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Reggie Workman

Reggie Workman is an NEA Jazz Master Reggie Workman has long been one of the most technically gifted of all bassists, a brilliant player whose versatile style fits into both hard bop and very avant-garde settings. He played piano, tuba, and euphonium early on but settled on bass in the mid-'50s. After working regularly with Gigi Gryce (1958), Red Garland, and Roy Haynes, he was a member of the John Coltrane Quartet for much of 1961, participating in several important recordings and even appearing with Coltrane and Eric Dolphy on a half-hour West German television show that is currently available on video (The Coltrane Legacy). After Jimmy Garrison took his place with Coltrane, Workman became a member of Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers (1962-1964) and was in the groups of Yusef Lateef (1964-65), Herbie Mann, and Thelonious Monk (1967). He recorded frequently in the 1960s (including many Blue Note dates and Archie Shepp's classic Four for Trane).

Since that time, Workman has been both an educator (serving on the faculty of music schools including the University of Michigan) and a working musician, and has played with numerous legendary jazz musicians including Max Roach, Art Farmer, Mal Waldron, David Murray, Sam Rivers, and Andrew Hill (Rivers and Hill joined Workman for the 1993 session, Summit Conference). In the 1980s, Workman began leading his own group, the Reggie Workman Ensemble. He also began a collaboration with pianist Marilyn Crispell that lasted into the next decade (the two acclaimed musicians reunited for a festival performance in 2000). During the '90s, Workman was not only active with his own ensemble, but also in Trio Three, with Andrew Cyrille and Oliver Lake, and Reggie Workman's Grooveship and Extravaganza.

In recognition of Reggie Workman's international performances and recordings spanning over 40 years, he was named a Living Legend by the African-American Historical and Cultural Museum in his hometown of Philadelphia; he is also a recipient of the Eubie Blake Award.

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Album Review

New York Art Quartet: New York Art Quartet Revisited

Read "New York Art Quartet Revisited" reviewed by Alberto Bazzurro


Questa preziosa (ancora una volta) riedizione di oltre un'ora e un quarto di musica riunisce i primi due album di uno dei gruppi più leggendari della stagione free, il primo intitolato semplicemente col suo nome e pubblicato dall'altrettanto leggendaria ESP fondata nel 1963 da Bernard Stollman (incisione del 16 novembre 1964), il secondo, Mohawk, di pochi mesi successivo (17 luglio 1965), edito su Fontana. Il gruppo è per tre quarti identico in entrambe le occasioni, allineando figure nodali di quella ...

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Album Review

Bill Dixon: With Archie Shepp, 7-Tette & Orchestra Revisited

Read "With Archie Shepp, 7-Tette & Orchestra Revisited" reviewed by Chris May


If Bill Dixon is today, in 2023, less widely remembered than other New Thing warriors such as Archie Shepp, Cecil Taylor and Albert Ayler, it is partly because he had little desire for celebrity, devoting much of his energy to organizing on behalf of his fellow musicians and composers, and teaching. In 1964, midway through making the 1962-1967 recordings collected on this album, Dixon organized the historic October Revolution in Jazz at the Cellar Café in Manhattan, which ...

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Album Review

John Coltrane: Evenings At The Village Gate

Read "Evenings At The Village Gate" reviewed by Mike Jurkovic


All music is, as are all our greater gestures and pursuits--poetry, painting, literature, sculpture, dance--spiritual by nature. An outreach by the artist and thus, by extension, us, beyond the daily argot of the ordinary. But sometimes those instances are so far and in-between, so masked by the lawlessness of the present moment, that our higher selves are forgotten, or worse, denied. And sometimes the music is downright holy. Welcome to the church known as the Village Gate. Welcome ...

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Album Review

John Coltrane: Evenings At The Village Gate

Read "Evenings At The Village Gate" reviewed by Chris May


It is important to emphasize, at the outset of this review, that Evenings At The Village Gate is a John Coltrane album of headline significance. Recorded during a four-week run at the New York City club in August and September 1961, the disc is a snapshot of Coltrane partway through the most momentous year of his development. He is in incandescent form from start to finish, leading an astounding sextet completed by multi-reedist Eric Dolphy, pianist McCoy Tyner, twin bassists ...

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In Pictures

Vision Festival 2023

Read "Vision Festival 2023" reviewed by Frank Rubolino


Beginning in 1996, the Vision Festival In New York has been a mainstay for featuring both established and upcoming artists dedicated to playing music outside the boundaries of established mores. Now, some 27 years later, it is still going strong and is fully committed to its original mission. This year, at Roulette in Brooklyn, bassists Joelle Leandre from France and Reggie Workman from the USA were honored for their contributions to the music over the decades. During the six-day festival ...

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Liner Notes

Heiner Stadler: Brains on Fire

Read "Heiner Stadler: Brains on Fire" reviewed by Howard Mandel


Brains on Fire fuels reflection on the past and response in the present. These eight extraordinary extended tracks, recorded in unusual conjunctions of master jazz improvisers instigated by composer/pianist Heiner Stadler for sessions held from 1966 through 1974, are alive with the passions of that era celebrating large, original works stretching the bounds of even the most ambitious music come before. As Stadler and his cadre of fully collaborative, creative interpreters brought immense smarts, skills and sensibilities besides ...

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Album Review

John Coltrane: Chasin' The Trane Revisited

Read "Chasin' The Trane Revisited" reviewed by Chris May


A high-tide moment in jazz history, John Coltrane's November 1-5 1961 engagement at New York's Village Vanguard was exhaustively documented on a series of Impulse albums during the 1960s and 1990s. Those discs have now, in autumn 2021, been supplemented by the Swiss-based ezz-thetics label's magnificent Chasin' The Trane Revisited. Before examining the new album, it is worth getting its provenance straight... The first Impulse album, Live At The Village Vanguard, was released in 1962; it comprised what ...

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Event

National Jazz Museum In Harlem - Benefit Concert - June 10 - Dianne Reeves

National Jazz Museum In Harlem - Benefit Concert - June 10 - Dianne Reeves

Source: Scott Thompson Public Relations

National Jazz Museum in Harlem Benefit Concert - June 10 - 7:30PM The Kaye Playhouse - Hunter College Featuring Dianne Reeves & Special Guest Honoring Reggie Workman & Albert Maysles (In Memoriam) 2015 GALA BENEFIT CONCERT Featuring: DIANNE REEVES Acclaimed Jazz Vocalist & Grammy Award Winner Honoring: REGGIE WORKMAN Bassist, Composer, Educator, Producer Legends of Jazz Award ALBERT MAYSLES, In Memoriam And ...

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Performance / Tour

Reggie Workman's African-American Legacy Project (AALP) in Concert @ HSA, Sat., Nov. 13, 11- 2pm

Reggie Workman's African-American Legacy Project (AALP) in Concert @ HSA, Sat., Nov. 13, 11- 2pm

Source: The Cinarae Group

Don't miss Reggie Workman's African-American Legacy Project (AALP) in Concert @ HSA, Nov. 13, 11- 2pm a glorious 20-piece orchestra and 18-piece chorus celebration co-created by Jazz luminaries, legendary bassist Reggie Workman and trumpet titan and conductor, Charles Tolliver. Featuring Choral Conductor Richard Harper and talented HSA and community students of the AALP Workshop Rehearsal series. Witness the AALP's virtual who's who of first call musicians: Jazz stalwarts (including Billy Harper, t. sax. (Max Roach) Neil Clarke, percussion(Randy Weston)), emerging ...

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Performance / Tour

Trio 3 (Oliver Lake / Reggie Workman / Andrew Cyrille) @ Barnes & Noble, Cool Mondays Mini-Showcase/Signing, July 20, 6PM

Trio 3 (Oliver Lake / Reggie Workman / Andrew Cyrille) @ Barnes & Noble, Cool Mondays Mini-Showcase/Signing, July 20, 6PM

Source: The Cinarae Group

Jazz masters Oliver Lake (sax), Reggie Workman (bass) and Andrew Cyrille (drums) showcase selections from their exciting new release, TRIO 3 (Lake/Workman/Cyrille) + Geri Allen, At This Time.

TRIO 3 (Lake/Workman/Cyrille) Barnes and Noble Cool Mondays Series Mini-Showcase/Signing Mon., July 20, 6pm Lincoln Triangle, 1972 Broadway @ W. 66th, NYC FREE

COMING IN AUGUST Don't miss TRIO 3 + Geri Allen @ Birdland, August 5-8, 8:30 & 11pm sets. BIRDLAND ...

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Contest

Enter the Origin Records "Hal Galper/Reggie Workman/Rashied Ali - Art-Work" Giveaway Contest

Enter the Origin Records "Hal Galper/Reggie Workman/Rashied Ali - Art-Work" Giveaway Contest

Source: All About Jazz

All About Jazz members are invited to enter the Origin Records “Hal Galper/Reggie Workman/Rashied Ali - Art-Work“ giveaway contest starting today. We'll select FIVE winners at the conclusion of the contest on April 5th. Click here to enter the contest

(Following Hal Galper at AAJ automatically enters you in the contest.)

Good luck! Your Friends at Origin Records

One of the jazz world's most dynamic pianists, Hal Galper continues the exploration of his “rubato" concept of ...

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Performance / Tour

Reggie Workman's New School Annual Dual Concerts, December 15 @ The New School

Reggie Workman's New School Annual Dual Concerts, December 15 @ The New School

Source: The Cinarae Group

Legendary Bassist Reggie Workman directs the “next generation" of Jazz with his New School Annual Dual Concerts event featuring the New School's Futuristic and Coltrane Ensembles. Bring the family for this FREE holiday fete of music by the great John Coltrane, John Carter, Reggie Workman, Sonelious Smith, as well as exciting originals by these promising students at this world-class jazz program!

Reggie Workman NEW SCHOOL ANNUAL DUAL CONCERTS The NS Coltrane Ensemble (7pm) & The NS ...

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Photos

Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

The Mighty Warriors

Elemental Music
2024

buy

Embracing the Unknown

Mahakala Music
2024

buy

Evenings At The...

Impulse! Records
2023

buy

Players

Open Mic Records
2022

buy

Sittin at the Bar

From: Players
By Reggie Workman

There Are Thorns

From: Players
By Reggie Workman

Videos

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