Lenny White
Leonard White III is a three-time Grammy Award-winning American jazz fusion drummer, born in New York City, best known for being the drummer of Chick Corea's Return to Forever. A resident of Teaneck, New Jersey, White has been described as "one of the founding fathers of jazz fusion". Credits adapted from AllMusic and Discogs. 1975: Venusian Summer 1977: Big City 1978: The Adventures of Astral Pirates 1978: Streamline 1979: Best of Friends 1980: Twennynine 1981: Just Like Dreamin' 1983: Attitude 1983: In Clinic 1995: Present Tense 1996: Renderers of Spirit 1999: Edge 2002: Collection 2004: The Love Has Never Gone: Tribute to Earth, Wind & Fire 2008: Hancock Island 2010: Anomaly With Azteca 1972: Azteca 1973: Pyramid of the Moon 2008: From The Ruins With Gato Barbieri 1971: Fenix With Ron Carter Stardust With Cyrus Chestnut Natural Essence There's a Sweet, Sweet Spirit With Stanley Clarke 1973: Children of Forever 1975: Journey to Love With Al Di Meola: 1976: Land of the Midnight Sun 1977: Elegant Gypsy With Return to Forever 1973: Hymn of the Seventh Galaxy 1974: Where Have I Known You Before 1975: No Mystery 1976: Romantic Warrior 2009: Returns 2009: Forever 2012: The Mothership Returns With Larry Coryell & Victor Bailey 2005: Electric 2006: TrafficWith Chaka Khan, Freddie Hubbard, Joe Henderson, Chick Corea & Stanley Clarke 1982: Echoes of an Era 1982: Echoes of an Era 2 – The Concert With Buster Williams Houdini Griot Libertè 65 Roses With others 1969 – Andrew Hill: Passing Ships 1970 – Joe Henderson: If You're Not Part of the Solution, You're Part of the Problem 1970 – Freddie Hubbard: Red Clay 1970 – Woody Shaw: Blackstone Legacy 1970 – Miles Davis: Bitches Brew 1971 – Curtis Fuller: Crankin' 1972 - Buddy Terry: Pure Dynamite 1973 - Eddie Henderson: Realization 1976 – Don Cherry: Hear & Now 1976 – Jaco Pastorius: Jaco Pastorius 1977 - With Brian Auger's Oblivion Express: Happiness Heartaches 1986 – Eliane Elias: Illusions 1990 – The Manhattan Project 1990 – Michel Petrucciani: Music 1993 - Bobby Hutcherson: Acoustic Masters II 1994 – Marcus Miller, Michel Petrucciani, Bireli Lagrene & Kenny Garrett: Dreyfus Night in Paris 1995 – Urbanator: Urbanator 1997 – The Geri Allen Trio & The Jazzpar 1996 Nonet: Some Aspects of Water 1998 – Geri Allen: The Gathering 1999 – Stanley Clarke, Karen Briggs, Rachel Z and Richie Kotzen Vertú 2009 – The Stanley Clarke Trio: Jazz in the Garden 2011 – Jamey Haddad, Lenny White, Mark Sherman: Explorations in Space and Time Official website Lenny White video interview at All About Jazz Return to Forever: Twelve Historic Tracks at Jazz.com Lenny White biography at MusicTaste Lenny White on IMDb
The Rolling Stone Album Guide
The Rolling Stone Album Guide known as The Rolling Stone Record Guide, is a book that contains professional music reviews written and edited by staff members from Rolling Stone magazine. Its first edition was published in 1979 and its last in 2004; the guide can be seen at Rate Your Music, while a list of albums given a five star rating by the guide can be seen at Rocklist.net. The Rolling Stone Record Guide was the first edition of what would become The Rolling Stone Album Guide, it was edited by Dave Marsh and John Swenson, included contributions from 34 other music critics. It is divided into sections by musical genre and lists artists alphabetically within their respective genres. Albums are listed alphabetically by artist although some of the artists have their careers divided into chronological periods. Dave Marsh, in his Introduction, cites as precedents Leonard Maltin's book TV Movies and Robert Christgau's review column in the Village Voice, he gives Tape Guide as raw sources of information.
The first edition included black and white photographs of many of the covers of albums which received five star reviews. These titles are listed together in the Five-Star Records section, coincidentally five pages in length; the edition included reviews for many comedy artists including Lenny Bruce, Lord Buckley, Bill Cosby, The Firesign Theatre, Spike Jones, Richard Pryor. Comedy artists were listed in the catch-all section "Rock, Soul and Pop", which included the genres of folk, bluegrass and reggae, as well as comedy. Traditional pop performers were not included, with the notable exceptions of Frank Sinatra and Nat King Cole. Included too were some difficult-to-classify artists. Big band jazz was handled selectively, with certain band leaders omitted, while others were included. Many other styles of jazz did appear in the Jazz section; the book was notable for the time in the provocative, "in your face" style of many of its reviews. For example, writing about Neil Young's song, "Down by the River", John Swenson described it both as an "FM radio classic", as a "wimp anthem".
His colleague, Dave Marsh, in reviewing the three albums of the jazz fusion group Chase, gave a one-word review: "Flee.". Introduction Rock, Soul and Pop Blues Jazz Gospel Anthologies and Original Casts Five-Star Records Glossary Selected Bibliography The guide employs a five star rating scale with the following descriptions of those ratings: Indispensable: a record that must be included in any comprehensive collection Excellent: a record of substantial merit, though flawed in some essential way. Good: a record of average worth, but one that might possess considerable appeal for fans of a particular style. Mediocre: a record, artistically insubstantial, though not wretched. Poor: a record where technical competence is at question or it was remarkably ill-conceived. Worthless: a record that need never have been created. Reserved for the most bathetic bathwater; the New Rolling Stone Record Guide was an update of 1979's The Rolling Stone Record Guide. Like the first edition, it was edited by Swenson.
It included contributions from 52 music critics and featured chronological album listings under the name of each artist. In many cases, updates from the first edition consist of short, one-sentence verdicts upon an artist's work. Instead of having separate sections such as Blues and Gospel, this edition compressed all of the genres it reviewed into one section except for Jazz titles which were removed for this edition and were expanded and published in 1985 Rolling Stone Jazz Record Guide. Besides adding reviews for many emerging punk and New Wave bands, this edition added or expanded a significant number of reviews of long-established reggae and ska artists. Since the goal of this guide was to review records that were in print at the time of publication, this edition featured a list of artists who were included in the first edition but were not included in the second edition because all of their material was out of print; this edition dispensed with the album cover photos found in the first edition.
Introduction to the Second Edition Introduction to the First Edition Ratings Reviewers Record Label Abbreviations Rock, Blues, Country and Pop Anthologies and Original Cast Index to Artists in the First Edition The second edition uses the same rating system as the first edition. The only difference is that in addition to a rating, the second edition employs the pilcrow mark to indicate a title, out of print at the time the guide was published; some artists had the ratings for their albums lowered as the book now offered a revisionist slant to rock's history. The Rolling Stone Jazz Record Guide was published in 1985 and incorporated the jazz listings omitted from The New Rolling S
Minimoog
The Minimoog is an analog synthesizer first manufactured by Moog Music between 1970 and 1981. In the 1960s, synthesizers—in the form of large and complex modular synthesizers—were inaccessible to most musicians; the Minimoog was designed as an affordable, simplified instrument which combined the most useful components in a single device. It was the first synthesizer sold in retail stores, it was first popular with progressive rock and jazz musicians and found wide use in disco, pop and electronic music. After the sale of Moog Music, production of the Minimoog stopped in the early 1980s. In 2002, after founder Robert Moog regained the rights to the Moog brand and bought the company, the Minimoog Voyager, an updated version, was released. In 2016, the company, now rebranded as Moog Music, released a new version of the original Minimoog. In the 1960s, RA Moog Co manufactured Moog modular synthesizers, which helped bring electronic sounds to music but remained inaccessible to ordinary people; the modular synthesizers were difficult to use and required users to connect components manually with patch cables to create sounds.
They were sensitive to temperature and humidity, cost tens of thousands of dollars. Most were owned by universities or record labels, used to create soundtracks or jingles. Moog engineer Bill Hemsath wondered if the company could create a smaller, more reliable synthesizer, he created a prototype, the Min A, by sawing a keyboard in half and wiring several modules into a small cabinet. Moog president Robert Moog felt the prototype was fun, but did not see a market for it. Hemsath and other engineers, Moog, created several more prototypes, adding features such as the suitcase design to aid portability. In early 1970, Moog Co began losing money. While Moog was away, the engineers, fearing they would lose their jobs if the company closed, developed a version of Hemsath's miniature synthesizer, the Minimoog Model D. Moog chastised them, but came to see the potential in the Model D and authorized its production; the engineers could not get the power supply to stabilise properly, which meant that the Minimoog's three oscillators were never synchronized.
Although unintentional, this created the synthesizer's "rich" sound. Its voltage-controlled filter was unique, allowing users to shape sounds to create "everything from blistering, funky bass blurps... to spacey whistle lead tones". The Minimoog was the first synthesizer to feature a pitch wheel, which allows players to bend the note of the synthesizer as a guitarist or saxophonist does, allowing for more expressive playing. Future synthesizers incorporated their own pitch wheels. According to David Borden, one of the first users of the Minimoog, "If had patented, he would have been an wealthy man." Moog Co released the first Minimoog in 1971. Moog said the Minimoog was "conceived as a session musician's axe, something a guy could carry to the studio, do a gig and walk out. We thought we'd sell maybe 100 of them." Moog hired engineer and musicologist David Van Koevering to travel demonstrating Minimoogs to musicians and music stores. Van Koevering's friend Glen Bell, founder of Taco Bell, allowed him to use a building on a private island Bell owned in Florida.
Van Koevering used the building to host an event he billed as "Island of Electronicus", a "pseudo-psychedelic experience that brought counterculture to straight families and connected it with the sound of the Minimoog". The Minimoog was in continuous production for thirteen years and over 12,000 were made, it was the first synthesiser sold in retail stores. Despite the success, Moog Co could not afford to meet demand, nor had credit for a loan, Moog sold the company. Production of the Minimoog stopped in the early 1980s and the company ceased all production in 1993. In 2002, Robert Moog bought the company. In 2002, Moog Co released the Moog Voyager, an updated version of the Minimoog that sold more than 14,000 units, more than the original Minimoog. In 2016, Moog Music began manufacturing an updated version of the Model D. Moog announced the end of Model D production in June 2017. Numerous companies, including Arturia and Behringer, have developed clones and software emulations of the Minimoog.
In 2018, Moog Music released the Minimoog Model D app for iOS. According to TJ Pinch, author of Analog Days, the Minimoog was "the first synthesizer to become a'classic'". Wired described it as "the most famous synthesizer in music history... a ubiquitous analog keyboard that can be heard in countless pop, hip-hop, techno tracks from the 1970s, 80s, 90s". It was important for its portability. David Borden, an associate of Moog, said that the Minimoog "took the synthesizer out of the studio and put it into the concert hall". According to the Guardian, "Tweaked now so that the synthesiser could reliably perform as either a melodic lead or propulsive bass instrument, the Minimoog changed everything... the Moogs oozed character. Their sound could be quirky and cute, or pulverising, but it was always identifiable as Moog."The Minimoog changed the dynamics of rock bands. For the first time, keyboardists could play lead solos in the style of lead guitarists, or play synthesised basslines popular in funk, as in the track "Flash Light" by Parliament.
Wakeman said: "For the first time you could go on and give the guitarist a run for his money...a guitarist would say,'Oh shoot, he's got a Minimoog', so they're looking for eleven on their volume control - it's the only way they can compete." Wakeman said
Percussion instrument
A percussion instrument is a musical instrument, sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater. The percussion family is believed to include the oldest musical instruments, following the human voice; the percussion section of an orchestra most contains instruments such as timpani, snare drum, bass drum, cymbals and tambourine. However, the section can contain non-percussive instruments, such as whistles and sirens, or a blown conch shell. Percussive techniques can be applied to the human body, as in body percussion. On the other hand, keyboard instruments, such as the celesta, are not part of the percussion section, but keyboard percussion instruments such as the glockenspiel and xylophone are included. Percussion instruments are most divided into two classes: Pitched percussion instruments, which produce notes with an identifiable pitch, unpitched percussion instruments, which produce notes or sounds without an identifiable pitch. Percussion instruments may play not only rhythm, but melody and harmony.
Percussion is referred to as "the backbone" or "the heartbeat" of a musical ensemble working in close collaboration with bass instruments, when present. In jazz and other popular music ensembles, the pianist, bassist and sometimes the guitarist are referred to as the rhythm section. Most classical pieces written for full orchestra since the time of Haydn and Mozart are orchestrated to place emphasis on the strings and brass; however at least one pair of timpani is included, though they play continuously. Rather, they serve to provide additional accents. In the 18th and 19th centuries, other percussion instruments have been used, again sparingly; the use of percussion instruments became more frequent in the 20th century classical music. In every style of music, percussion plays a pivotal role. In military marching bands and pipes and drums, it is the beat of the bass drum that keeps the soldiers in step and at a regular speed, it is the snare that provides that crisp, decisive air to the tune of a regiment.
In classic jazz, one immediately thinks of the distinctive rhythm of the hi-hats or the ride cymbal when the word "swing" is spoken. In more recent popular music culture, it is impossible to name three or four rock, hip-hop, funk or soul charts or songs that do not have some sort of percussive beat keeping the tune in time; because of the diversity of percussive instruments, it is not uncommon to find large musical ensembles composed of percussion. Rhythm and harmony are all represented in these ensembles. Music for pitched percussion instruments can be notated on a staff with the same treble and bass clefs used by many non-percussive instruments. Music for percussive instruments without a definite pitch can be notated with a specialist rhythm or percussion-clef. Percussion instruments are classified by various criteria sometimes depending on their construction, ethnic origin, function within musical theory and orchestration, or their relative prevalence in common knowledge; the word "percussion" derives from Latin the terms: "percussio", "percussus".
As a noun in contemporary English, Wiktionary describes it as "the collision of two bodies to produce a sound." The term has application in medicine and weaponry, as in percussion cap. However, all known uses of percussion appear to share a similar lineage beginning with the original Latin: "percussus". In a musical context the percussion instruments may have been coined to describe a family of musical instruments including drums, metal plates, or blocks that musicians beat or struck to produce sound. Hornbostel–Sachs has no high-level section for percussion. Most percussion instruments are classified as membranophones; however the term percussion is instead used at lower-levels of the Hornbostel–Sachs hierarchy, including to identify instruments struck with either a non-sonorous object or against a non-sonorous object. This is opposed to concussion, which refers to instruments with two or more complementary sonorous parts that strike against each other and other meanings. For example: 111.1 Concussion idiophones or clappers, played in pairs and beaten against each other, such as zills and clapsticks.
111.2 Percussion idiophones, includes many percussion instruments played with the hand or by a percussion mallet, such as the hang and the xylophone, but not drums and only some cymbals. 21 Struck drums, includes most types of drum, such as the timpani, snare drum, tom-tom. (Included in most drum sets or 412.12 Percussion reeds, a class of wind instrument unrelated to percussion in the more common sense There are many instruments that have some claim to being percussion, but are classified otherwise: Keyboard instruments such as the celesta and piano. Stringed instruments played with beaters such as the hammered dulcimer. Unpitched whistles and similar instruments, such as the pea whistle and Acme siren. Percussion instruments are sometimes classified as "pitched" or "unpitched". While valid, this classification is seen as inadequate. Rather, it may be more informative to describe percussion instruments in regards to one or more of the following four paradigms: Many texts, including Teaching Percussion by Gary Cook of the University of Arizona, begin by studying the physica
Return to Forever
Return to Forever is a jazz fusion group founded and led by pianist Chick Corea. Through its existence, the band has had many members, with the only consistent bandmate of Corea's being bassist Stanley Clarke. Along with Weather Report and Mahavishnu Orchestra, Return to Forever is cited as one of the core groups of the jazz-fusion movement of the 1970s. Several musicians, including Clarke, Flora Purim, Airto Moreira and Al Di Meola, first came to prominence through their performances on Return to Forever albums. After playing on Miles Davis's groundbreaking jazz-fusion albums In a Silent Way and Bitches Brew, Corea formed an avant-garde jazz band called Circle with Dave Holland, Anthony Braxton and Barry Altschul. However, in 1972, after having become a member of Scientology, Corea decided that he wanted to better "communicate" with the audience; this translated into his performing a more popularly accessible style of music, since avant-garde jazz enjoyed a small audience. The first edition of Return to Forever performed Latin-oriented music.
This initial band consisted of singer Flora Purim, her husband Airto Moreira on drums and percussion, Corea's longtime musical co-worker Joe Farrell on saxophone and flute, the young Stanley Clarke on bass. Within this first line-up in particular, Clarke played acoustic double bass in addition to electric bass. Corea's electric piano formed the basis of this group's sound. Clarke and Farrell were given ample solo space themselves. While Purim's vocals lent some commercial appeal to the music, many of their compositions were instrumental and somewhat experimental in nature; the music was composed by Corea with the exception of the title track of the second album, written by Stanley Clarke. Lyrics were written by Corea's friend Neville Potter, were quite Scientology-themed. Clarke himself became involved in Scientology through Corea, but left the religion in the early 1980s, their first album, titled Return to Forever, was recorded for ECM Records in 1972 and was released only in Europe. This album featured La Fiesta.
Shortly afterwards, Airto and Tony Williams formed the band for Stan Getz's album Captain Marvel, which featured Corea's compositions, including some from the first and second Return to Forever albums. Their second album, Light as a Feather, was released by Polydor and included the song "Spain", which became quite well known. After the second album, Farrell and Moreira left the group to form their own band, guitarist Bill Connors, drummer Steve Gadd and percussionist Mingo Lewis were added. However, Gadd was unwilling to risk his job as an in-demand session drummer. Lenny White replaced Gadd and Lewis on drums and percussion, the group's third album, Hymn of the Seventh Galaxy, was rerecorded; the nature of the group's music had by now changed into jazz-rock, had evolved into a similar vein as to that the Mahavishnu Orchestra, Weather Report, some progressive rock bands were performing at the time. Their music was still melodic, relying on strong themes, but the jazz element was by this time entirely absent, replaced by a more direct, rock oriented approach.
Over-driven, distorted guitar had become prominent in the band's new sound, Clarke had by switched completely to electric bass guitar. A replacement on vocals was not hired, all the songs were now instrumentals; this change did not lead to a decrease in the band's commercial fortunes however, Return to Forever's jazz rock albums instead found their way onto US pop album charts. In the September 1988 Down Beat magazine interview with Chick Corea by Josef Woodward, Josef says, "There is this general view... that... Miles crystallized electric jazz fusion and that he sent his emissaries out." Chick responds, "Nah. Miles is a leader... But there were other things that occurred that I thought were as important. What John McLaughlin did with the electric guitar set the world on its ear. No one heard an electric guitar played like that before, it inspired me.... John's band, more than my experience with Miles, led me to want to turn the volume up and write music, more dramatic and made your hair move."While their second jazz rock album, Where Have I Known You Before was similar in style to its immediate predecessor, Corea now played synthesizers in addition to electric keyboards, Clarke's playing had evolved considerably- now using flange and fuzz-tone effects, with his now signature style beginning to emerge.
After Bill Connors left the band to concentrate on his solo career, the group hired new guitarists. Although Earl Klugh played guitar for some of the group's live performances, he was soon replaced by the 19-year-old guitar prodigy Al Di Meola, who had played on the album recording sessions, their following album, No Mystery, was recorded with the same line-up as "Where Have I Known You Before", but the style of music had become more varied. The first side of the record consisted of jazz-funk, while the second side featured Corea's acoustic title track and a long composition with a strong Spanish influence. On this and the following album, each member of the group composed at least one of the tracks. No Mystery went on to win the Grammy Award for Best
Clavinet
The clavinet is an electrically amplified clavichord, invented by Ernst Zacharias and manufactured by the Hohner company of Trossingen, West Germany from 1964 to the early 1980s. Hohner produced seven models over II, L, C, D6, E7 and Duo, its distinctive bright staccato sound has featured most prominently in funk, jazz-funk, reggae and soul songs. The clavinet is an electric/mechanical instrument that requires a keyboard amplifier to produce a usable sound level. Most models have 60 keys and a keyboard range of F1 to E6; this five-octave span covers the range of an electric guitar and most of the range of a four-string electric bass guitar. The sound is produced by a harp of 60 tensioned steel strings oriented diagonally below the key surface; each key of the simple keyboard action is a single lever element that pivots on a fulcrum point at the rear. A spring returns the key to the rest position. Beneath each key, a metal holder grips a small rubber pad. Depressing a key makes the pad perform what is known in guitar technique as a "hammer on".
An electro-magnetic pickup turns the string vibration into an electric current. The unique playing feel of a clavinet comes from this abrupt impact of the pad striking its anvil point against the string; the end of each string farthest from the pick-ups passes through a weave of yarn. When the key is released, the yarn damps the vibration of the string; each string is tuned by a machine-head positioned along the front of the harp. This harp mechanism is different from the other Hohner electric piano keyboard products, the Cembalet and Pianet, which use the principle of plectra or sticky pads plucking metal reeds that do not require user tuning. Most clavinets have two sets of pickups, positioned below the strings; the clavinet has pickup selector switches, a guitar-level output that connects to an amplifier. Early clavinet models featured single-coil pickups; the D6 introduced a six-core pickup design. Hohner intended the instrument for home use and early European classical and folk music; the clavinet L, introduced in 1968 was a domestic model with a wood-veneered triangular body and wooden legs.
It had an acrylic glass music stand. The final E7 and Clavinet Duo models reflected the culmination of several engineering improvements to make the instrument more suitable for live amplified rock music, where it had become a popular instrument; the Clavinet Duo model combined a clavinet with the Hohner Pianet T in one compact instrument. After Hohner stopped producing the Clavinet E7 and Clavinet Duo, they used the brand name for electronic and digital keyboards with no electro-mechanical sound production features. In the late 1980s, they applied the "Clavinet DP" name to a range of Japanese-made digital pianos; these instruments were designed for the home market, made no attempt to emulate the electro-mechanical clavinet. In 2000, Hohner disassociated themselves from the clavinet by transferring their spare-parts inventory to the restoration website Clavinet.com. The unique sound of the clavinet lives on in patches and voices built into contemporary digital keyboards, it is one of a handful of vintage keyboard sounds considered so distinctive that most major electronic keyboard makers include emulations of it.
As digital keyboard technology has advanced, the quality of clavinet emulations has improved. It is now common to find clavinet emulations that model both the original sound of a clavinet and the sound they made when the rubber pads decayed and began to stick to the strings. During the production life of the clavinet, mechanical features and electronics changed to keep pace with developments in electronics manufacture, reductions in manufacturing costs, fashion; the clavinet evolved in response to the needs of musicians playing rock music in amplified bands. The Clavinet I is housed in a bulky timber veneer box with a rectangular case profile, it has a bronze-gold hammertone painted aluminium fascia panel below the keys with the word'Clavinet I' in black at the left hand end. There are box ends at either end of the case with controls on the top surface; the 60 note keyboard sits recessed between these, under a folding lid. The keys are injection moulded plastic attached to metal frames. A white speaker grill faces upward on the left box end.
Tapered rectangular cross-section legs mount to the ends of the case, secured by four threaded knobs. The legs are wood grain to match the case, braced by a gold cross bar towards the base of the rear legs. A bent rod music stand pegs into two holes on the upper surface. Same general description as the Clavinet I except the bronze-gold hammertone painted aluminium fascia panel below the keys has the word'Clavinet II' in black at the left. There is no internal speaker grill on the left; the Clavinet C has a slimmer case than the I or II, is finished in red vinyl material. A removable black aluminium panel below the keys provides access to the tuning machines; the words'Hohner Clavinet C' are screen printed on the right hand end. The upper surface of the keyboard is finished in white, a slot holds an acrylic panel music rest; the music rest has the Hohner logo printed onto the lower left corner. Four black tapered tubular steel legs are threaded into mounts on the underside of the case; the legs fit into a box section under the top surface for transport.
A removable transport lid controls. The Clavinet L, introduced in 1968 was a domestic model and featured a wood-veneered triangular body with three wooden legs, reverse-colour keys and an acrylic glass music stand; the Clavinet D6 continued the case style of the C but is covered in blac
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