Even though there hasn’t been much of a member shake-up since the band’s inception in 1988, Bela Fleck & the Flecktones are getting ready to release a brand new record featuring their classic lineup. The departure of pianist/harmonica player (and founding member) Howard Levy in 1992 left the band as a trio for years before bringing in saxophonist Jeff Coffin in 1998. After the passing of Dave Matthews Band saxophonist LeRoi Moore in 2008, Coffin took a hiatus from the band to help out the DMB camp, igniting the spark that brought Levy back to the fold in 2009. Now, with the original lineup in place, the jazz fusion quartet’s upcoming album, Rocket Science, will be the first studio effort in 20 years that sees the incarnation of Fleck, Levy, and brothers Victor and Roy “Future Man” Wooten holding it down with their eclectic signature sound.
Grady Champion announced himself as one of the most promising talents in the blues with two excellent albums for Shanachie Records in 1999 and 2001. They showed he was a skillful harmonica player and songwriter with a particularly good voice with a Wilson Pickett-ish rasp that was perfect for the blues. 2 Days Short of a Week produced a legitimate classic in “Policeman’s Blues.” He didn’t exactly disappear after that. He was still gigging around south Florida, but he wasn’t visible on the national scene.
Last year Champion re-emerged with a victory at the International Blues Challenge and issued a live recording of a 2007 show at Jackson, Mississippi’s 930 Blues Cafe on his own label. It featured his earlier songs and some standards. Now he’s back with Dreamin’ featuring ten originals. Backed by Zac Harmon’s band, Champion’s still in fine form and his songwriting is sharp as ever. The disc immediately shows he’s picking up where he left off, reprising the rocking “My Rooster is King” from his first Shanachie record Payin’ For My Sins.
Here is an intriguing album featuring harmonica virtuoso Cham-Ber Huang in duets with Danish accordionist Mogens Ellegaard. Huang, who emigrated from Shanghai in 1950, is quite a sensitive player and manages to make harmonica arrangements of classical pieces sound completely natural -- no easy trick. Ellegaard was likewise an excellent musician, and in later years went on to record a great deal of experimental music, by the likes of Per Norgaard and Arne Nordheim. I've given you Huang and Ellegaard's fine performance of Bela Bartok's Roumanian Folk Dances, composed in 1915.
Born in 1971 in Warsaw, Greg Zlap arrived in Paris in the late 80s, a little harmonica in his pocket. In search of new sounds, he perfected his art as an autodidact, and quickly became a sought after studio musician. You find Greg’s harmonica in French Chanson, in the Slam movement, or on film soundtracks. Untiring ambassador of his instrument, Greg Zlap created in 1998 a harmonica school in Paris. Then, convinced that music can do much more than nourish the soul, he launched harmonica workshops for asthmatic children in hospitals.
Myers, who has very limited sight, was educated at the Piney Woods School for the Blind, and played a number of instruments before settling for harmonica at 12. Despite joining the Elmore James band for a time, and recording under his own name and, in the '70s as a member of the Mississippi Delta Blues Band, Myers's fame was largely confined to the Jackson, Mississippi area, until he joined Anson Funderburgh's band as a featured artist.Myers and the band-especially Myers and Mel Brown-are much more together on this album, and the rhythm section is looser and less humdrum. There are some unequivocally good tracks here, notably 'My Daily Wish' on which Brown plays both organ and guitar. On balance, though, this is disappointing CD; most of tracks are at least one solo too long, and while Myers's harp retains its big, bold tone, his stock of ideas is relatively small. As a singer, he seldom escapes a hoarsely inflexible holler.
Sonny Boy Williamson was, in many ways, the ultimate blues legend. By the time of his death in 1965, he had been around long enough to have played with Robert Johnson at the start of his career and Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page, and Robbie Robertson at the end of it. In between, he drank a lot of whiskey hoboed around the country, had a successful radio show for 15 years, toured Europe to great acclaim, and simply wrote, played and' sang some of the greatest blues ever etched into black phonograph records. His delivery was sly, evil and world-weary, while his harp playing was full of short, rhythmic bursts one minute and powerful, impassioned blowing the next. His songs were chock-full of mordant wit, with largely autobiographical lyrics that hold up to the scrutiny of the printed page. Though he took his namesake from another well-known harmonica player, no one really sounded like him.
The Headcutters, from Itajaí, Brazil, is considered to be one of the most highlighted blues bands in Brazil. Using the 40s ands 50s sound and style, they follow the legendaries Blues records labels from Chicago of that time.
The band's name serves as tribute to the Blues idols from the 50s, such as Muddy Waters, Little Walter and Jimmi Rogers, who in that period were called “The Headhunters”. Thus, THE HEADCUTTERS comes as a reference to those great masters who were clear and strong influence to the band.
Marc Breitfelder has mastered the “Mississippi saxophone” to perfection. Using his own overblow technique, he is able to reach spheres on a harp that fascinate audiences and musicians all over the world. An ingenious match with Georg, he plays one-of-a-kind notes and sounds – however, always very true to the tradition of “classical” harp play! The foundation of the mostly improvised music of Georg Schroeter and Marc Breitfelder is the Blues, complemented by many related kinds of music: Rock 'n' Roll, Rhythm 'n' Blues, Boogie Woogie or Country – orchestrated with masterly piano play, an outstanding harmonica and a unique Blues voice.
Harmonica master Charlie Musselwhite’s life reads like a classic blues song: born in Mississippi, raised in Memphis and schooled on the South Side of Chicago. A groundbreaking recording artist since the 1960s, Musselwhite continues to create trailblazing music while remaining firmly rooted in the blues. His worldly-wise vocals, rich, melodic harmonica playing and deep country blues guitar work flawlessly accompany his often autobiographical and always memorable original songs. Living Blues says, “Musselwhite’s rock-solid vocals creep up and overwhelm you before you know it. He plays magnificent harp with superb dexterity and phrasing. The results are amazing.”
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