CD of the Month

In the beginning of his career Freddy Cole had to live in the shadow of his legendary older brother, Nat. Like his most famous sibling, Freddy as well as his other lesser known brothers Eddie & Ike all had similar timbres as Nat so each had to develop their own unique approach and style in singing. Freddy has been the most successful follower of big brother Nat King Cole. Born in Chicago Freddy began his piano lessons as an adolescent and as a teen during in post WW2 Chi-Town he would frequent many of the great jazz and blues clubs.

Jimmy Greene     Beautiful Life     Greene Music Works/Mack Avenue Records

Be-bop pianist and composer David Hazeltine is one of the top ten pianists of what I like to call the “tweener generation”, those veteran musicians who have not yet made it to the elders bracket and are too well seasoned to be labeled “up n coming” or “young lions” because David had already made his impact in jazz and is held in high esteem by his contemporaries.  Hazeltine is original from Milwaukee, WI, playing professionally since he was 13 years of age, he decided to pursue a career as a pianist so he enrolled at the

Mark Elf is a gifted guitarist who early in his career played in the band led by “The Mighty Burner”-Charles Earland as well as other leading organ players; Jimmy McGriff and Richard “Groove” Holmes.

Paquito D’Rivera was a child prodigy on sax and clarinet, by the time he was a teen, he had already traveled to New York and Santo Domingo to perform as a featured soloist with an orchestra.  In his native Cuba he had played with the  National Symphony Orchestra of Cuba and became the youngest endorser of Selmer instruments. While visiting New York he promised himself that one day he would relocate to N.Y.