Stevie Haberman plays piano with singer Mary Lou Gnoza and Gary Danielson. (Credit: Annie Warren / NWPB) Listen (Runtime 4:33) Read The Emerald of Siam is the night spot for […]Read More
The Lionel Hampton Jazz Festival (LHJF) is a jewel among the rolling Palouse hills. Held for 56 years at the University of Idaho in Moscow, this festival has gathered on stage such luminaries as Ella Fitzgerald, Dizzy Gillespie, and the man of note, Lionel Hampton, who has the U of I School of Music named in his honor. This festival is a grand event that brings together Read More
A scheme to entertain a 4-year-old youngster in Spokane by playing a jazz album nearly three decades ago produced a cascade of aftereffects that culminated on stage in Olympia, Washington, this month with crescendos of horns and multiple standing ovations. During the debut of a 16-piece, all-Indigenous big band, the performers on stage hearkened even further back in Read More
Simmons died last week at the age of 87. The cause of death remains unknown, but his life is cause for considerable celebration. Although jazz has established a place in academic and cultural institutions, it was and largely still is an outsider's music, and Simmons was an outsider's outsider. Read More
When Duke Ellington famously coined the phrase "beyond category," he was talking about freedom — of choice, of expression, of belonging. He meant following your heart and your instincts into an artistic territory without borders. And that's the place where violinist Regina Carter makes her home.Read More
Andra Day’s performance in the film earned the singer the Golden Globe for best actress in a drama. She is the second Black performer to ever win the award, following Whoopi Goldberg’s win in the category in 1985 for “The Color Purple.”Read More
All the lights in the house would go dark. The wait staff would turn still. The audience, often largely white, would either wait, in discomfort, or leave, knowing what was to come. On stage, a single spotlight illuminated the jazz artist’s face. And then Holiday, the glamorous jazz singer, would end her set with “Strange Fruit,” a song of protest against lynchings. There Read More
In 1968, Chick Corea entered our lives with two albums under his name: Tones for Joan's Bones and Now He Sings, Now He Sobs. And on Feb. 9, the pianist, composer and bandleader departed from this realm after a fast-moving cancer.Read More
Candles and books rest on a trunk at the bottom right corner of the wide shot. There, too, are special photographs of alto saxophonist Immanuel Wilkins with family in his childhood home in Philadelphia. "One of the brightest things about this pandemic was going home to spend time with my mother, father and grandmother after being on the road for a while," Wilkins told NPR Read More
The keyboardist, composer and bandleader Chick Corea — one of the most revered figures in contemporary jazz, but whose work spanned fusion to classical — died on Feb. 9 at age 79.Read More
NPR Music’s Tiny Desk series will celebrate Black History Month by featuring four weeks of Tiny Desk (home) concerts and playlists by Black artists spanning different genres and generations each […]Read More
Americans knew Bolling best for a recording project with noted French flutist Jean-Pierre Rampal which contained Bolling's sparkling "Suite for Flute and Jazz Piano." The album, which was released by CBS in 1975, remained on Billboard's classical charts for an astonishing 530 consecutive weeks.Read More
Pixar's new animated film Soul is the story of Joe Gardner, a middle school school music teacher with big dreams about performing jazz onstage. "Music is all I think about, from the moment I wake up in the morning to the moment I fall asleep at night," he says. "I was born to play."Read More
This year's edition of "A Jazz Piano Christmas" features REDWOOD, Cory Henry and Kenny Barron. We're celebrating the holidays with swing from the East Coast jazz scene. Read More
The film continues writer Linda Kuehl's unfinished investigation into Holiday's life through never-before-heard interviews with jazz luminaries, and explores her experiences with institutional racism.Read More
The blues prodigy performs a special Tiny Desk show at the Ground Zero Blues Club in Clarksdale, Miss.Read More
On this show, the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis invite the Sesame Street gang onstage. Plus, trombonist Joe Fielder's Open Sesame share rare songs from the Sesame songbook.Read More
From the '80s on, Kondo stood with a new generation of free-form players, collaborating with a long list of fellow iconoclasts.Read More
In 1965, two young fans heard the jazz giant John Coltrane play at a San Francisco club and had a religious epiphany. Their church is an idiosyncratic and joyful blend of devotion to the divine — and to jazz.Read More
As jazz experienced an awakening in the late '60s and early '70s , a record label from Oakland was at the forefront of capturing it. Now, those records are finally returning.Read More
One of the British jazz scene's rising stars performs a quarantine concert on the River Thames. Nubya Garcia's (home) concert took place on a boat — a first in Tiny Desk history — because she was in between homes. Read More
Ronald Bell, along with his brother, Robert "Kool" Bell, brought generations of music fans together on the dancefloor with hits like "Celebration," "Get Down On It" and "Jungle Boogie."Read More
Performances and speeches honor this year's NEA Jazz Masters award recipients, including Dorthaan Kirk, Roscoe Mitchell, Reggie Workman and Bobby McFerrin. Read More
The platinum-selling, low-key superstar performs a solo set at her piano for Tiny Desk's quarantine series.Read More
Guitarist Julian Bream, who died Friday at the age of 87, was as important to the history of classical guitar as Andres Segovia.Read More
Twenty-six-year old Grammy-winning multi-instrumental composer and prodigy Jacob Collier talks about his new album, Djesse Vol. 3., which features collaborations with Ty Dolla $ign and T-Pain.Read More
Woods played in the International Sweethearts of Rhythm, a history-making all-female big band. She was 96.Read More
Denin Koch's trip to the Hanford B Reactor when he was 19 stirred his musical passion. It eventually inspired a full jazz album exploring the complicated history of Hanford, 75 years after the U.S. bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan ended WWII.Read More
Host Ari Shapiro talks with Linda Diaz, the winner of this year's NPR Music Tiny Desk Contest. Her entry, "Green Tea Ice Cream" is a dreamy R&B song anchored by her skilled and soulful voice.Read More
After collaborating with David Bowie in 2014, the multiple Grammy-winning composer found her artistic process had been recombobulated a bit — much like our ever-more digital world.Read More
The trumpeter, who died last week at the age of 78, was at the vanguard of jazz's midcentury development and is regarded as a legend by his peers.Read More
In 1968, a teenager convinced Thelonious Monk to play a concert at his high school to ease racial tensions in his community. More than 50 years later, it's been rediscovered and remastered.Read More
Ari Shapiro talks to jazz saxophonist Lakecia Benjamin about her new album Pursuance: The Coltranes and an artist she is grateful for: James Blake.Read More
Watch the pianist reimagine old spirituals and songs of freedom that continue to resonate in new ways.Read More
The drummer's subtle and steady hand guided some of jazz's most beloved recordings, including Miles Davis's iconic Kind Of Blue. Read More
Drummer Alvester Garnett joined MacArthur "genius" violinist Regina Carter's band in 1998. It was purely professional at first, but it soon grew into a romantic relationship; the couple married in 2004. "She's the boss two-times over," Garnett says half-jokingly.Read More
Little Richard was an explosive performer who inspired generations of musicians from Otis Redding to The Beatles to David Bowie. He died Saturday morning.Read More
The lauded trumpeter was attending eighth grade in Oakland when he saw a certain pillar of the avant-garde play live. Some 25 years later, the connection between then and now is stronger than ever.Read More
On April 30, the global jazz community will celebrate International Jazz Day with an expert panel and a global concert featuring pianist Lang Lang, bassist Marcus Miller and more.Read More
On this episode of Alt.Latino, we pull an interview from the archives with the great Cuban percussionist. From Havana nightlife in the 1940s to the pulsing streets of New York just after World War II, he reminisces about the seminal recordings and jam sessions that took place. Read More
Soul singer Allen Stone demonstrated a commitment to the Tiny Desk that we rarely, if ever, see.Read More
The patriarch of the famous musical Marsalis family, Ellis Marsalis was not only a performer but a teacher, a mentor and a coach.Read More
Stefon Harris has been attracting the attention of jazz fans since he released his 1998 debut, but he's less interested in praise than helping his listeners empathize with the world around them.Read More
The Cameroonian musician who became an international star with his song "Soul Makossa" died Tuesday at age 86 in Paris. His music helped fuel disco — and songs by Michael Jackson and Rihanna.Read More
Watch the award-winning pianist play a hit by Chopin, a premiere by Thomas Adès and a cherished song by Gershwin dressed in a virtuosic arrangement.Read More
An innovative member of the classic John Coltrane Quartet, few musicians have ever exerted as much influence as a sideman, but Tyner also had a long and consequential career leading bands of his own.Read More
The album, recorded in 1982 after Simone had relocated to France, captures the legendary artist reinvigorated and exploratory.Read More
The saxophonist and composer — an artist who wrote for Miles Davis and Charlie Parker, and who nurtured John Coltrane — died Sunday at age 93.Read More
Watch the celebrated opera star deconstruct old Italian love songs with her signature flair, backed by a crack jazz ensemble.Read More
The irrepressible harpist proves that the instrument can be as tempestuous as a tango, as complex as a Bach fugue and sing as serenely as a church choir.Read More
