Obituaries Archives - Jazz Journal

Obituary: Roy Ayers

Jazz Journal — Sun, 09 Mar 2025 13:35:22 +0000

Roy Ayers was a virtuoso jazz vibraphone player and multi-instrumentalist, but he was also able, in the 1970s, to bring jazz substance into R&B, funk and soul and later to inspire the style known as neo-soul. Everyone Loves The Sunshine, his 1976 pop hit, became a soundtrack to summer and the sampled hook to countless […]

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Obituary: Howard Riley

Matthew Wright — Fri, 14 Feb 2025 11:53:25 +0000

“Only posterity will show whether Howard Riley is a European Cecil Taylor, an avant-garde John Lewis, a jazz Stockhausen or the Howard Riley” reported Martin Davidson after hearing the pianist at the Purcell Room with Barry Guy and Paul Lytton in 1972, and it’s with sadness that Riley’s death was announced on 8 February, at […]

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Obituary: Derek Ansell

Mark Gilbert — Fri, 20 Dec 2024 10:34:09 +0000

Derek Ansell, who had written for Jazz Journal since the mid-80s, died suddenly, aged 90, on 13 December. He had reported a gastric problem as, in mid-November, he regretfully withdrew from writing an obituary of Lou Donaldson, a player right in the middle of his musical ambit. I never guessed anything serious was afoot, but […]

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Obituary: Martial Solal

John White — Tue, 17 Dec 2024 09:00:00 +0000

Born in Algiers to Algerian Jewish parents, Martial Solal was encouraged in music from an early age by his mother, an amateur opera singer. Largely self-educated, he was expelled from school by the Vichy regime in 1942 because of his Jewish ancestry but after studying classical music in school, and encouraged by a local bandleader, […]

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Obituary: Quincy Jones

John White — Thu, 07 Nov 2024 18:03:04 +0000

Rarely – if ever – has an American musician received such fulsome praise both during their lifetime and after their death. Such headlines as “Quincy Jones, Giant of American Music Dies At 91” (New York Times) and “Quincy Jones: Musician, producer and arranger who had global hits with Michael Jackson and won 28 Grammys” (The […]

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We Love Sérgio Mendes

Jazz Journal — Thu, 17 Oct 2024 14:51:39 +0000

Sérgio Mendes may not have been the main originator of bossa nova – one of the most innovative musical movements of the 20th century – and he may not have been the most talented musician to come out of Brazil, but he became the most successful Brazilian musician that ever lived. He put Brazilian music […]

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Obituary: Benny Golson

Derek Ansell — Wed, 09 Oct 2024 10:15:22 +0000

One of the last survivors of the golden age of bebop – the 1950s – tenor saxophonist and composer Benny Golson died on Saturday, 21 September at home in Manhattan. He was 95 and had been ill for a short time. Best known in the jazz world as a composer and tenor soloist, Golson produced […]

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Obituary: Palle Danielsson

Michael Tucker — Fri, 07 Jun 2024 13:24:58 +0000

The Swedish bassist played with a host of leading local and international musicians, ranging in style from standards to ECM-type modalism

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Obituary: Bill Holman

Gordon Jack — Tue, 04 Jun 2024 11:19:38 +0000

André Previn said saxophonist Holman's true instrument was the orchestra, which he played with 'musicianship, honesty and brilliance'

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Obituary: Michael Cuscuna

Derek Ansell — Tue, 30 Apr 2024 10:30:03 +0000

The Connecticut-born jazz fan was the saviour of a wealth of forgotten, unreleased recordings and a champion of audiophile reissues

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