Maxwell Lemuel Roach was an American jazz drummer and composer. A pioneer of bebop, he worked in many other styles of music, and is generally considered one of the most important drummers in history. He worked with many famous jazz musicians, including Clifford Brown, Coleman Hawkins, Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk, Abbey Lincoln, Dinah Washington, Charles Mingus, Billy Eckstine, Stan Getz, Sonny Rollins, Eric Dolphy, and Booker Little. He also played with his daughter Maxine Roach, Grammy nominated Violist. He was inducted into the DownBeat Hall of Fame in 1980 and the Modern Drummer Hall of Fame in 1992.
Clifford Benjamin Brown was an American jazz trumpeter, pianist and composer. He died at the age of 25 in a car crash, leaving behind four years' worth of recordings. His compositions "Sandu", "Joy Spring", and "Daahoud" have become jazz standards. Brown won the DownBeat magazine Critics' Poll for New Star of the Year in 1954; he was inducted into the DownBeat Hall of Fame in 1972.
Cedar Anthony Walton Jr. was an American hard bop jazz pianist. He came to prominence as a member of drummer Art Blakey's band, The Jazz Messengers, before establishing a long career as a bandleader and composer. Several of his compositions have become jazz standards, including "Mosaic", "Bolivia", "Holy Land", "Mode for Joe" and "Ugetsu/Fantasy in D".
Gary Bartz is an American jazz saxophonist. He has won two Grammy Awards.
Charles Tolliver is an American jazz trumpeter, composer, and co-founder of Strata East Records.
Thomas Walter Turrentine, Jr. was a swing and hard bop trumpeter and composer who was active between the 1940s and the 1960s. He rarely worked as a bandleader, and was known for his work as a sideman with drummer Max Roach and his younger brother, the saxophonist Stanley Turrentine.
Booker Little Jr. was an American jazz trumpeter and composer. He appeared on many recordings in his short career, both as a sideman and as a leader. Little performed with Max Roach, John Coltrane, and Eric Dolphy and was strongly influenced by Sonny Rollins and Clifford Brown. He died aged 23.
Julian Priester is an American jazz trombonist and occasional euphoniumist. He is sometimes credited "Julian Priester Pepo Mtoto". He has played with Sun Ra, Max Roach, Duke Ellington, John Coltrane, and Herbie Hancock.
Anna Marie Wooldridge, known professionally as Abbey Lincoln, was an American jazz vocalist. She was a civil rights activist beginning in the 1960s. Lincoln made a career out of delivering deeply felt presentations of standards as well as writing and singing her own material.
Liane Carroll is an English vocalist, pianist and keyboardist.
We Insist! is a jazz album which was released through Candid Records in December 1960. It contains a suite which composer and drummer Max Roach and lyricist Oscar Brown had begun to develop in 1959 with a view to its performance in 1963 on the centennial of the Emancipation Proclamation. The cover references the sit-in movement of the Civil Rights Movement. The Penguin Guide to Jazz awarded the album one of its rare crown accolades, in addition to featuring it as part of its Core Collection.
Percussion Bitter Sweet is an album by jazz drummer Max Roach recorded in 1961, released on Impulse! Records. It was trumpeter Booker Little's penultimate recording before he died from uremia in early October 1961.
It's Time is a 1962 album by jazz drummer Max Roach, released on Impulse! Records which also features trumpeter Richard Williams, tenor saxophonist Clifford Jordan, trombonist Julian Priester, pianist Mal Waldron, bassist Art Davis, and a vocal choir conducted by Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson. Singer Abbey Lincoln appears on "Lonesome Lover".
Straight Ahead is an album by American jazz vocalist Abbey Lincoln featuring performances recorded in 1961 for the Candid label.
James Houston Leary III was an American double bass player and arranger/composer. Among his notable teachers and mentors was Ortiz Walton, the youngest member to sign with the Boston Symphony and its first African America member. Leary played double bass with the Count Basie Orchestra, Nancy Wilson, Earl Hines, Bobby Hutcherson, Eddie Harris, Dizzy Gillespie with the San Francisco Pops conducted by Arthur Fiedler, Max Roach, Eddie Cleanhead Vinson, Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Johnny Hartman, Major Lance, Johnny Taylor, Esther Phillips, Rosemary Clooney, and Don Shirley. His involvement with Broadway shows included Eubie!, They're Playing Our Song, Ain't Misbehavin', Bubbling Brown Sugar, Five Guys Named Moe, Timbuktu! with Eartha Kitt, Oakland Symphony Bass Section, Pharoah Sanders, Red Garland, Jaki Byard, Randy Weston, and John Handy.
That's Him! is the second album by American jazz vocalist Abbey Lincoln featuring tracks recorded in 1957 for the Riverside label.
Abbey Is Blue is the fourth album by American jazz vocalist Abbey Lincoln featuring tracks recorded in 1959 for the Riverside label.
Keystone Korner was a jazz club in the North Beach neighborhood of San Francisco, which opened in 1970 and continued operation until 1983. Many live recordings were made at the club. Jessica Williams was the house pianist for a number of years.
You Gotta Pay the Band is an album by jazz vocalist Abbey Lincoln. It was recorded on February 25 and 26, 1991, at BMG Recording Studios in New York City, and was released later that year by Verve Records and Gitanes Jazz Productions. On the album, Lincoln is joined by saxophonist Stan Getz, pianist Hank Jones, double bassist Charlie Haden, and drummer Mark Johnson. Video clips from the recording sessions were used in the documentary film You Gotta Pay The Band.
Sophisticated Abbey: Live at the Keystone Korner is a live album by jazz vocalist Abbey Lincoln. It was recorded during March 1980 at the Keystone Korner in San Francisco, California, and was released in 2015 by HighNote Records. On the album, Lincoln is joined by pianist Phil Wright, double bassist James Leary, and drummer Doug Sides.
