on drums. This durable unit recorded together until 2011, releasing five discs on HighNote. Of the third disc, 2010’s
Late R&B Legend Denise LaSalle Always Called Her Own Shots
Always the Queen: The Denise LaSalle Story is available now Tweet
In her posthumously published memoir,
Always the Queen: The Denise LaSalle Story, the fiercely unapologetic soul singer and songwriter LaSalle looks back at her illustrious career as a self-made R&B icon. Co-written with blues historian David Whiteis, the narrative is told from LaSalle’s perspective and draws largely from transcripts of conversations between the two collaborators and friends.
In 1963, a young LaSalle signed her first recording contract with Chess Records the preeminent blues label that launched legends like Muddy Waters and Etta James. But the magic faded for the singer and songwriter shortly after she signed. The label wouldn’t record her material, and she had her suspicions as to why. “See, I wouldn’t go there [to the studio] alone,” she writes. In those days, manipulative tactics from male power brokers were