Revered free-jazz drummer Milford Graves has died

Free-jazz drummer Milford Graves has died of congestive heart failure at the age of 79, NPR's Lars Gotrich and NME have reported. A founding member of the New York Art Quartet in the 1960s Graves' musical explorations encompassed studies of …

Published: 13 Feb 2021. Updated: 3 years.

Free-jazz drummer Milford Graves has died of congestive heart failure at the age of 79, NPR's Lars Gotrich and NME have reported. A founding member of the New York Art Quartet in the 1960s Graves' musical explorations encompassed studies of Indian, Asian and African music. Val Wilmer in her 1977 book As Serious as Your Life was one of the first to explore Graves' innovations and put them in the context of the free-jazz maelstrom that he found himself at the centre of in the 60s taking part for instance in the October Revolution in Jazz festival in 1964. A documentary about Graves' life Full Mantis was released in 2018. His honours included a Guggenheim Fellowship. Graves was also a teacher on the music faculty of Bennington College in Vermont from 1973-2012.

Online tributes included one from pianist and composer Jason Moran, who wrote on Twitter: ''Take time, take a soul, take a reading, make an extract, learn a dance, teach it to someone, grow a plant, savor the light, play the dark, and breathe. Thank you Milford for your love of souls. Into the garden we go.''

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Iggy Pop guests on Dr Lonnie Smith's latest

Boogie-woogie started the Blue Note sound at the end of the 1930s. Soul-jazz became its beating heart later. Part of the great label's sound firmly in that world is the Hammond B-3 culture and Breathe from one of the greatest Hammond organists in …

Published: 12 Feb 2021. Updated: 3 years.

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Boogie-woogie started the Blue Note sound at the end of the 1930s.

Soul-jazz became its beating heart later.

Part of the great label's sound firmly in that world is the Hammond B-3 culture and Breathe from one of the greatest Hammond organists in jazz is new soon from Dr Lonnie Smith.

The veteran giant of the idiom who returned to the label five years ago for first, second and now third helpings this new 'un was made live at the Jazz Standard venue in New York. Iggy Pop guests on a couple of tracks! 'Bright Eyes' is streaming. Dr Lonnie Smith, top. Release date is 26 March.