Geoffrey Himes
Geoffrey’s Contributions
09/15/10 Features
Bitches Brood
Today’s heavy hitters discuss the influence of Miles’ fusion masterwork
08/13/10 Features
Miles Davis: Forty Years of Freedom
Four decades after the release of Bitches Brew, Miles Davis alumni John McLaughlin, Jack DeJohnette, Dave Holland and more reflect on a groundbreaking recording that had some surprising precedents
07/06/10 Features
John McLaughlin
Legendary guitarist on Coltrane, Miles, Mahavishnu, and the search for infinite oneness
June 2010 Albums
People Time: The Complete Recordings
Stan Getz/Kenny Barron
When a jazz musician crosses the boundary of 60, he or she must decide what to do with phrases already played thousands of times. Do you just keep playing them with less and less emotional force? Do you replace them with a whole new bag of tricks? Or do...
August/September 2009 Features
Joe Lovano: Party of Five
After decades of acclaimed collaborations with peers and mentors, Joe Lovano introduces a powerhouse quintet featuring youthful talent—and two drummers.
December 2008 Features
Jazz and Country Fusion: The Searchers
When Sonny Rollins released his Way Out West album in 1957, the cover featured the tall tenor saxophonist standing out in the desert between a bleached cow skull and a multi-armed cactus. In the William Claxton photo, Rollins cradled his horn like a six...
November 2008 Features
David Sanborn: The Blues and the Abstract Truth
In 1956 David Sanborn was a skinny 11-year-old kid whose left arm hung awkwardly, a result of his eight-year bout with polio. While the other boys were out playing sports, little David spent countless hours listening to the radio, falling in love with the...
October 2008 Features
Freddie Hubbard: The Show Must Go On
The blue-neon sign of the Iridium Jazz Club glowed softly behind Freddie Hubbard. The legendary trumpeter wore a yellow-straw fedora, a gold tie and a tailored dark suit with a handkerchief peeking out of the jacket pocket. He was celebrating his 70th birthday...
October 2008 Albums
Earfood The Roy Hargrove Quintet
Roy Hargrove makes no bones about his desire to play jazz for lots of paying customers. And why not? We all want jazz to be heard by a large audience. But how does one attract that audience without resorting to pop music and merely slapping the jazz label...
06/28/08 Concerts
Charles Lloyd Quartet at JVC - New York
On his recent albums, Jason Moran has been experimenting with samples of spoken speech as springboards for improvisation, using the rhythms and inflections of people talking as cues for his piano solos. In his new role as a member of the Charles Lloyd Quartet...
June 2008 Features
Rahsaan Roland Kirk: The Cult of Kirk
Having spent almost all his life without eyesight, Rahsaan Roland Kirk could never understand why people were preoccupied with his show’s visual aspects. But how could we not be? Who would not be mesmerized by the sight of a man in a towering fur hat, wraparound...
May 2008 Features
Lionel Loueke: African American
In January, Lionel Loueke visited Joe’s Pub in Manhattan to preview the songs from his first major-label album, Karibu on Blue Note. Backed only by his longtime triomates, the guitarist sketched out the lilting melody of the title track on a nylon-string...
April 2008 Albums
Down in New Orleans
Blind Boys of Alabama
At the 1990 New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, the hometown’s top gospel act, the Zion Harmonizers, was doing its customary second-Sunday set in the Gospel Tent, when the group’s leader Sherman Washington called up a guest from the grassy backstage. Aaron...
January/February 2008 Albums
Shayari
Ron Blake
The title of Roy Hargrove’s 1993 album, Of Kindred Souls, was taken from a composition by the trumpeter’s then-regular saxophonist, Ron Blake. The intriguing, hymnlike melody was first enunciated, naturally, by Hargrove, but Blake took the first solo, a...
December 2007 Features
Herbie Hancock and Joni Mitchell: Music & Lyrics
Herbie Hancock has a confession to make: For the longest time, he ignored the lyrics of the songs he played on. Asked if he considered the lyrics when he assembled his poll-topping Gershwin’s World album, he says, “Not at all,” and spreads his hands before...
June 2007 Albums
Pilgrimage
Michael Brecker
Is it possible to disentangle the music on Michael Brecker’s final recording from the circumstances of its making? Probably not, but let’s try. As anyone reading this magazine must know, Brecker announced in 2005 that he would stop performing in public because...
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