From the Broadway scrap heap to a widely interpreted jazz standard, “Darn That Dream” has had quite the journey.

This brave song, written about the horror of racism long before the Civil Rights movement, is given a different complexity by Cassandra Wilson.

What was cool about Lester Young was that he kept evolving. All “Pres” did was: — Pave the way for bebop in the 1930s. — Presuppose, while playing clarinet with Basie back in the day, the cool California sound of Paul Desmond in Dave Brubeck’s 1960s band. — Later findRead More

by Nick DeRiso Billie Holiday’s voice, fragile and thin at the end, belied the strong-willed fighter she always was. This record, dotted with tunes she’d once owned two decades before as a bubbly bird in front of big bands, makes the argument for her. By the mid-1950s, the hard-living HolidayRead More