mick laBriola

William “Smokey” Robinson Jr. (born February 19, 1940) is an American singer, songwriter, record producer, and former record executive. Robinson was the founder and front man of the Motown vocal group the Miracles, for which he also served as the group’s chief songwriter and producer. Robinson led the group from its 1955 origins as the Five Chimes until 1972 when he announced a retirement from the group to focus on his role as Motown’s vice president.

However, Robinson returned to the music industry as a solo artist the following year. Following the sale of Motown Records in 1988, Robinson left the company in 1990. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987. Robinson was awarded the 2016 Library of Congress Gershwin Prize for his lifetime contributions to popular music.

Smokey Robinson was born to an African-American father and a mother of African-American and French ancestry into a poor family in the North End area of Detroit. His uncle Claude gave him the nickname “Smokey Joe” when he was a child. He attended Northern High School, where he was above average academically and a keen athlete, though his main interest was music and he formed a doo-wop group named the Five Chimes. At one point, he and Diana Ross lived several houses from each other on Belmont; he once said he has known Ross since she was about eight

Johnny Dunn (February 19, 1897 – August 20, 1937) was an American traditional jazz trumpeter and vaudeville performer, who was born in Memphis, Tennessee. He is probably best known for his work during the 1920s with musicians such as Perry Bradford or Noble Sissle. He has been compared in sound and style to both King Oliver and Louis Armstrong. In 1922, he recorded as a member of Mamie Smith‘s Jazz Hounds, together with Garvin Bushell, Coleman Hawkins, Everett Robbins, Bubber Miley and Herb Flemming 

Fargana Qasimova was born April 23, 1979 in Baku, Azerbaijan. She is the daughter of celebrated mugham (Azerbaijani classical music) singer, Alim Qasimov and has an exquisite vocal style. Her repertory includes mugham and lighter songs traditionally performed by ashiqs (minstrels) who often perform with a small ensemble. Fargana accompanies herself on daf (frame drum).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GQbsHU2El8k

Daily Roots with U Roy

2-19-18

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNeL00pyGTw

Stars can make waves in the Orion Nebula’s sea of gas and dust. This esthetic close-up of cosmic clouds and stellar winds features LL Orionis, interacting with the Orion Nebula flow. Adrift in Orion’s stellar nursery and still in its formative years, variable star LL Orionis produces a wind more energetic than the wind from our own middle-aged Sun. As the fast stellar wind runs into slow moving gas a shock front is formed, analogous to the bow wave of a boat moving through water or a plane traveling at supersonic speed. The small, arcing, graceful structure just above and left of center is LL Ori’s cosmic bow shock, measuring about half a light-year across. The slower gas is flowing away from the Orion Nebula‘s hot central star cluster, the Trapezium, located off the upper left corner of the picture. In three dimensions, LL Ori’s wrap-around shock front is shaped like a bowl that appears brightest when viewed along the “bottom” edge. This beautiful painting-like photograph is part of a large mosaic view of the complex stellar nursery in Orion, filled with a myriad of fluid shapes associated with star formation.

Al Foster (born January 18, 1944) is an American jazz drummer. Foster played with Miles Davis during the 1970s, and was one of the few people to have contact with Davis during his retirement from 1975–1981. Foster also played on Davis’s 1981 comeback album The Man with the Horn in 1981. He was the only musician to play in Davis’s band both before and after his retirement.

Foster has toured extensively with Herbie Hancock, Sonny Rollins, and Joe Henderson. He is a versatile drummer who has played in musical styles ranging from bebop to free form to jazz/rock.

Foster was born in Richmond, Virginia, and grew up in New York. He began playing drums at the age of 13 and made his recording debut with Blue Mitchell at 21.

He joined Miles Davis‘s group when Jack DeJohnette left in 1972,^[2] and played with Davis until 1985. In his 1989 autobiography, Davis described the first time he heard Foster play live in 1972 at the Cellar Club in Manhattan: “He [Foster] knocked me out because he had such a groove and he would just lay it right in there. That was the kind of thing I was looking for. Al could set it up for everybody else to play-off and just keep the groove going forever.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2rpsbQ7-lk8

Harold de Vance Land (December 18, 1928 – July 27, 2001) was an American hard bop and post-bop tenor saxophonist. Land developed his hard bop playing with the Max Roach/Clifford Brown band into a personal, modern style; often rivalling Clifford Brown’s instrumental ability with his own inventive and whimsical solos. His tone was strong and emotional, yet hinted at a certain introspective fragility.

Land was born in Houston and grew up in San Diego. He started playing at the age of 16. He made his first recording as the leader of the Harold Land All-Stars, for Savoy Records in 1949. In 1954 he joined the Clifford Brown/Max Roach Quintet, with whom he was at the forefront of the hard-bop/bebop movement.Because of family problems he moved to Los Angeles in 1955. There he played with Curtis Counce, led his own groups, and co-led groups with Bobby Hutcherson,Blue Mitchell, and Red Mitchell. From the 1970s onwards his style showed the influence of John Coltrane.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hY-ftTTqkTE&list=PLEB3LPVcGcWbB01GmOD865HHfGmHUj_y9&index=1

Frank Butler (February 18, 1928 – July 24, 1984) was an American jazz drummer.

Butler was born in Kansas City, Missouri, but later moved west and was associated in large part with the West Coast school. He played the drums in multiple high school bands (including one in Omaha, Nebraska), in local jazz combos, and in USO shows during World War II.

Butler never became well known, but was highly regarded by fellow musicians (in 1958, veteran drummer Jo Jones proclaimed him “the greatest drummer in the world”) and performed with numerous jazz notables. His big debut was as the drummer for the Dave Brubeck combo at a 1950 engagement in San Francisco. He went on to perform with Duke Ellington, John Coltrane, Miles Davis and Art Pepperin the 1950s and 1960s. He performed on several television series, including Stars of Jazz with bassist Curtis Counce. The Contemporary label noticed Butler and Counce, and, from 1956 through 1958, captured them together on several Curtis Counce Quintet albums. Sidelined for many years by an addiction to heroin, Butler did not record albums under his own name until the 1970s, when he released two highly regarded albums titled Wheelin’ and Dealin’ and The Stepper

World Music from Bangladesh with Bari Siddiqui

Daily Roots with Scientist & Roots Radics

2-18-18

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ddwr7mRCXVc&list=PLEB3LPVcGcWZ0hsQ5_jgSMhawAnDzy1io&index=17&t=22s

NGC 3614 (also PGC 34561 or UGC 6318 ) – a spiral galaxy (Sc), located in the constellation Ursa Major, about 115 million light years away . It was discovered by William Herschel on February 5, 1788

Distance: 115.2 million ly 

Jeremy Webster “Fred” Frith (born 17 February 1949)is an English multi-instrumentalist, composer, and improvisor.

Probably best known for his guitar work, Frith first came to attention as one of the founding members of the English avant-rock group Henry Cow. He was also a member of the groups Art Bears, Massacre, and Skeleton Crew. He has collaborated with a number of prominent musicians, including Robert Wyatt, Derek Bailey, the Residents, Lol Coxhill, John Zorn, Brian Eno, Mike Patton, Lars Hollmer, Bill Laswell, Iva Bittová, Jad Fair, Kramer, the ARTE Quartett, and Bob Ostertag. He has also composed several long works, including Traffic Continues (1996, performed 1998 by Frith and Ensemble Modern) and Freedom in Fragments (1993, performed 1999 by Rova Saxophone Quartet). Frith produces most of his own music, and has also produced many albums by other musicians, including Curlew, the Muffins, Etron Fou Leloublan, and Orthotonics.

Frith is the subject of Nicolas Humbert and Werner Penzel’s award-winning 1990 documentary Step Across the Border. He also appears in the Canadian documentary Act of God, which is about the metaphysical effects of being struck by lightning. Frith has contributed to a number of music publications, including New Musical Express and Trouser Press, and has conducted improvising workshops across the world. Frith’s career spans over four decades and he appears on over 400 albums. He still performs actively throughout the world.

Currently Frith is Professor of Composition in the Music Department at Mills College in Oakland, California. He lives in the United States with his wife, German photographer Heike Liss, and their children, Finn Liss (born 1991) and Lucia Liss (born 1994).

Frith was awarded the 2008 Demetrio Stratos Prize for his career achievements in experimental music. The prize was established in 2005 in honour of experimental vocalist Demetrio Stratos, of the Italian group Area, who died in 1979. In 2010 Frith received an honorary doctorate from the University of Huddersfield in West Yorkshire, England in recognition of his contribution to music.

Frith is the brother of Simon Frith, a music critic and sociologist, and Chris Frith, a psychologist at University College London.

Noble “Thin Man” Watts (February 17, 1926 – August 24, 2004) was an American blues, jump blues and rhythm and blues saxophonist. He primarily played tenor saxophone. The AllMusicjournalist, Bill Dahl, considered Watts “one of the most incendiary […] fire-breathing tenor sax honkers” of the 1950s.

Born in DeLand, Florida, Watts studied violin and trumpet in his youth, later switching to sax. He gained musical training at Florida A&M, where he played in the school’s marching band with future saxophonist Cannonball Adderley. Hired to play with The Griffin Brothers after college, Watts began his professional career. During the 1950s, he would work with Lionel Hampton, Dinah Washington, Jerry Lee Lewis, Buddy Holly, Chuck Berry, the Everly Brothers, and others.^[3] He also appeared on American Bandstand with Johnny Mathis in 1957, and performed in the house band at a Harlem club owned by boxer Sugar Ray Robinson.

World Music with Brenda Fassie from South Africa

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ayd0G5-XVIg

Daily Roots with Rod Taylor

2-17-18

The comet PanSTARRS, also known as the blue comet (C/2016 R2), really is near the lower left edge of this stunning, wide field view recorded on January 13. Spanning nearly 20 degrees on the sky, the cosmic landscape is explored by well-exposed and processed frames from a sensitive digital camera. It consists of colorful clouds and dusty dark nebulae otherwise too faint for your eye to see, though. At top right, theCalifornia Nebula (aka NGC 1499) does have a familiar shape. Its coastline is over 60 light-years long and lies some 1,500 light-years away. The nebula’s pronounced reddish glow is from hydrogen atoms ionized by luminous blue star Xi Persei just below it. Near bottom center, the famous Pleiades star cluster is some 400 light-years distant and around 15 light-years across. Its spectacular blue color is due to the reflection of starlight by interstellar dust. In between are hot stars of the Perseus OB2 association and dusty, dark nebulae along the edge of the nearby, massive Taurus and Perseus molecular clouds. Emission from unusually abundant ionized carbon monoxide (CO+) molecules fluorescing in sunlight is largely responsible for the telltale blue tint of the remarkable comet’s tail. The comet was about 17 light minutes from Earth.

Otis Blackwell (February 16, 1931 – May 6, 2002) was an African-American songwriter, singer, and pianist, whose work significantly influenced rock and roll. His compositions include “Fever“, recorded by Little Willie John; “Great Balls of Fire” and “Breathless“, recorded by Jerry Lee Lewis; “Don’t Be Cruel“, “All Shook Up” and “Return to Sender” (with Winfield Scott), recorded by Elvis Presley; and “Handy Man“, recorded by Jimmy Jones. He is not to be confused with the songwriter and record producer Robert “Bumps” Blackwell.

Blackwell was born in Brooklyn, New York. He learned to play the piano as a child and grew up listening to both R&B and country music.

William Ballard Doggett (February 16, 1916 – November 13, 1996) was an American jazz and rhythm and blues pianist and organist. He is best known for his compositions “Honky Tonk” and “Hippy Dippy”, and variously working with the Ink Spots, Johnny Otis, Wynonie Harris, Ella Fitzgerald, and Louis Jordan.

Doggett was born in Philadelphia.His mother, a church pianist, introduced him to music when he was nine years old. By the time he was fifteen, he had joined a Philadelphia area combo, playing local theaters and clubs while attending high school.

World Music with Javier Conde on Flamenco Fridays performing Grannies.

Granaína (pronunciación española: [ɡɾanaina]) es un estilo flamenco de canto y guitarra de Granada. Es una variante de los fandangos de Granada. Originalmente era bailable, pero ahora ha perdido su ritmo, es mucho más lento, y normalmente solo se canta o se toca como solo de guitarra, lo que refleja su herencia árabe-morisca con más fuerza que otros fandangos.

El famoso cantante Don Antonio Chacón (1869-1929) se atribuye a liberar la granaína de sus ataduras rítmicas y hacerla popular. Los cantantes usualmente terminan su interpretación de la granaína con una media granaína, una canción similar pero que aumenta a un tono más alto. Manuel Vallejo (1891-1960) fue un famoso exponente de este último cante.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3EvcL4hc4Jc

Daily Roots with Big Youth

2-16-18

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VHGqPe2QzcQ