Critic Kevin Whitehead reviews biographies of two musicians who transcended jazz, and to whom recognition was slow in coming: James P. Johnson, born in 1894, and Alice Coltrane, born in 1937.
NPR: John Coltrane and Eric Dolphy's fearless experiment sets a new album ablaze
A little over 60 years ago, the editor-in-chief of DownBeat magazine asked John Coltrane and Eric Dolphy a deceptively simple question: What are you trying to do? He rephrased slightly: What are you ...
John Coltrane and Eric Dolphy's fearless experiment sets a new album ablaze
The New York Times: 5 Minutes That Will Make You Love John Coltrane
John William Coltrane was born on in Hamlet, North Carolina. At the age of three his family moved to High Point, NC, where young Coltrane spent his early years. His father, John ...
Few jazz musicians inspire more respect or demand more attention than John Coltrane. Elvin Jones, Coltrane's drummer in "The Classic Quartet" (1961-65), said that most people who listen seriously to ...
Coltrane: The Story of a Sound by Ben Ratliff 250pp, Faber, £14.99 It is more difficult to write about John Coltrane than almost any other major 20th-century artist. By the standards of many jazz ...
“I think the main thing a musician would like to do is give a picture to the listener of the many wonderful things that he knows of and senses in the universe.” − John Coltrane On Dec. 9 and 10, 1964, ...
HIGH POINT, N.C. (WGHP) — There are a few people in every profession who, when you mention their name, people can’t help but smile. John Coltrane is one of those in the world of jazz music. “In a ...