mick laBriola

December 3nd 1953

The history of jazz is strewn with brilliant players who have inexplicably eluded widespread recognition, flying under the radar of labels, journalists, and fans. But guitarist David Haskell’s stealth status over the past two decades isn’t hard to explain. He’s spent most of that time on the move as a commercial pilot, fulfilling a dream that took root as a child, about the same time he became enamored with the guitar. Before Haskell took to the air as a profession, he was a widely respected improviser at the center of the San Francisco jazz scene, a versatile, blues-drenched player often heard as a sideman and bandleader at high profile venues like Keystone Korner.

Now that he’s hung up his wings, Haskell is once again making waves on the Bay Area scene, working with a superlative group. With his lean, fluid tone, clean attack, and simmering sense of swing, Haskell is back in fighting trim, ready to pick up his music career where he left off back in the mid-1980s.

Born into a jazz-loving San Francisco family, Haskell soaked up the sounds of Duke Ellington and Count Basie from the record collection of his father, a doctor. When his father’s medical career took the family to Ukiah, they ended up moving near a small airfield, which sparked Haskell’s lifelong love of flying. He credits the Beatles’ invasion of America with turning him onto the guitar, and by the mid-1960s he was leading a garage band. While initially inspired by the straight ahead artistry of guitarists like Wes Montgomery, Howard Roberts, and Barney Kessel, Haskell fell in with a trio of blues loving brothers, Mark, Patrick, and Robben Ford, who turned him onto the Chicago sound.

“Robben Ford had a bluesy R&B band with horns, and when he took off for the summer to play with his brothers in San Francisco I ended up subbing for him,” Haskell recalls. “When he came back he played alto sax and I took over the guitar chair. Of course, he was still playing guitar with his brothers in Charles Ford Blues Band and he became a role model and mentor for me.”

Working with Robben, Haskell performed in churches, schools, and social halls around Ukiah, and when the Fords relocated to the Bay Area, he used to head down on weekends to hear them play. “I barely finished high school, because I needed to get out of Ukiah,” Haskell says. “I graduated in 1972, and the Fords engineered it so that I came down and joined a blues band.”

After a few years playing blues, Haskell fell in with a succession of exceptional pianists based in the Bay Area, including Yugoslav-raised Larry Vuckovich, Smith Dobson, Larry Dunlap, and New Zealand-born Mike Nock, who featured the guitarist on a gig with his seminal fusion combo the Fourth Way at the Great American Music Hall. While gaining invaluable bandstand experience, he started making a name for himself as one of the hottest young guitarists in the area. When Native American tenor saxophonist Jim Pepper, a jazz/rock fusion pioneer who co-led The Free Spirits, decamped from New York City in 1974, he quickly scooped up Haskell, bringing him to Alaska for a four-month gig the following year.

Back in the Bay Area, Haskell started playing with pianist Mark Soskin. When Pepper returned to town, the saxophonist launched a new incarnation of Pepper’s Powwow with Haskell, bassist Ratzo Harris, and pianist Russell Ferrante (who went on to found the Yellowjackets). Featuring a singular sound blending rock, post-bop jazz, and Native American influences, the group worked steadily for several years performing up and down the West Coast, with long sojourns in Portland and Alaska.

In 1977 Haskell decided to launch his own combo, the David Haskell Group. Honing a book of intricate, rock-tinged compositions, Haskell attracted several rising young stars, like pianist Susan Muscarella, who was also working with saxophonist Mel Martin’s popular band Listen. When she left, multi-instrumentalist Bruce Williamson, best known these days as a lyrical saxophonist, took over the piano chair. With regular gigs at Keystone Korner and a devoted local following, the DHG signed a contract with Theresa Records and made an album produced by Mark Isham, but it was never released.

When he wasn’t leading his own band, Haskell often worked with keyboardist Jeff Lorber and harmonica ace Mark Ford, his high school buddy from Ukiah. Playing with Ford’s band gave Haskell the opportunity to share stages with blues and R&B institutions like Muddy Waters, Albert King, and Tower of Power. Around the same time, a call from organ star Merl Saunders led to a gig backing soul singer Randy Crawford on the Crusaders’ 1980 national tour. Haskell continued to work with Saunders throughout that year.

Joseph William “Joe” Thomas, also known as Brother Cornbread (December 3, 1902 – February 18, 1981) was an American jazz clarinetist and singer, closely associated with the New Orleans jazz scene.

Thomas’s first professional gig was in New Orleans with trombone player Joe Harris in 1923. Soon after that, he worked with Jack Carey, Chris Kelly, and Kid Rena. He recorded with Charles Derbigny in 1941, but the recordings were not publicly released until the 1960s, by which time Thomas had become a figure in the Dixieland revival movement. He led his own ensemble at New Orleans’s H&J Tavern for much of the 1940s, then, in 1951, became a sideman for Papa Celestin. He worked with this ensemble for years, including after Papa French and Eddie Pierson had taken over as leader. Other associations in the 1950s and 1960s included work with Freddie Kohlman, Punch Miller, the Olympia Brass Band, and on Swedish television with Sweet Emma Barrettin 1968. In the 1970s he worked with the Legends of Jazz, replacing Joe Darensbourg.

The dust sculptures of the Eagle Nebula are evaporating. As powerful starlight whittles away these cool cosmic mountains, the statuesque pillars that remain might be imagined as mythical beasts. Featured here is one of several striking dust pillars of the Eagle Nebula that might be described as a gigantic alien fairy. This fairy, however, is ten light years tall and spews radiation much hotter than common fire. The greater Eagle Nebula, M16, is actually a giant evaporating shell of gas and dust inside of which is a growing cavity filled with a spectacular stellar nursery currently forming an open cluster of stars. This great pillar, which is about 7,000 light years away, will likely evaporate away in about 100,000 years. The featured image in scientifically re-assigned colors was released in 2005 as part of the fifteenth anniversary celebration of the launch of the Hubble Space Telescope.

Tal Wilkenfeld (born 2 December 1986) is an Australian bassist, singer, songwriter and guitarist who has performed alongside artists including Jeff Beck, Prince, Eric Clapton, Herbie Hancock and Mick Jagger. She is also a bandleader of her own eponymous bands. In her earlier work, she was backed by musicians such as Wayne Krantz and Vinnie Colaiuta. In Wilkenfeld’s current band, she sings, plays guitar and bass, and opened for The Who on the North American part of The Who Hits 50! tour in 2016. Wilkenfeld’s single “Corner Painter” features Blake Mills and Benmont Tench.

In 2008, Wilkenfeld was voted “The Year’s Most Exciting New Player” in a Bass Player magazine readers’ choice poll. In 2013, Wilkenfeld was awarded Bass Player Magazine’s “Young Gun Award” by Don Was, where she performed “Chelsea Hotel” by Leonard Cohen.

Ronald Mathews (December 2, 1935 in New York City – June 28, 2008 in Brooklyn) was an American jazz pianist who worked with Max Roach from 1963 to 1968 and Art Blakey‘s Jazz Messengers. He acted as lead in recording from 1963 and 1978–79. His most recent work was in 2008, as both a mentor and musician with Generations, a group of jazz musicians headed by veteran drummer Jimmy Cobb. He contributed two new compositions for the album that was released by San Francisco State University’s International Center for the Arts on September 15, 2008.

Critics have compared him to pianists Thelonious Monk, Bud Powell, and McCoy Tyner.

In his twenties, Mathews toured internationally and recorded with Roach, Freddie Hubbard and Roy Haynes. He was also a member of Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers in the late 1950s through the 1960s. By thirty, he began teaching jazz piano and led workshops, clinics and master classes at Long Island University in New York City. Besides Dexter Gordon and Clark Terry, he toured and recorded on two Louis Hayes projects in the 70’s (i.e. the Louis Hayes-Woody Shaw Quintet and the Louis Hayes-Junior Cook Quintet).

Wynton Charles Kelly (December 2, 1931 – April 12, 1971) was a Jamaican American jazz pianist and composer. He is known for his lively, blues-based playing and as one of the finest accompanists in jazz. He began playing professionally at the age of 12, and was pianist on a No. 1 R&B hit at the age of 16. His recording debut as leader occurred three years later, around the time he started to become better known as accompanist to singer Dinah Washington, and as a member of trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie‘s band. This progress was interrupted by two years in the army, after which Kelly returned to Washington and Gillespie, and played with other leaders. Over the next few years, these included instrumentalists Julian “Cannonball” Adderley, John Coltrane, Roland Kirk, Wes Montgomery, and Sonny Rollins, and vocalists Betty Carter, Billie Holiday, and Abbey Lincoln.

Kelly attracted the most attention as part of Miles Davis‘ band from 1959, including an appearance on the trumpeter’s Kind of Blue, often mentioned as the best-selling jazz album ever. After leaving Davis in 1963, Kelly played with his own trio, which recorded for several labels and toured the United States and internationally. His career did not develop much further, and he had difficulty finding enough work late in his career. Kelly, who was prone to epilepsy, died in a hotel room in Canada following a seizure, aged 39.

The son of Jamaican immigrants, Kelly was born in Brooklyn, New York, on December 2, 1931. He began playing the piano at the age of four,but did not receive much formal training in music. He attended The High School of Music & Art and the Metropolitan Vocational High School in New York, but “they wouldn’t give us piano, so I fooled around with the bass and studied theory.

• The Rosette Nebula is a star-forming region about 5,000 light years from Earth.

• X-rays from Chandra reveal about 160 stars in the cluster known as NGC 2237 (right side of the image).

• Combining X-ray and optical data, astronomers determined that the central cluster formed first, followed by neighboring ones including NGC 2237.

This X-ray and optical image shows the Rosette star formation region, located about 5,000 light years from Earth. The Chandra X-ray data shows hundreds of young stars in the central cluster and fainter clusters on either side. The central cluster appears to have formed first, producing a burst of radiation and stellar winds that caused the surrounding nebula to expand, triggering formation of two neighboring clusters. The optical data shows large areas of gas and dust, including giant pillars that remain behind after intense radiation from massive stars has eroded the more diffuse gas. The presence of several X-ray emitting stars around the pillars shows star formation is continuing in the region.

John Francis Anthony “Jaco” Pastorius III (/ˈdʒɑːkoʊ pæˈstɔːriəs/, December 1, 1951 – September 21, 1987) was an American jazz bassist who was a member of Weather Report from 1976 to 1981. He worked with Pat Metheny, Joni Mitchell, and recorded albums as a solo artist and band leader.His bass playing employed funk, lyrical solos, bass chords, and innovative harmonics. As of 2017, he is the only electric bassist of seven bassists inducted into the DownBeat Jazz Hall of Fame, and has been lauded as one of the best electric bassists of all time.

John Francis Pastorius was born December 1, 1951, in Norristown, Pennsylvania. He was the oldest of three boys born to Stephanie, his Finnishmother, and Jack Pastorius, a charismatic singer and jazz drummer who spent much of his time on the road. His family moved to Oakland Park in Fort Lauderdale when he was eight. Pastorius’ nickname, “Jaco”, became adopted, and was partially influenced by his love for sports as well as the umpire Jocko Conlan. In 1974, he began spelling it “Jaco” after it was misspelled by his neighbor, pianist Alex Darqui. His brother called him “Mowgli” after the wild boy in The Jungle Book because he was energetic and spent much of his time shirtless on the beach, climbing trees, running through the woods, and swimming in the ocean. He attended St. Clement’s Catholic School in Wilton Manors and was an altar boy at St. Clement’s Church. His confirmation name was Anthony, thus expanding his name to John Francis Anthony Pastorius. He was intensely competitive and excelled at baseball, basketball, and football.

He played drums until he injured his wrist playing football when he was thirteen. The damage was severe enough to warrant corrective surgery and inhibited his ability to play the drums.

Before recording his debut album, Pastorius attended a concert in Miami by the jazz fusion band Weather Report. After the concert, he approached keyboardist Joe Zawinul, who led the band. As was his habit, he introduced himself by saying, “I’m John Francis Pastorius III. I’m the greatest bass player in the world.”Zawinul admired his brashness and asked for a demo tape. After listening to the tape, Zawinul realized that Pastorius had considerable skill. They corresponded, and Pastorius sent Zawinul a rough mix of his solo album.

After bassist Alphonso Johnson left Weather Report, Zawinul asked Pastorius to join the band. Pastorius made his band debut on the album Black Market(Columbia, 1976), in which he shared the bass chair with Johnson. Pastorius was fully established as sole band bass player for the recording of Heavy Weather(Columbia, 1977), which contained the Grammy-nominated hit “Birdland“.

During his time with Weather Report, Pastorius began abusing alcohol and illegal drugs, which exacerbated existing mental problems and led to erratic behavior.^[13] He left Weather Report in 1982 due to clashes with tour commitments for his other projects, plus a growing dissatisfaction with Zawinul’s synthesized and orchestrated approach to the band’s music.

Warner Bros. signed Pastorius to a favorable contract in the late 1970s based on his groundbreaking skill and his star quality, which they hoped would lead to large sales. He used this contract to set up his Word of Mouth big band which consisted of Chuck Findley on trumpet, Howard Johnson on tuba, Wayne Shorter, Michael Brecker, and Tom Scott on reeds, Toots Thielemans on harmonica, Peter Erskine and Jack DeJohnette on drums, and Don Alias on percussion. This was the group that recorded his second solo album, Word of Mouth (Warner Bros., 1981).

Bette Midler (/bɛt/; born December 1, 1945) is an American singer, songwriter, actress, comedian, and film producer.

Born in Honolulu, Hawaii, Midler began her professional career in several Off-Off-Broadway plays, prior to her engagements in Fiddler on the Roof and Salvation on Broadway in the late 1960s. She came to prominence in 1970 when she began singing in the Continental Baths, a local gay bathhousewhere she managed to build up a core following.

Since 1970, Midler has released 14 studio albums as a solo artist. Throughout her career, many of her songs became hits on the record charts, including her renditions of “The Rose“, “Wind Beneath My Wings“, “Do You Want to Dance“, “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy“, and “From a Distance“. In 2008, she signed a contract with Caesars Palace in Las Vegas to perform a show titled Bette Midler: The Showgirl Must Go On, which ended in 2010.

Midler made her motion picture debut in 1979 with The Rose, which earned her a Golden Globe for Best Actress, as well as a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actress. She has since starred in a number of hit films, which include: Down and Out in Beverly Hills (1986), Ruthless People(1986), Outrageous Fortune (1987), Big Business (1988), Beaches (1988), Hocus Pocus (1993), The First Wives Club (1996), The Stepford Wives(2004), and Parental Guidance (2012). She also starred in For the Boys (1991) and Gypsy (1993), winning two additional Golden Globes for these films and receiving a second Academy Award nomination for the former.

Sander L. Nelson (born December 1, 1938) is an American drummer. Nelson, one of the best-known rock drummers of the early 1960s, had several solo instrumental Top 40 hits and was a session drummer on many other well-known hits, and released over 30 albums. He lives in Boulder City, Nevada, and continues to experiment with music on keyboards and piano.

His first recording, with a band called the Renegades (Richard Podolor, Bruce Johnston, and Nick Venet), was “Geronimo”, written by Venet, produced by Kim Fowley, and released on the Original Sound Records label. Although it flopped on the national charts, it charted in some of the Mid West markets. The song, along with “Charge”, is part of the soundtrack of 1959 film Ghost of Dragstrip Hollow released by American International Pictures.

Nelson attended high school with Jan Berry, Dean Torrence (who became Jan and Dean), and Kim Fowley. After gaining respect as a session drummer, he played on such songs as “To Know Him Is To Love Him” (Phil Spector‘s Teddy Bears, 1958), “Alley-Oop” (The Hollywood Argyles, 1960), and “A Thousand Stars” (Kathy Young and the Innocents, 1960).

His song “Teen Beat“, on Original Sound Records, rose to number 4 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in 1959. It sold over one million copies, and was awarded a gold disc. Subsequently, he signed with the Imperial record label, and pounded out two more Top 40 hits, “Let There Be Drums“, which went to number 7 on the Billboard Hot 100, and “Drums Are My Beat”. In December 1961, the British music magazine, NME, reported that “Let There Be Drums” had gone Top 10 in both the United Kingdom and United States. All three were instrumentals (a feat rarely repeated). Guitar playing on these hits was by co-writer Richard Podolor, later a songwriter and record producer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-bKVZMF7-Q4

Ike Isaacs (December 1, 1919, Rangoon, Burma – January 11, 1996, Sydney, Australia) was a jazz guitarist from Rangoon, Burma, best known for his work with violinist Stéphane Grappelli.

Isaacs was self taught on guitar. He started playing professionally in college while pursuing a degree in chemistry. In 1946 he moved to England, where he became a member of the BBC Show Band. During the 1960s and ’70s, he was a member of the Hot Club of London, led by guitarist Diz Disley, which often collaborated with Stéphane Grappelli. He was a member of the band Velvet with Digby Fairweather, Len Skeat, and Denny Wright. In the 1980s, he moved to Australia and taught at the Sydney School of Guitar.

Rhythm Roots Workshop solo performance

PRI Minneapolis 11-30-18 noon-2pm

This is the conclusion of a Art Access Residency

NGC 7552 (also known as IC 5294) is a barred spiral galaxy in constellation Grus. It is at a distance of circa 60 million light years from Earth, which, given its apparent dimensions, means that NGC 7552 is about 75,000 light years across. It forms with three other spiral galaxies the Grus Quartet.

NGC 7552 was originally discovered and reported in 1826 by James Dunlop and John Herschel added it in the General Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters as number 3977. However, Lewis Swift reported the galaxy independently in on October 22, 1897, at right ascention 9 arcseconds off the location of the galaxy and was included in Index Catalogue as IC 5294