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UMO Jazz Orchestra
250px, UMO Jazz Orchestra UMO Jazz Orchestra is a Finnish big band. It was founded in 1975 by jazz musicians Heikki Sarmanto and Esko Linnavalli. UMO is an abbreviation of "Uuden Musiikin Orkesteri" (New Musical Orchestra). Since 1984 UMO has been a professional orchestra which is financed by Finnish Broadcasting Company, Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture and the city of Helsinki. UMO has been toured in Europe, Canada, and the U.S. and has worked with Dexter Gordon, Dizzy Gillespie, Gil Evans, Mercer Ellington, McCoy Tyner, Maria Schneider, Michael Brecker, John Scofield, and Lenny Pickett. Discography * ''Our Latin Friends'' (1976) * ''A Good Time Was Had By All'' (1976) * ''Thad Jones, Mel Lewis & UMO'' (1978) * ''Umophilos'' (1979) * ''Sea Suite Effoa'' (1983) * ''Ultima Thule'' (1983) * ''Bad Luck, Good Luck'' (1985) * ''UMO New Music Orchestra Plays the Music of Koivistoinen & Linkola'' (1985) * ''Passions of a Man – Kalevala Fantasy'' (1987) * ''Green & Yellow' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Big Band
A big band or jazz orchestra is a type of musical ensemble of jazz music that usually consists of ten or more musicians with four sections: saxophones, trumpets, trombones, and a rhythm section. Big bands originated during the early 1910s and dominated jazz in the early 1940s when swing was most popular. The term "big band" is also used to describe a genre of music, although this was not the only style of music played by big bands. Big bands started as accompaniment for dancing. In contrast to the typical jazz emphasis on improvisation, big bands relied on written compositions and arrangements. They gave a greater role to bandleaders, arrangers, and sections of instruments rather than soloists. Instruments Big bands generally have four sections: trumpets, trombones, saxophones, and a rhythm section of guitar, piano, double bass, and drums. The division in early big bands, from the 1920s to 1930s, was typically two or three trumpets, one or two trombones, three or four saxo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Maria Schneider (musician)
Maria Lynn Schneider (born November 27, 1960) is an American composer and jazz orchestra leader who has won multiple Grammy Awards. Biography Born in Windom, Minnesota, Schneider studied music theory and composition at the University of Minnesota, graduating in 1983, then earned a master's degree in Music in 1985 from the Eastman School of Music, studying for one year as well at the University of Miami. After leaving Eastman, she was hired by Gil Evans as his copyist and assistant. She collaborated with Evans for the next few years, working with him on music for a tour with Sting and assisting him as he scored the film ''The Color of Money''. Before she became one of the most acclaimed composers and bandleaders of her generation, Schneider received an NEA Apprenticeship Grant to study with Bob Brookmeyer in 1985. In 1988, Schneider formed her first band in collaboration with her then-husband, jazz trombonist John Fedchock, and that group appeared at Visiones in Greenwich Vill ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Viktoria Tolstoy
Louise Viktoria Tolstoy (born 29 July 1974) is a Swedish jazz singer of Russian ancestry. She is the great-great-granddaughter of Russian writer Leo Tolstoy and the daughter of Erik Kjellberg. Tolstoy was a regular studio guest in season one of the television series '' Big Brother'' in 2000. She was married to designer Per Holknekt from 2001 until they divorced in March 2008. Discography As leader * ''Smile, Love and Spice'' (Sittel, 1994) * ''Viktoria Tolstoy'' (EMI, 1996) * ''For Alskad'' (EMI, 1996) * ''White Russian'' (Blue Note, 1997) * ''Blame It On My Youth'' (EMI, 2001) * ''Shining On You'' (ACT, 2004) * ''My Swedish Heart'' (ACT, 2005) * ''Pictures of Me'' (ACT, 2006) * ''My Russian Soul'' (ACT, 2008) * ''Letters to Herbie'' (ACT, 2011) * ''A Moment of Now'' (ACT, 2013) * ''Meet Me at the Movies'' (ACT, 2017) * ''Stations'' (ACT, 2020) As guest With Nils Landgren * 2002 – ''Sentimental Journey'' * 2004 – ''Funky ABBA'' With others * 1998 − ''Här kommer na ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nils Landgren (musician)
Nils Landgren (born 15 February 1956) is a Swedish R&B, funk, and jazz trombone player and singer. He is known as ''The Man with the Red Horn'' because he plays a red trombone. Career Landgren was born in Degerfors. Between 1972 and 1978 he studied classical trombone at the music college in Karlstad, Sweden, and continued his education at the university of Arvika. After meeting the Swedish folk-jazz pioneer Bengt-Arne Wallin and trombonist Eje Thelin, Landgren was persuaded to move from his strictly classical studies to improvisation and to begin developing his own sound and approach to music. After his graduation, Landgren moved to Stockholm to work as a professional trombone player. He was soon touring with Swedish pop star Björn Skifs. Skifs's band, Blue Swede, recorded a number one hit song in the U.S. pop charts with ''Hooked on a Feeling''. In 1981, Thad Jones invited Landgren to join his big band, called Ball of Fire, as the lead trombonist. Landgren has worked in ma ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Norma Winstone
Norma Ann Winstone MBE (born 23 September 1941) is an English jazz singer and lyricist. With a career spanning more than 50 years, she is best known for her wordless improvisations. Musicians with whom she has worked include Michael Garrick, John Surman, Michael Gibbs, Mike Westbrook, as well as pianist John Taylor, who was her former husband. Biography Early years and education Born as Norma Ann Short in Bow, East London, England, she was 10 years old when her family moved to Dagenham, Essex.Odeen-Isbister, Sara (5 October 2012)"Jazz star Norma Winstone on growing up in Dagenham" '' Barking and Dagenham Post''. Encouraged by her primary school teacher, she applied for and won a scholarship to attend Saturday-school at Trinity Music College, and after passing her 11-plus exams, she went to Dagenham County High School (where Dudley Moore was then a senior pupil). Like Moore, her music teacher there was Peter Cork (1926–2012). At the age of 17 she discovered jazz, list ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kenny Wheeler
Kenneth Vincent John Wheeler, OC (14 January 1930 – 18 September 2014) was a Canadian composer and trumpet and flugelhorn player, based in the U.K. from the 1950s onwards. Most of his performances were rooted in jazz, but he was also active in free improvisation and occasionally contributed to rock music recordings. Wheeler wrote over one hundred compositions and was a skilled arranger for small groups and large ensembles. Wheeler was the patron of the Royal Academy Junior Jazz course. Early life Wheeler was born in Toronto, Ontario, on 14 January 1930. Growing up in Toronto, he began playing the cornet at age 12 and became interested in jazz in his mid-teens. Wheeler spent a year studying composition at The Royal Conservatory of Music in 1950. In 1952 he moved to Britain. He found his way into the London jazz scene of the time, playing in groups led by Tommy Whittle, Tubby Hayes, and Ronnie Scott. Career In the late 1950s, he was a member of Buddy Featherstonhaugh's quinte ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lenny Pickett
Lenny Pickett (born April 10, 1954) is an American saxophonist and musical director of the ''Saturday Night Live'' band. From 1973 to 1981 he was a member of Tower of Power. He is known for his skill in the altissimo register (executed by using a combination of voicing control, air stream control, and alternate fingerings), which can be heard during the opening credits of ''Saturday Night Live''. Music career Pickett grew up in Berkeley, California. He has no formal musical training, did not attend high school beyond the first year and did not attend college. After dropping out of high school, he took lessons from Bert Wilson, a jazz saxophonist known for his facility with the altissimo register. Other than those lessons, he is self-taught on saxophone. In the 1970s and early 1980s, he led the horn section for Tower of Power, an innovative and funk-focused East San Francisco Bay area band, and also a popular session band that backed many musicians in multiple genres, from Elto ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Scofield
John Scofield (born December 26, 1951), sometimes referred to as "Sco", is an American guitarist and composer whose music over a long career has blended jazz, jazz fusion, funk, blues, soul and rock. He first came to mainstream attention in the band of Miles Davis, and has toured and recorded with many prominent jazz artists, including saxophonists Eddie Harris, Dave Liebman, Joe Henderson and Joe Lovano; keyboardists George Duke, Joey DeFrancesco, Herbie Hancock, Larry Goldings and Robert Glasper; fellow guitarists Pat Metheny, John Abercrombie, Pat Martino and Bill Frisell; bassists Marc Johnson and Jaco Pastorius; and drummer Billy Cobham and Dennis Chambers. Outside the world of jazz, he has collaborated with Phil Lesh, Mavis Staples, John Mayer, Medeski Martin & Wood, and Gov’t Mule. Biography Scofield was born in Ohio but, when he was still a baby, his family moved to Wilton, Connecticut, where he discovered his interest in music. Educated at the Berklee College of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Michael Brecker
Michael Leonard Brecker (March 29, 1949 – January 13, 2007) was an American jazz saxophonist and composer. He was awarded 15 Grammy Awards as both performer and composer. He was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from Berklee College of Music in 2004, and was inducted into the ''DownBeat'' Jazz Hall of Fame in 2007. Biography Early life and career Michael Brecker was born in Philadelphia and raised in Cheltenham Township, a local suburb. He was raised in a Jewish—and artistic—family: his father, Bob (Bobby), was a lawyer who played jazz piano and his mother, Sylvia, was a portrait artist. Michael Brecker was exposed to jazz at an early age by his father. He grew up as part of the generation of jazz musicians who saw rock music not as the enemy but as a viable musical option. Brecker began studying clarinet at age 6, then moved to alto saxophone in eighth grade, settling on the tenor saxophone as his primary instrument in his sophomore year. He graduated from Chelte ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
McCoy Tyner
Alfred McCoy Tyner (December 11, 1938March 6, 2020) was an American jazz piano, jazz pianist and composer known for his work with the John Coltrane Quartet (from 1960 to 1965) and his long solo career afterwards. He was an NEA Jazz Masters, NEA Jazz Master and five-time Grammy award winner. Unlike many of the jazz keyboardists of his generation, Tyner very rarely incorporated Electronic keyboard, electric keyboards or synthesizers into his work. Tyner has been widely imitated, and is one of the most recognizable and influential pianists in jazz history. Early life and family Tyner was born on December 11, 1938, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the eldest of three children of Jarvis and Beatrice (Stevenson) Tyner. His younger brother Jarvis Tyner was the executive vice-chairman of the Communist Party USA. Tyner was encouraged to study piano by his mother, who had installed a piano at her beauty salon. He began piano lessons at age 13 at the Granoff School of Music where he had als ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jazz
Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major form of musical expression in traditional and popular music. Jazz is characterized by swing and blue notes, complex chords, call and response vocals, polyrhythms and improvisation. Jazz has roots in European harmony and African rhythmic rituals. As jazz spread around the world, it drew on national, regional, and local musical cultures, which gave rise to different styles. New Orleans jazz began in the early 1910s, combining earlier brass band marches, French quadrilles, biguine, ragtime and blues with collective polyphonic improvisation. But jazz did not begin as a single musical tradition in New Orleans or elsewhere. In the 1930s, arranged dance-oriented swing big bands, Kansas City jazz (a hard-swinging, bluesy, improvisationa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mercer Ellington
Mercer Kennedy Ellington (March 11, 1919 – February 8, 1996) was an American musician, composer, and arranger. His father was Duke Ellington, whose band Mercer led for 20 years after his father's death. Biography Early life and education Ellington was born in Washington, D.C., United States. He was the only child of the composer, pianist, and bandleader Duke Ellington and his high school sweetheart Edna Thompson (d. 1967). Ellington grew up primarily in Harlem from the age of eight. By the age of eighteen, Ellington had written his first piece to be recorded by his father ("Pigeons and Peppers"). Ellington attended New College for the Education of Teachers at Columbia University, New York University and the Juilliard School. Career In 1939, 1959, and 1946 through 1949, Ellington led his own bands, many of whose members later performed with his father, or achieved a successful career in their own right (including Dizzy Gillespie, Kenny Dorham, Idrees Sulieman, Chico Hamilto ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
