Five years ago today, Michael Brecker—one of my favorite saxophone players, and a pioneer on the instrument in many ways—passed away of complications from leukemia. He had suffered from the rare blood disorder myelodysplastic syndrome, and never found a matching...  read

My virtual contribution to the December CD Mix of the Month Club was Street Cred: Brad Mehldau Plays the Popular Favorites of Yesterday and Today!.  read

I'm not sure how good the turnout was at this past Thursday's CD Mix of the Month Club meeting in New York City, but attendance was 100% at the Chicago chapter—me. My mix, providing my own idiosyncratic take on Muzak...  read

I am unable to attend tomorrow night's February CD Mix of the Month Club, since I'll be in Utah at my grandfather's memorial service. But I'm sending my mix, Tenor of the Times, along to the meeting in my absence....  read

In which Bill, as threatened, pays tribute to late jazz great Michael Brecker. A special all-music edition!  read

Because poor Kenny G seems to come in for abuse in this blog from time to time, I thought it might be fun to revisit what I consider one of the greatest examples of musician-on-musician slagging in the history of...  read

Of the Mos Def character in 16 Blocks, you wrote: “Eddie has the kind of voice that makes fingernails on a blackboard sound like Kenny G.” What are we to make of this comparison, given that Kenny G. already sounds...  read

My contributions to the May CD Mix of the Month Club were Young Turks: A Sadly Shallow Survey of Hard Bop and Modal Jazz from 1956 to 1968 and its sequel Young Lions: A Criminally Incomplete Catalog of Post-Bop Players...  read

My contribution to the March CD Mix of the Month Club was An Electricity in the Air.  read

It didn't actually turn into a riot two weeks ago at Iridium, but it looked like it might for a few minutes there. The first indication of trouble came early, though we didn't recognize it as such as the time....  read