Joshua Redman Master Class

A buddy of mine gave me these a while back and I thought I'd share them with you guys.  Redman was in Atlanta a little while ago with his trio at Spivey Hall and HOLY CRAP was that a good concert!  Make sure to check out Josh's website and pick up a copy of his latest release, Compass.  There's also a new CD in the works with his James Farm Band which you can read about in this related post.  The sound is a little low in both Master Class recordings, but that's fairly normal.  The third is a recording of a live concert with Bill Stewart (drums), Larry Grenadier (bass), Taylor Eigsti (piano), and of course Joshua himself.  Happy listening and hope you enjoy! Joshua Redman Master Class 1

Joshua Redman Master Class 2

Joshua Redman in Concert

Artists' Set Ups

So, I was looking around for certain players' set-ups recently and was having to hunt more than I thought I should.  A lot of the more modern players' set-ups, unless they're endorsed by a particular mouthpiece or reed company, were really difficult to piece together.  Theo Wanne has an excellent set up chart on his website.  I took some of my information from that, some from hunting and pecking around SOTW and some other forums, and added a few of the younger guys that I was interested in learning about.  This is a chart of saxophonists' set ups broken down into instrument, horn, mouthpiece, reed, & ligature.  As you can probably tell, there are some artists missing.  But, I've tried to provide as much information on each artist as possible.  The list is organized to read reverse chronologically, where the most recent set up is first.  I also include their clarinet, flute, bass clarinet set ups as well where applicable.  If there's anyone you guys would like to know about that's not on the list already, leave me a comment and I'll try and fill them in as soon as I can. Click the thumbnail below for a larger version.

James Farm Band

In case you haven't heard, Joshua Redman has a new collaborative project called the James Farm Band with Aaron Parks, Matt Penman, & Eric Harland.  News from the group's Facebook Fan Page shows that they've been hard at work in the studio and are finished recording for their highly anticipated Spring 2011 release. If you haven't checked out some of the rehearsal tracks on their MySpace you're in for a treat.  The music is, of course, very cool and it'll be great to hear the finished product.  Until then, check out some of the shots from the recording session below.  Also, I'd love to hear what their shows have been like over the last tour.  Leave your stories in the comment box.

Shopping with Joshua Redman

While this article has absolutely no musical value, I thought this would be something funny to share with everyone.  Follow the link to read the full two page article by Eric Asimov.  Hint: there is mention of a personal Prada shopper.... :-)

STYLE | January 10, 1999 SHOPPING WITH: Joshua Redman; A Jazz Virtuoso Is Picky About the Details By ERIC ASIMOV AS Joshua Redman would be the first to tell you, he is a picky kind of fellow. Mr. Redman, the jazz saxophonist and band leader, was poring over shirts at the Prada store on Madison Avenue last Wednesday, looking for stagewear for his coming two-week tour of Japan. As his personal shopper at Prada, Ola Itani, brought in several dozen selections, each individually boxed with a clear plastic top, he zoomed in on defect after defect. The color was wrong on one, the collar too long on another, the shape on a third was too boxy and a single button on a fourth interrupted an otherwise clean line of Velcro closures.

Joshua Redman - Slap Tongue Compilation

Joshua Redman - Birthday Song (Part II) Live

Joshua Redman - Tenor Sax, Organ, Effects

Sam Yahel - Keyboards

Jeff Ballard - Drums

The slap tongue portion of this video occurs at the very end, but it is GORGEOUS.  In some of the other videos it is not nearly as clean as this.

Joshua Redman - Slap Tongue Intro

Joshua Redman - "Hide & Seek" Slap Tongue Intro

This takes place at the Jazz Alley in Seattle on June 7th, 2007.  This is an amazing sample of Redman's ability to slap tongue.  It's also filmed at angle that you can see a little bit of how he's manipulating his mouth (except when the waitress gets in the way :-) ).