By Fred Schruers Musician January 1983 “Lack of irony,” says Donald Fagen with a wry grin, “is not exactly my speciality.” It’s an odd apology—more like a boast—from the man who shared status with his Steely Dan partner, Walter Becker, as a mandarin of pop irony. But...
By Alex Belth The Stacks Reader Is James Brown the most influential American musician of the 20th Century? He’s certainly in the conversation along with Louis Armstrong, Bob Dylan and Michael Jackson. His story—the undeniable musical legacy as well as the catastrophic...
By Nat Hentoff From Jazz Is 1976 Coltrane, a man of almost unbelievable gentleness made human to us lesser mortals by his very occasional rages. Coltrane, an authentically spiritual man, but not innocent of carnal imperatives. Or perhaps more accurately, a man, in his...
By Alex Belth Bronx Banter March 31, 2003 I was lucky enough to meet Buck O’Neil, the legendary Negro League ballplayer, nine years ago when I was working as a production assistant on the Ken Burns documentary, Baseball. I escorted him around town before a screening...
By Ralph J. Gleason Rolling Stone July 4, 1974 Edward Kennedy “Duke” Ellington was three weeks and four days past his 75th birthday when he died last month in a New York City hospital. He had played his music in almost every part of the world except China and...
