Jazz and Blues

Happy Holidays all. The blog will be active with fresh content early next week, though I will be away. Thanks for reading, and see y'all in 2012.

KPLU was pleased to welcome back our special guest from last year, award-winning Northwest jazz vocalist Gail Pettis to the 15th Annual Christmas Jam on December 8. Along with the PLU Jazz Ensemble, under the direction of Dr. David Deacon-Joyner, Pettis performed numerous holiday classics.

Trumpeter, composer, bandleader and jazz educator Clark Terry will be 91 years old this week. His 70-plus year career is being celebrated with a couple of biographical events.

Read more on Groove Notes.

Groove Notes writer and KPLU jazz host Kevin Kniestedt lists the 10 releases that stood out to him over the past year (with an informal ranking).

Read more on Groove Notes.

The nominations have been released for the 2011 Grammy Awards, and there are some great selections for jazz categories. The winners are named on Feb. 12. Until then, vote on Groove Notes for your favorite.

Vote on Groove Notes.

I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to sit down in the KPLU performance studio last Friday with jazz legend Chick Corea for an interview and live performance.

One of the topics we covered was how he has remained so versatile over the years.

“I keep a student kind of mentality in my life, so that I am always learning something, and that keeps me fresh,” he said.

Read more on Groove Notes.

Each week in a new feature on our jazz blog – Groove Notes – we'll tell you about a few of the songs added to KPLU’s "All That Jazz" rotation by our music director Nick Francis.

This week’s picks are three tracks from Sarah Vaughan’s first long-play album “In Hi-Fi.”

Read more on Groove Notes.

In November, Chick Corea celebrated his 70th birthday with four weeks of concerts at The Blue Note in New York. However, when he walked into the KPLU studios in early December it was impossible to see him as a 70-year-old man.

He looks 20 years younger, acts 40 years younger and plays piano with as much passion, creativity and fire as he ever did.