In The Groove, Jazz and Beyond

Tonight's show begins by paying homage to the holiday weekend with Coltrane's "Spiritual". From there, I will play some of my favorite releases from 2009 as a retrospective. There were many great albums released, and I found myself not being able to get to them all. I will most likely continue to play these recent CDs in my next broadcast. I try to highlight some of the recordings that were nominated for Grammy Awards, though the grammy organization truly disrespects jazz artists in favor of popular trendy music. I guess America's only original art form doesn't fit with the glitz, glamour and money of popular music. In any case, here on In The Groove, I'll feature some of today's best jazz including some lesser known artists you will probably hear only on our show. Special mention to Miguel Zenon, Robert Glasper, John Funkhauser, Rob Garcia for outstanding CD's that are represented here.

This years pre-holiday show is designed to warm you up on a cold snowy winter eve and get you in the holiday vibe. We just play a short set of Christmas classics from Chris Potter and Marian McPartland. Those tracks are preceeded by a be-bop set featuring Greg Abate, Kent Hewitt and friends and are followed by a set of new modern jazz featuring the likes of Steve Slaigle, Rob Garcia 4 and Ingrid Jensen. Enjoy! on a cold snowy winter eve and get you in the holiday vibe. We just play a short set of Christmas classics from Chris Potter and Marian McPartland. Those tracks are preceeded by a be-bop set featuring Greg Abate, Kent Hewitt and friends and are followed by a set of new modern jazz featuring the likes of Steve Slaigle, Rob Garcia 4 and Ingrid Jensen. Enjoy!

This show ventures into an edgier ground than the usual In The Groove. We will highlight some of the original innovators of the genre like Ornette Coleman, Eric Dolphy and Cecil Taylor. We will hear some established players that have stretched the boundries of jazz such as Joe Lovano and Mario Pavone. Newer jazz artists on the scene such as Rez Abbazi and Noah Preminger are using this freedom in their compositions and improvisations and are breaking new ground in their music establishing their own voice and style.

This show is a Latin-Jazz special featuring pianist and band leader David Gonzalez of the Latin Jazz Experience. He is here in our studio to kick-off the release of his new CD Dreams, and a gig this week in Hartford. We start off the show with jazz greats Ray Baretto, Jerry Gonzalez, and Willi Bobo.

This is my post Thanksgiving show. We'll run through a set that is inspired by my favorite holiday. Food, Family and giving thanks for the all of the wonderful things in our life, and jazz music is one of those for sure. Also in this podcast is a surprising enchanted vocal arrangement of Spain by Manhattan Transfer from a new release entitled the Chick Corea Songbook.

This is the final installment of a 3 part series celebrating the Jazz Masters. It was a pleasure to feature greats like Miles, Trane, Ornette, J-Mac, Pepper, Henderson and Blakey for this show. These are Jazz music's Hall of Famers, in my opinion. If you missed any of the previous segments, you just need to scroll down on my web page for the other two shows.

A mix of some great music spanning many styles of jazz. Highlights include Pat Metheny, Wynton Marsalis, and Thomas Chapin. Thomas Chapin was a great jazz artist born in Manchester Connecticut. We used to listen to him play at local clubs in the early 80's. He always played with passion and fire. His career was cut short at the prime of his life from leukemia. At the time Chapin was at the top of his creative genius. This podcast contains two tracks and a video below that show Chapin's artistry and incredible chops.

This podcast is part 2 of a 3 hour radio special I did recently on the Masters of Jazz. This one features Sonny, Miles, Wes, Cannonball, Rashaan and more. Part 3 will show up next time my regular broadcast is pre-empted for sports programing, which happens frequently during this time of year. So, keep downloading these podcasts.

We get into the Halloween spirit with this scary collection of jazz tunes. Voodoo, Black Magic, Zombies, Ghosts and more for this weeks selection of tunes. For an entire CD of music inspired by ghosts and goblins, I would recommend Greg Abate's Monsters of the Night. One of the tunes closes out this weeks podcast, but Greg brews up an entire CD of hard driving compositions inspired by the Halloween theme.