Rob Shepherd

A History of the Newport Jazz Festival – Chapter XV: Passing the Torch, 2009-2016

For most music festivals, the loss of a longtime sponsor could be a death knell.  After all, organizers killed the…

4 years ago

A History of the Newport Jazz Festival – Chapter XIV: Destinations, 2005-2009

With the success of the 50th Anniversary event, Festival Productions Inc. quickly began work on the 2005 Festival. Like the…

4 years ago

Review: Questlove’s ‘Summer of Soul (… Or When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised)’

Far too often concert films depict performances as just an insular moment in time. While Jazz on A Summer’s Day,…

4 years ago

Review: Marc Ribot’s Ceramic Dog’s ‘Hope’

Nobel physicist Erwin Schrödinger once noted that “[i]f a man never contradicts himself, the reason must be that he virtually…

4 years ago

A History of the Newport Jazz Festival – Chapter XIII: Echoes of the Past, 2004

An intense and unceasing downpour left a twenty-eight-year-old George Wein with the difficult question of whether to abruptly cancel his…

4 years ago

Five Genre-Defying Selections from the Newport Jazz Festival’s 2021 Lineup

After a year canceled by the COVID-19 pandemic, the historic Newport Jazz Festival has announced it will be presenting the…

4 years ago

A History of the Newport Jazz Festival – Chapter XII: Expansion, 1995-2003

In the four decades since the Newport Jazz festival first took place in 1954, it became a global brand with…

4 years ago

Review: ‘Impulse! Records: Music, Message & The Moment’ and Sons of Kemet’s ‘Black to the Future’

In 1960, Creed Taylor founded Impulse! Records, which he dubbed "The New Wave in Jazz." While over time, Impulse! established…

4 years ago

A History of the Newport Jazz Festival – Chapter XI: Futures, 1990-1994

The 1990s was a period of change. The geopolitical order in place for nearly half a century ended with the…

4 years ago

Review: Tony Allen’s ‘There is No End’

An artist’s final recording is often an unusual gift to the world. In large part, this derives from the fact…

4 years ago