Herb Alpert (center) and Lani Hall (left) with 2013 winners of the Alpert Awards. "When I was 8 years old, I went into a music appreciation classroo...
If "This Guy's in Love with You" means anything, Herb Alpert and Lani Hall's show at the Café Carlyle offers, in Alpert's words, "music that is very déjà-vu."
"I enjoy getting out in front of the crowds every single night, I enjoy seeing their faces light up and having a good time out there and seeing the smiles on their faces. That's what gives me a thrill now, just getting up there for the live action and just performing."
Imagine this... two guys have been partners for 50 years in the volatile music business, and until they sold the company in 1989 (for several hundred million dollars!), they didn't even have a written contract between them!
Lani Hall is a true literary talent who is now one of the major writers of the naturalistic Chicago school and will leave a lasting impact on us all.
"If you're prepared for what you'd like to do with the rest of your life and you're putting in the time and are passionate about what you're doing, you have to just stay with it. There's no magic formula for how to get through the maze."
This week I watched in astonishment as the Herb Alpert Foundation gave its 18th annual awards to five brilliant artists in different fields.
The goal of International Jazz Day is to have jazz celebrated, studied and presented for 24 consecutive hours around the world. Jazz "is a universal music of freedom and creativity."
There's a lot about the New York trod by the real Mad Men back in 1966 -- the year in which we assume season five will be set -- that would send even die-hard Mad Men retroheads scurrying back to 2012.
At first the concept was to have a great jazz club with good food. Now it is is a really great restaurant with exciting jazz.
I recalled that Hillary Clinton famously said, "It takes a village to raise a child," based upon an old African proverb. Well, all of these folks have taken that literally, and... are building a village.
Five exceptional artists have received grants from the Herb Alpert Foundation and California Institute of the Arts (CalArts). I recently had the pleasure of meeting each of these extraordinary young individuals.
Boomer Power is ablooming. What's next? The responsibility that comes with all that influence and clout.
"I really did not want to make another record just because I could, especially now. Why make another record when I've got eleven albums, you know? I've got tons of music out there."
Hand it to Ace Gallery for not compromising on scale! If you want to be wowed by the sheer bloody visual WALLOP of art, there's no better place to go...
Welcome to Snoopworld, where Chevys still are bouncin', would-be gangstas still kind of prowl the streets (albeit it's a new generation), explicit-isms flow like 40 oz. beer, and tempos best not harsh anyone's mellow.
Most of the "new" music I've gotten into this year is actually old music that's never been heard before, dredged up from the vaults just in time to make a buck before recorded music ceases to have any monetary value whatsoever.
Last Herb and Lani re-emerged, hitting the road for a series of low-key shows which were recorded for the newly-released Anything Goes -- the first time they've ever collaborated musically.
Six years later, the newest installment of the series passes the torch to a younger stable of artists who, along with series initiator Vicki Iovine and Timothy Shriver, shared their thoughts about the album.
Record bins are rife with charity singles and concert history is filled with benefit shows for every imaginable cause. Musicians like to give back. Here, see the most generous musicians ever.
Richard Carpenter: "So many people have said to us, 'We can understand every word to your songs,' which, with all the pop and rock records at the time, was difficult to do."
Father Greg Boyle wants to stop the causes of gang violence, instead of waiting to clean up the results.
