Word: pianos
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...First Taste, her voice suggests the distant melancholy of soul singer Sade; in Sleep to Dream she assumes a smoldering anger that comes off like a muted Alanis Morissette; and in the wordy, moody Sullen Girl she evokes arty singer-pianist Tori Amos. But Apple, who plays the piano and writes her own songs, is more than an imitation of her predecessors. By the end of Tidal she's sketched out a musical identity of her own that's articulate and precocious...
...South. It was always a point of pride to Linda Lambert, the wife of Kossuth's mayor, that 109 years ago her ancestors donated the land on which black ex-sharecroppers built the Mount Pleasant Missionary Baptist Church--a big, beautiful edifice that housed a $10,000 baby-grand piano, the congregation's pride...
...wearing men's boots, she won an amateur-night contest at the Apollo Theater. When she was brought to Chick Webb's attention, he complained, "I don't want that old ugly thing!" But he took her. As admirers would later marvel, "Poor Ella, she can't play piano. All she can do is sing everything right on the first take...
Roberts, 32, began showing indications of greatness at a young age. Born in Jacksonville, Florida, and blind since age five, when cataracts destroyed his vision, he began taking piano lessons at 12, learning how to read music through Braille. He was a quick study. When Roberts was 22, Marsalis asked him to join his band; and at 25 he won first prize in the prestigious Thelonious Monk International Jazz Competition. His subsequent career as a recording artist also met with early success--he is the first musician to have had his first three albums reach No. 1 on Billboard...
...post-Armstrong treatment; simply put, he makes it swing. Even the famous opening--the skyward clarinet glissando--is given a new twist. Roberts instead starts the piece with what he calls "a series of improvised statements," the first being the forlorn sound of a single banjo. Gershwin's 1920s piano rolls have set a high standard for pianists to follow, but Roberts' performance on this CD adds some graceful verve. His fleet-fingered improvisations--constant, probing, thoughtful--provide color to an already multihued work without seeming merely ornamental. After hearing Roberts, we sense that there are many more shades...