Jazz

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews Without a Song: The 9/11 Concert by legendary tenor saxophonist Sonny Rollins. He turns 75 Wednesday. The CD was recorded live at a concert in Boston shortly after Sept. 11, 2001.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews Song X: Twentieth Anniversary, a reissue and remix of a 1985 collaboration between guitarist Pat Metheny and saxophonist Ornette Coleman.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews Simulated Progress, from the co-operative trio Fieldwork. The CD features Vijay Iyer on piano, Steve Lehman on alto and sopranino saxophones and Elliot Humberto Kavee on drums and percussion.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews Triplicity, from tenor saxophone player Bob Feldman

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews Hope, Future and Destiny, the latest CD from flute player Nicole Mitchell.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews Backstabber's Ball, the new album from bassist Neal Caine.

The legendary jazzman turns 87 on July 31, 2005. He and his trio have just released a new CD, For My Father, and he joins John Patitucci and Jack De Johnette for the Great Jazz Trio's upcoming CD, S'Wonderful.

Billie Holiday: The Ultimate Collection, is a two CD/one DVD collection of Holiday performances. Included along with many of the singer's classic songs are some rarely seen appearances of Holiday on 1950s television.

Gareth Cook covers science for The Boston Globe. Last week, he won the 2005 Pulitzer Prize for explanatory journalism for his yearlong series of stories on stem-cell research. The judges praised Cook's work for explaining "the complex scientific and ethical dimensions of stem cell research."

Lewis Black is a playwright, stand-up comic, actor, and a commentator on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. He's been described as having the mouth of a shock-jock and the heart of a liberal. His new book is entitled Nothing's Sacred.

Critic Milo Miles checks out the New Orleans sound via a recent recording by the Neville Brothers, Walkin' in the Shadow of Life, as well as a new Sonny Landreth CD, Grant Street.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews I Have The Room Above Her by the Paul Motian/Bill Frisell/Joe Lovano trio.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews two new box set releases from the mail-order house Mosaic: The Complete Argo/Mercury Art Farmer/Benny Golson/Jazztet Sessions and The Complete Roulette Dinah Washington Sessions.

In his 30-year career, musician Fred Hersch has performed in solo, duo, trio and quintet settings. In 2003 he received the prestigious Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship, which he used to work on his latest project, Leaves of Grass. For it, Hersch leads a 10-piece ensemble, which includes vocalists singing the words of Walt Whitman set to compositions by Hersch. He is touring the ensemble this month.

With his latest CD, Ivey Divey, bandleader Don Byron pays homage to saxophonist Lester Young. Byron is a prolific musician who gets inspiration from all kinds of music. One of Byron's most-played recordings is Bug Music, heard, among other places, on NPR.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews And now... The Revolutionary Ensemble. The three-man group uses instruments ranging from violin and harmonica to acoustic bass and a wide range of percussion.

Bandleader and clarinetist Artie Shaw died Dec. 29 at the age of 94, apparently of natural causes. In the 1930s and '40s, Shaw's band ranked with the Goodman, Dorsey and Miller bands in popularity. But he largely rejected pop tunes and stuck with music by composers like Porter, Gershwin and Berlin. We remember Shaw.

We rebroadcast a tribute to the great vocalist and composer Thomas "Fats" Waller from May 19, 2004. Guitarist and singer Marty Grosz and cornet player Randy Reinhart join us for a special in-studio performance in honor of Waller's 100th birthday. Waller wrote many hit songs, appeared in films in the 1930s and '40s, and wrote Broadway musicals.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews Careless Love, the CD from singer Madeleine Peyroux.

The new book Living With Jazz: A Reader, is the first collection of Dan Morgenstern's writing, including liner notes, record and concert reviews, critical essays and other writings. Morgenstern has been on the jazz scene for more than 40 years, from his earliest days as an editor of the jazz magazine Down Beat. Since 1976, he has been the director of the Institute of Jazz Studies at Rutgers University in Newark, N.J. The institute is billed as the largest collection of jazz-related materials anywhere. Morgenstern has won four Grammy Awardss for liner notes.