Lara Pellegrinelli
Lara’s Contributions
October 2007 Artist Profiles
René Marie: Home Is Where the Heart Is
Following four highly regarded recordings for MaxJazz, vocalist René Marie independently released her new CD, Experiment in Truth, on May 26 without much fanfare. That same evening, Marie played at Charleston, South Carolina’s Spoleto Festival, her last...
06/13/06 Concerts
The Fès Festival of World Sacred Music
The city of Fès scarcely seems like it could be home to nearly a million Moroccans. Surrounded by medieval walls and ramparts, the medina, or old city, is a hive of activity, but one that conceals as much as it puts on display. Vendors’ booths piled high...
December 2003 Features
Singing for Our Supper
Marketing instrumental jazz has never been easy. It’s a niche market, and one that requires a certain amount of intelligence, dedication and patience on the part of its customers. With attention spans flagging, the economy ailing and the music industry in...
October 2003 Overdue Ovation
Ernie Andrews: No Regrets
Sure, writing about music is a little like tap dancing about architecture, but beyond the usual inadequacies caused by translating from one mode of expression to another, writing about Ernie Andrews has its own particular challenges. His performances are...
December 2002 Features
Anita O’Day: Yesterday & O’Day
“Hello, camera! You want some shots with the boobies? We ignore ’em, but they’re there.” Outfitted in a silver blouse and pearl earrings, vocal legend Anita O’Day ambles toward center stage at New York City’s Fez. As it turns out, she only looks demure...
May 2002 Albums
The Best of Etta Jones: The Prestige Singles
Etta Jones
Late last year, JazzTimes asked its writers to contribute their highs and lows for 2001. The two extremes have melded into a single, bittersweet memory for me-that of 72-year-old vocalist Etta Jones in her last performances at the Village Vanguard. I knew...
January/February 2002 Albums
Girl Talk
Ernie Andrews
I once asked Jon Hendricks, the Godfather of vocalese, if he had a favorite singer. His immediate answer? Ernie Andrews, who, he informed me, is a singer in the same class as Joe Williams, Jimmy Rushing, Al Hibbler and Billy Eckstine. Having made a couple...
December 2001 Features
The Women Jacketed By Records
As I remember her, Erroll Garner was attractive and self-confident. Waves of reddish-brown hair swung skyward behind her left ear. Narrowed blue eyes peered from under thin, arched brows. Perhaps she wore too much lipstick, but the red oval circling neat...
December 2001 Albums
Lady Day: The Complete Billie Holiday on Columbia 1933-1944
Billie Holiday
"This month there has been a real find in the person of a singer named Billie Halliday [sic]," wrote John Hammond in the British monthly Melody Maker in April 1933. The fledgling columnist had stopped by a small Harlem nightspot named Monette's, expecting...
September 2001 Albums
Come Dream With Me
Jane Monheit
Since the release of her debut recording, Never Never Land, a mere year and a half ago, 23-year-old vocalist Jane Monheit has been hailed as a sultry, young, white reincarnation of Ella Fitzgerald. With due respect to Monheit, the comparison is neither fair...
September 2001 Albums
The Complete Columbia Recordings of Mildred Bailey
Mildred Bailey
A total of 214 tracks over 10 discs of Mildred who? Although her name is less familiar to today's audiences than Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald or Anita O'Day, Mildred Bailey (1903-51) was perhaps the most influential female singer at a critical moment...
September 2001 Albums
The Calling: Celebrating Sarah Vaughan
Dianne Reeves
Dianne Reeves continues to grapple with a challenge facing all contemporary jazz singers, namely what to sing. She obviously enjoys drawing from a broad range of material; previous albums present songs by Cole Porter and Jule Styne alongside those of Cat...
July/August 2001 Albums
Nothin' But Love
Bertha Hope
Nothin' but Love, pianist Bertha Hope's first domestic recording as a leader, is not without its flaws. Hope, a veteran musician in her mid-60s, could be more agile pianistically speaking. Her attacks sometimes lack the precision expected in this era of...
June 2001 Albums
Doin' the Do!
Dave Berger and The Sultans of Swing
The swing revival may have peaked a couple of years ago in terms of being a fashionable retro movement, nonetheless, the bands keep playing and the music keeps coming. Why, casual listeners may wonder? Simply put, genuine devotion outlives popular fads...
June 2001 Albums
Spirits of Congo Square
The New Orleans Legacy Ensemble
The first recording by the New Orleans Legacy Ensemble is aptly titled Spirits of Congo Square-unfortunately, not in remembrance of the city's lively past as the birthplace of jazz, but for their wan, ghostlike performance. Despite the notable cast of musicians...
May 2001 Features
Shirley Horn: Around the Horn with Shirley
Aside from a boat-sized Cadillac moored in the driveway, the white stucco house in Northeast Washington, D.C., betrays few signs of its occupants. No lights shine, inside or out. Metal bars guard first-story windows with heavy curtains drawn beneath. Grating...
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