Joseph Harry Fowler Connick Jr. is an American singer, pianist, composer, actor, and television host. He has sold over 28 million albums worldwide. Connick is ranked among the top 60 best-selling male artists in the United States by the Recording Industry Association of America, with 16 million in certified sales. He has had seven top 20 US albums, and ten number-one US jazz albums, earning more number-one albums than any other artist in US jazz chart history.
Wynton Learson Marsalis is an American trumpeter, composer, teacher, and artistic director of Jazz at Lincoln Center. He has promoted classical and jazz music, often to young audiences. Marsalis has won nine Grammy Awards, and his Blood on the Fields was the first jazz composition to win the Pulitzer Prize for Music. He is the only musician to win a Grammy Award in both jazz and classical during the same year.
Teresa Brewer was an American singer whose style incorporated pop, country, jazz, R&B, musicals, and novelty songs. She was one of the most prolific and popular female singers of the 1950s, recording nearly 600 songs.
Cassandra Wilson is an American jazz singer, songwriter, and producer from Jackson, Mississippi. She is one of the most successful female Jazz singers and has been described by critic Gary Giddins as "a singer blessed with an unmistakable timbre and attack [who has] expanded the playing field" by incorporating blues, country, and folk music into her work. She has won numerous awards, including two Grammys, and was named "America's Best Singer" by Time magazine in 2001.
Kenneth David Kirkland was an American pianist and keyboardist.
Jason Marsalis is an American jazz drummer, vibraphone player, composer, producer, band leader, and member of the Marsalis family of musicians. He is the youngest son of Dolores Ferdinand Marsalis and the late Ellis Marsalis, Jr.
Ellis Louis Marsalis Jr. was an American jazz pianist and educator. Active since the late 1940s, Marsalis came to greater attention in the 1980s and 1990s as the patriarch of the musical Marsalis family, when sons Branford and Wynton became popular jazz musicians.
"Fight the Power" is a song by American hip hop group Public Enemy, released as a single in the summer of 1989 on Motown Records. It was conceived at the request of film director Spike Lee, who sought a musical theme for his 1989 film Do the Right Thing. First issued on the film's 1989 soundtrack, a different version was featured on Public Enemy's 1990 studio album Fear of a Black Planet.
Regina Carter is an American jazz violinist. She is the cousin of jazz saxophonist James Carter.
Straight-ahead jazz is a genre of jazz that developed in the 1960s, with roots in the prior two decades. It omits the rock music and free jazz influences that began to appear in jazz during this period, instead preferring acoustic instruments, conventional piano comping, walking bass patterns, and swing- and bop-based drum rhythms.
Wycliffe A. Gordon is an American jazz trombonist, arranger, composer, band leader, and music educator at the collegiate-conservatory level. Gordon also sings and plays didgeridoo, trumpet, soprano trombone, tuba, and piano. His nickname is "Pinecone".
William Doyce “Buddy” Killen was an American record producer and music publisher, and a former owner of Trinity Broadcasting Network and Tree International Publishing, the largest country music publishing business, before he sold it to CBS Records in 1989. He was also the owner of Killen Music Group, involved with more diverse genres of music, such as pop and rap.
Claudia Acuña is a Chilean jazz vocalist, songwriter, and arranger.
Moacir Santos was a Brazilian composer, multi-instrumentalist and music educator. Musicians such as Baden Powell, Bola Sete and Wilson das Neves studied under him. As a composer, Santos worked with Nara Leão, Roberto Menescal, Sérgio Mendes and Lynda Laurence, among others. His music was highly respected by musicians in Brazil and the United States, despite never achieving wider recognition.
Robert Hurst is an American jazz bassist.
Branford Marsalis is an American saxophonist, composer, and bandleader. While primarily known for his work in jazz as the leader of the Branford Marsalis Quartet, he also performs frequently as a soloist with classical ensembles and has led the group Buckshot LeFonque. From 1992 to 1995 he led the Tonight Show Band.
Andrew Shapter was an American film director, producer, writer and photographer. Shapter is known for his documentaries, Before the Music Dies (2006) and Happiness Is (2009), his feature film The Teller and the Truth (2015), his music videos with Willie Nelson and The Roots, and his U.N. Summit video on refugees, Refugees Are... Shapter completed cancer treatment in October 2014. Shapter was a partner at the creative production company Roadwings Entertainment, which has offices in Austin, Las Vegas, and San Francisco.
Happiness Is is a 2009 documentary film that the examines the different interpretations of the "pursuit of happiness" in America. The film features interviews with notable personalities such as the Dalai Lama, Willie Nelson and John Mellencamp as well as happiness authors Daniel Gilbert, Gretchen Rubin and Darrin McMahon. It's the second film from director and writer Andrew Shapter.
Joel Rasmussen is a Montana born filmmaker, author, and producer. He produced and co-wrote Before the Music Dies, a 2006 documentary, narrated by Forest Whitaker that examines the homogenization of the music industry. Rasmussen and the film's director, Andrew Shapter spent a year traveling across the U.S. interviewing hundreds of people in the music business. The film features interviews and performances from such musicians and groups as Doyle Bramhall II, Erykah Badu, Eric Clapton, Dave Matthews, Branford Marsalis, Elvis Costello, and Bonnie Raitt He is the CEO and Co-founder of Fantrail.
Royal Garden Blues is an album by the American saxophonist Branford Marsalis, released in 1986. Marsalis promoted it with a North American tour.
