Happy Birthday Les Paul!

[Bright Moments]

Les Paul is 89 years young today - and STILL performing every Monday night at the Iridium in New York!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY LES PAUL!!!!!

Here's a pic of me with Les (I'm the one who's NOT Les Paul!)

[Bright Moments]

whatt???!!!!!

no les paul fans??!!!

[Joe G]

Gotta tip the hat to Les!

[chris olivarez]

He's done some amazing things on the electric guitar. Are the chops still there?

[LAL]

I've never heard any of the music of this legendary guitarist. Any album to start with? I've seen the following (Complete Decca Trios Plus '36-'47) in stores but have held back.

Thanks in advance for any feedback.

[robviti]

Sound basses

Les Paul exhibit opens in Cleveland

By DENNIS A. SHOOK - GM Today Staff

March 11, 2004

WAUKESHA -

They were rockin’ in Cleveland ...

Sue Baker was part of the celebration at that Ohio city’s Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame last weekend, when the exhibit honoring Waukesha native Les Paul was opened for the first time.

Baker was excited by the event but as the executive director of the Waukesha County Historical Society and Museum, she is used to being close to history. Paul, soon to turn 89, is certainly a major part of the history of rock ‘n’ roll music.

"It was called, ‘Les Paul - The New Sound,’" Baker said of the exhibit. She noted he still goes by the nickname "The Wizard of Waukesha."

Paul was there to greet Baker, as the pair have been working to put together a much larger exhibit to honor Paul at the museum at the Old County Courthouse, 101 W. Main St.

Baker said Monday the two exhibits will not rival each other and could actually complement each other. She said people visiting the 400-square-foot Cleveland exhibit might be advised once the 5,000-square-foot Paul exhibit is ready in Waukesha.

"That will be in about two to three years, depending on the level of contributions," Baker said of the plans for the Waukesha exhibit.

Some common threads

The Cleveland exhibit and the Waukesha exhibit will share some artifacts, like a model of his first electric guitar, the small model of a microphone he invented and examples of his then-revolutionary multi-track recording technique that eventually became the trademark of his records with his wife, Mary Ford.

Yet the Waukesha museum will feature much more in the way of artifacts and an overall musical experience.

"We’re talking to different providers to bring a real technological side to the exhibit," Baker said. "So we will be asking people if they can build what we are looking at, and how much will that cost?"

The plan is to allow for a hands-on musical experience, she said.

"He is real excited about the Waukesha exhibit," Baker said of Paul, who is helping plan its design. "We’ll tell his story a completely different way. We will start with Les in Waukesha and move on to his inventions."

More Les

During the weekend, Paul and his backup trio played for groups of about 45 people to nearly 500, Baker said.

Paul’s was a long journey from the corner of Wisconsin and St. Paul avenues, but only blocks from where his legacy will be housed.

"(Paul) said the ‘new’ part of the old courthouse was not even there when he used to ride his bike past it as a kid," Baker said of the 1938 addition to the original structure.

His musical inventions soon took him to Chicago and New York and away from his hometown. but Baker said it is downtown Waukesha that he wants as the repository of his many artifacts.

The area on the second floor is already being cleared to prepare for the new exhibit. Baker said it will be the largest permanent exhibit in the museum, taking up nearly a fourth of the courthouse building.

The society is working on securing more donations from various musical companies and individuals worldwide, as well as Waukesha County benefactors, she said. Donations of $1,000 and above will be recognized on a Les Paul donation board, Baker said.

Baker has previously estimated the museum cost at about $1 million.

The hope is that the museum will become an attraction with international appeal.

In a previous interview with the Freeman, Paul said he is giving all of his major memorabilia to the society for its exhibit.

"I told them they can back the truck up to my house and take it all," Paul told the Freeman about a year ago.

And "all" that is going to make for a significant exhibit of Paul’s career and his creation of what is likely the most influential musical innovation of the past century.

Among the artifacts will be most of the approximately 2,000 records Paul played on or produced, countless piles of original sheet music, the harmonica that was his first musical instrument and even the telephone earpiece that served as his first makeshift speaker for his electric guitar experiments.

This story appeared in the Waukesha Freeman on March 11, 2004.

Les Paul Trio with Bing Crosby 1946

Edited June 10, 2004 by jazzshrink

[P.D.]

I've never heard any of the music of this legendary guitarist. Any album to start with? I've seen the following (Complete Decca Trios Plus '36-'47) in stores but have held back.

Thanks in advance for any feedback.

It spans a wide range...His music.. not the CD you imaged..... if you are purely into Jazz.. be careful..

But don't miss his exchanges with Nat King Cole during a 12 bar blues on the JATP recording from '44.

Their segment must rank up there as being one of the top live recordings in Jazz history

Until I heard this my main exposure to Les Paul had been his multi track pop collaborations with Mary Ford.

There's a Proper Pair that collects a lot of early Les Paul ( and Mary) together.

Edited June 10, 2004 by P.D.

[LAL]

Thanks P.D. for the insights and recommendation. I'm now wary of Proper's sets -their reputation for lifting others work and all. Think I have the JATP performance somewhere - gotta dig it out again. I probably should just start with a 'best of' to see if the music is to my liking.

[Bright Moments]

tomorrow les paul turns 90!! a living legend!!!

i thought i'd wish him an early happy birthday!!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY LES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Edited June 8, 2005 by Bright Moments

[Bright Moments]

hey! check this out!!

Les Paul marks 90th with new album

Tue Jun 7, 2005 11:04 AM ET

NEW YORK (Billboard) - Guitar legend Les Paul will celebrate his 90th birthday with his first new studio album since 1978's "Guitar Monsters," a collaboration with the late Chet Atkins. Les Paul & Friends' "American Made, World Played" is due Aug. 30 via Capitol/EMI.

The album will boast such collaborations as "Love Sneakin' Up on You" with Sting and Joss Stone, "Fly Like an Eagle" with Steve Miller, Eric Clapton on "Somebody Ease My Troublin' Mind," Jeff Beck on "Good News," ZZ Top's Billy Gibbons on "Bad Case of Lovin' You" and Buddy Guy, Keith Richards and Rick Derringer on "Good Morning, Little Schoolgirl."

Tuesday will see an expanded reissue of 1992's "Les Paul With Mary Ford: The Best of the Capitol Masters." Paul will also be honored June 9 with the Sammy Cahn Lifetime Achievement Award at New York's annual Songwriters Hall of Fame event.

Reuters/Billboard

© Reuters 2005. All Rights Reserved.

Edited June 8, 2005 by Bright Moments

[Bright Moments]

and this!

In celebration of Les Paul, father of the electric guitar

By Buddy Blue

UNION-TRIBUNE

June 5, 2005

This spring has been a special season for Les Paul. Last month, he was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame for creating the illustrious, iconic electric guitar that bears his name. Next: a 90th birthday gala at Carnegie Hall on June 19. "I'm right up there with the Wright Brothers and Edison," quips the man affectionately dubbed "the Wizard of Waukesha, Wis."

All this on top of Paul's five extant Grammy awards, 1988 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction and eminence as a pioneering jazz guitar great, pop hitmaker and innovator in recording technology – multitracking and reverb effects are his crowning accomplishments in that field. In short, it's impossible to imagine the evolution of music playing out as it has without Paul's contributions; he ranks among the most significant musical figures of the 20th century.

Yet for all he's achieved, it's the celebrated Les Paul guitar that continues, and probably shall for eons, to make his a household name.

"Les Paul got people to understand that an electric guitar didn't have to be an acoustic-bodied instrument; he was touting the sound of the electric guitar as something good in and of itself," says Dan Altilio, luthier, guitar historian and owner of Top Gear, a respected custom music shop in La Mesa. "Before that, nobody believed that a solid hunk of wood without a resonant chamber could ever work."

Several luthiers were experimenting with the concept of the solid-body electric in the 1940s – Paul and his friend Leo Fender, among others. So much debate over who conceived the idea has been tabled that the matter will probably never be settled conclusively, but it's Paul's creation that went on to achieve and maintain recognition as the finest model on the market.

Getting there took much trial and error. Paul initially tried jamming a phonograph needle into his acoustic guitar; wild feedback resulted. He stuffed it with cloth to attempt sound control, even going so far as to fill the chamber with plaster at one juncture – all to no avail.

Finally, Paul took a piece of broken railroad track, wired a double-magnet telephone mouthpiece to it, added a single guitar string and hooked the contraption up to his radio; this is how the Les Paul guitar – and the still-popular humbucking pickup – were born.

"Lo and behold, there was the sound I wanted," Paul reminisces. "The first thing I wished to get was sustainment and clarity, to reproduce everything I could capture off the string; then I could make it sound like an acoustic guitar, an electric guitar, a sax, a bass, do anything I wished with it. I wanted to get that string to behave, to ring forever."

Paul and Fender spent many an afternoon discussing how to perfect their common passion. "We were working on it at the same time, but going in different directions with it," Paul says. "We'd sit in my back yard, barbecuing and talking about what we craved to hear but couldn't find anywhere on Earth."

Ultimately, Leo Fender's adaptation of the solid body electric was released first, in 1950. Paul had long been negotiating with the historic Gibson company, which he considered the world's finest guitars, but it wasn't until Fender offered Paul collaboration with his own fledgling company that Gibson finally acquiesced.

"They called me 'The Character With the Broomsticks With Pickups on It,' " Paul recalls. "They laughed at me for 10 years. It wasn't until Leo and I decided we were gonna be partners that they agreed to work with me."

It's probably best that the friends became business rivals, as their vision of the instrument couldn't have been further removed from one another's. You might liken Fender's ultimate triumph, the Stratocaster, to driving a zippy Toyota, while the Gibson Les Paul, first released in 1952, was more akin to cruising in a dressed-out Caddy.

"Fenders were designed for mass production, while Les Pauls were quality instruments made by luthiers," says Altilio. "Gibsons have leaned toward glued-on necks with fine, furniture-quality woods like mahogany and maple. Fenders have screwed-on necks with woods that weren't selected for their fine characteristics; they were selected for their economy. Gibsons are viewed as the more legitimate instruments."

Paul has his own, less technical take on the matter: "One was an ironing board, the other was something that'd you'd want to love and hold and take to bed with you," he laughs. "A Fender says what it's supposed to say and it does it well, but we had another idea in mind: to make a beautiful instrument that would be your wife, your mistress, your bartender, your best friend; everything you could ever dream of."

Testimonials

Sound design engineer Tim Pinnell works with Altilio at Top Gear; he's played and collected Les Pauls for 30 years. "I washed dishes at a restaurant in Mission Valley for a year and a half so I could buy a real Gibson Les Paul the week I graduated from high school," he says. "I still have it today. It's proven itself over the years. Its sound can be applicable to just about anything you're doing. Other guitars sound brighter and thinner, but I just like the pure, thick, strong tone of the Les Paul. I find it very musical."

Pinnell is attracted to the guitar's classic design as well as its sound.

"It has a conservative look, as opposed to more modern designs that have unusual shapes," he says. "The style of a Les Paul reflects who I am – I'm less of a flashy, over-the-top guy and more of a meat-and-potatoes type."

Many flashy guitar players have adopted the Les Paul as a personal trademark over the years, however. In the 1960s, Mike Bloomfield and Eric Clapton were among its prime proponents; Jimmy Page, Duane Allman, Dickey Betts and Joe Perry were renowned Paul-slingers of the 1970s, while Slash of Guns 'N Roses nearly single-handedly brought about the instrument's resurgent popularity in the 1980s.

According to Mike Fenton, owner of the long-established guitar shop Muzik Muzik in El Cajon, the Les Paul's regard among clients largely hinges on which stars are playing it at a given time.

"When Jimmy Page was the man, if you didn't have a Les Paul then you didn't really have a guitar," he says. "Then, when Eddie Van Halen (who played a custom Charvel) got popular, the demand for Les Pauls dropped off completely. Then, Slash started playing 'em and they got popular all over again. I was talking to Billy Gibbons (of ZZ Top) about it, and he said people actually give him a hard time – you know, 'Why don't you ever play a Strat?' It's funny, because he's always been a Les Paul guy."

The market for Les Pauls has dropped off again in recent years, but, Fenton says, this time around it's due to a case of diminishing returns.

"What Gibson has done over the years is give you less guitar for the same price," he says. "I saw one that retailed for $899, but it was a total piece of crap. It didn't have a maple cap, there was no binding, it had a cheap satin finish, it was like a piece of mahogany that just looked like a Les Paul."

Classic-quality Les Pauls are still available, but a new one can set you back several thousand dollars. Meanwhile, the most collectible models, produced between 1958 and 1960, fetch up to $300,000 at auction.

"I think Les Pauls are drastically overpriced these days," says Fenton. "Gibson is just banking on their name. The only people who buy them now are collectors who sit in their bedroom with it and make good money selling stocks or whatever. The guys who really go out and play guitar for a living can't afford them."

Meanwhile, people who can afford as many Les Pauls as they want – people like Paul McCartney and Keith Richards – still come to sit in with the man himself every Monday night at New York City's Iridium Jazz Club, where Les Paul has been holding court for years. Does the jazzman embrace the distorted raunch that rockers came to wring from his venerated invention?

"I love anybody that does anything on the guitar," says Paul. "Even the worst stuff always has some good in it. Every player amazes me with something they do, and I still learn from them all."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Buddy Blue is a San Diego writer and musician.

[Bright Moments]

[Bright Moments]

from the LA Times:

POP MUSIC

A 90th birthday gig for innovative Les Paul

It's not just another low-key celebration for "the father of the electric guitar."

By Paul Lieberman, Times Staff Writer

NEW YORK — Two hours before show time, the band at the Iridium was sound-checking with a song that's been around awhile, "Misty," the singer going "I'm too misty / And too much in love" before the lead guitarist took over, the fingers of his left hand sliding down the neck of the electric guitar to end the tune with a flurry of high notes, a little show-off riff.

Monitoring the rehearsal, back near the entrance to the basement club, was a sound man a bit older than you normally see, a fellow with a cane beside him, needed since he lost a foot to diabetes. When the guitarist was done, the 64-year-old technician with the cane called out to him:

"That sounds good, dad. It's a birthday gift — you've got those fingers movin'."

Onstage, Les Paul ignored the compliment from his son, Rusty, and worked through the end of "Misty" again and again, half a dozen times in all. Then he put his guitar on his padded stool and headed to a back room, for customers were coming down the stairs from Broadway and starting to fill the club a few blocks above Times Square, there to hear, in person, still alive, the man they bill as "the father of the electric guitar."

Les Paul turns 90 on Thursday, and however much he insists that birthdays are best passed without a fuss, that's not how this one is being played out. Two Les Paul books are coming out, an autobiography and a biography, and two albums, a reissue of hits he produced half a century ago with his late wife, singer Mary Ford, and a new one of collaborations with the likes of Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck and Sting.

Paul will be getting a lifetime achievement award too, on Thursday, from the Songwriter's Hall of Fame, and then there's a "90th Birthday Salute" at Carnegie Hall on June 19, featuring many of his collaborators on the new "friends" album, that concert sponsored in part by the Gibson guitar people, who have made a fortune off his name — just as he's made a fortune off them — over the last five decades. Oh, yes, they'll be issuing 12 new "special edition Les Paul custom guitars," one a month, in another commemoration of his 90th.

"What I do on my birthday is usually forget it," Paul said minutes after finishing the sound check at the Iridium, where he performs two shows every Monday night. "It's the people around me and money. They figure they can make a buck."

He's not about to protest too much, of course, given how those guitars are one reason he has a home in New Jersey with a modest 34 rooms and is able to play, at 90, merely for fun and sanity. He looks forward to these hours in front of audiences, Paul says, "like it's an ice cream cone for a little kid."

He does quibble with his son, though, about those hands working well.

"No, it's not true, they're not working great at all. Don't tell him," Paul said, launching into a lecture about "the way the arthritis is," how calcification works and how cortisone shots don't really help, "and so I've got this — I've got claws, OK," and how eventually his hands will freeze. The same cursed disease landed his mother in a wheelchair by the time she died, he noted, at "101 and a half."

Paul does not pretend that he can play anything like he did as the young hotshot from Waukesha, Wis., who wowed 'em in the '30s at Chicago's mob hangouts. He did not actually go head to head with Clapton et al. for the new "friends" CD, his first real new album since his "Chester & Lester" collaboration with Chet Atkins in 1975 — his 2005 collaborators recorded their sides in a studio, and Paul added his later, at his mansion-studio in New Jersey, using modern versions of the overdubbing technology he pioneered ages ago for Bing Crosby.

Paul credits a nurse for giving him the wisdom to accept the gnarly hands that make it impossible for him to play chords any longer. The nurse, who appeared like an apparition when he started doing Monday nights at this club in 1996, "came down to the bar prior to the show and she said, 'I didn't come down here to catch your show. I came down here to talk to you.' And I said, 'Oh? Shoot.' And she says, 'Look, you're 80 and you can't expect to do what you did at 20. And the people who are sitting down here nine chances out of 10 don't know how you played when you were 20. So play how you play now and don't compete with yourself.'

"I said, 'That's easy to say, but hard to do.' She said, 'That's up to you,' and she got up and walked out."

When he thinks back on his life, Paul said, he most often goes back to one period, and it's not the '50s, when his guitars sprung on the market and he had his hits and TV show with Mary, before rock 'n' roll changed everything. He finds himself reminiscing instead about the stretch from 1942 to 1948, when he was in Los Angeles, not far from the Sunset Strip, and inventing things in his garage studio, like his multi-track recorder for Bing and his own "sound on sound" style.

"I had this drive, this curiosity that absolutely fascinated me," he said. "That even though you didn't have one and couldn't buy one, that didn't mean you couldn't make one."

He is convinced you have to be born with the inventor's spirit. His brother, for instance, never wondered why the light went on when you flipped the switch — and became a truck driver. In contrast, he had to know. And when he was still Lester "Nibs" Potsfuss, in kindergarten, and their father, a mechanic, took him out for a spin in a new Chrysler, he had to know why his dad's voice seemed to carry differently when the car reached 30 mph, then again at 60.

"My dad didn't know if I was down a quart or for real," Paul said, so they went to a Chrysler convention in Chicago and his father stood him on a table to ask the experts. Lo and behold, "there was a resonance" in that car at those exact speeds.

Paul says that one regret he has, at 90, may be his move east from L.A., right after he and Mary had their biggest hit in 1953, "Vaya Con Dios (May God Be With You)."

The president of the Listerine company offered the couple a bundle to do a daily television show, but he wanted it done close to company headquarters in New Jersey. That's how they landed in the sprawling home with broadcasting facilities in Mahwah.

Half a century later, Paul confesses that he still doesn't quite get Jersey but figures that's the place he'll die when the time comes. "Where else am I going to go?" he asked. Florida? Are you kidding?

The club was packed, and it was time to take the stage and serve up some of the old songs with his band: "Tennessee Waltz," "As Time Goes By" and that "Misty," with his show-off ending, claws or not.

On Monday night, he gave the audience plenty of stories too, of playing for Capone and all the Barrymores and about the lessons he learned about sound by singing to himself in the bathroom, how the tunes sounded better there than in the bedroom, with its drapes and all, "and that's how I came up with the reverb."

There was plenty of banter with the band, also, about this turning 90 business. Paul wondered whether he still might have a chance with Nicky Parrott, the blond babe from Australia on bass, though she'd have to be content to "play with my pacemaker."

"Ninety is a bitch, I'll tell you," he said, then he asked guitarist Lou Pallo, the one who sang "Misty," if he could imagine playing at that age.

"I'm gonna be down there," Pallo retorted, waving at the audience, "watchin' you."

[Bright Moments]

[Bright Moments]

jazz

All For Paul: Les Paul 90th Birthday Sunday June 19th at Carnegie Hall

One of the world's greatest gatherings of guitarists will take the stage for ALL FOR PAUL: LES PAUL'S 90th BIRTHDAY SALUTE, a star-studded celebration presented by Gibson Guitar at the JVC Jazz Festival – New York, at Carnegie Hall on Sunday, June 19, at 8:00 p.m.

Although the concert is 10 days after Les Paul’s actual birthday, the party will still be in full swing with Les at the helm of the stellar line-up of jazz, rock, blues and classical guitarists and other special guests. Also joining Les for the celebration are his long-time band members John Colliani, piano; Lou Pallo, guitar; and Nicky Parrott, bass.

Les Paul, the father of the electric guitar, was born June 9, 1915, in Waukesha, WI. The five-time Grammy Award winner and Rock & Roll Hall of Famer is the inventor of the solid body electric guitar and the pioneer of multi-track recording, the use of reverb and other techniques. A limited edition autobiography, Les Paul in His Own Words, is scheduled for release on his birthday with each numbered copy signed by the man himself. He’ll also receive the Songwriters Hall of Fame's Sammy Cahn Lifetime Achievement Award. He continues his longstanding weekly performances at Iridium and is recording an album (to be released this summer) of collaborations with some of music's hottest artists. A second book, The Les Paul Legacy, will be released in coming months; and in June Capitol/EMI will reissue “Les Paul with Mary Ford: The Best of The Capitol Masters (90th Birthday Edition)” with new artwork, bonus tracks and liner notes written by Paul. Guitarists around the world favor his signature line of Gibson guitars, which debuted in 1952.

The all-star celebration features:

Tommy Emmanuel, a household name in his native Australia with fans all over the world, began his professional career at the age of four and has played and/or recorded with Eric Clapton, Chet Atkins, Air Supply, Stevie Wonder and others. He has more than 100 concerts left on this year's schedule alone and his 15th and latest CD, “Endless Road,” continues to win praise.

Jose Feliciano has recorded nearly 70 albums and has earned 16 Grammy nominations and six Grammy Awards. His cover of the Doors' “Light My Fire” has become a classic and his version of “Feliz Navidad” is a Christmas standard.

Peter Frampton became one of the biggest arena rock acts of the 70s with his mainstream breakthrough double live album “Frampton Comes Alive.” In the mid-90s, he recorded a follow-up “Frampton Comes Alive II” and recorded and toured with Bill Wyman & The Rhythm Kings and Ringo Starr's All-Starr Band. A new compilation of his music, “Frampton Gold,” was released in April and included tunes from “Alive II” and his 2003 album “Now.”

Steve Lukather rose to fame as guitarist, vocalist and a songwriter with the chart topping, Grammy Award winning band Toto. He branched out with a solo career, recording four albums, and collaborated with Larry Carlton for the Grammy Award winning live album “No Substitutions.”

Pat Martino has been performing professionally for over 40 years, working with Chick Corea, Stanley Clarke and Woody Herman and others. He overcame an aneurysm and re-learned his craft, enabling him to continue recording, performing and teaching to great acclaim.

Steve Miller, with a string of multi-platinum albums including “Fly Like An Eagle” and the 80s classic “Abracadabra,” dazzles fans and critics alike with his rock, jazz and blues influenced music. Les taught five-year old Steve some chords on his new Gibson guitar and his father was the best man when Les married Mary Ford; so it’s doubly special for Steve to be on-hand to celebrate the birthday of his life-long friend.

A master of the seven-string guitar, Bucky Pizzarelli toured with Vaughn Monroe and Benny Goodman and has recorded with his son John on occasion since the early 80s.

Due to scheduling conflict Richie Sambora and John Rzeznik will not appear on this concert.

By the time he was 15, Neal Schon was traveling the world with Santana. In 1973, he left the band to join Gregg Rolie in what would become the mega-group Journey and is now the only original member of the band that has been on every album. In addition to Journey, which celebrates a new album, “Generations,” and hits the road on June 26 for the 30th Anniversary tour, Schon has maintained a solo career that produced the Grammy nominated album “Voice” and his latest solo offering, “i on U,” as well as “WorldPlay” with his band Soul SirkUs.

Kenny Wayne Shepherd became known as one of the young guns of blues music when he released his first record “Ledbetter Heights” in 1995 while still in his teens. The Gold record was followed by “Trouble Is …,” which earned him a Grammy nomination, and his most recent outing “The Place You're In” is the first album on which he does the majority of the lead vocals.

Blues-rock guitarist Derek Trucks hones his skills onstage with The Derek Trucks Band and the Allman Brothers Band, where his slide playing has been compared to the late Duane Allman. He began performing professionally at the age of 11 and has shared the stage with music legends Buddy Guy, Bob Dylan and Stephen Stills.

Keyboardist Edgar Winter has been thrilling audiences and garnering critical acclaim throughout his 35-five year career with such hits as “Frankenstein” and “Free Ride” with The Edgar Winter Group. He has more than 20 albums and numerous collaborations to his credit in addition to film, television projects and live performances where he continues to display his cutting edge style.

Madeleine Peyroux's voice has been described as timeless, dark and haunting, but she lights up the stage with her musical stories. A former street musician in Paris, she took the music world by storm in 1996 with her debut “Dreamland” and is reaping even greater accolades with her new CD, “Careless Love,” and an extensive worldwide tour.

The rhythm section features Steve Lukather along with Will Lee and Omar Hakim.

auskern

source :: jazz press service

© jazz news :: home page

[7/4]

Happy Birthday Les Paul.

And for the rest of us, here and here and here is some food for thought.

Edited June 8, 2005 by 7/4

[brownie]

whatt???!!!!! 

no les paul fans??!!!       

←

Sure, I'm a big fan of Les Paul! But I've grown tired of wishing him a Happy Birthday He was already a veteran when I was still a teenager.

Caught him live several years ago and he was still putting a hell of a show!

The moon is not high enough for him

[king ubu]

The only Les Paul I know is that JATP jam PDEE (--->hey, P.D.: where are you? You're being missed! Hope all's fine!<---) refers to.

Where else to search for some good jazz guitar stuff? What about that Decca disc mentioned above?

[Bright Moments]

the BIG "90"!!!!!!!

happy birthday Les Paul!!!!!!!

[Brad]

Just like Florian, the only stuff I know of his is from the JATP. Somehow I get the feeling Evan likes Les Paul. Wonder if I'm wrong about that?

On Jazzmatazz there was a 90th Birthday CD. Any thoughts about that or what should I get?

[medjuck]

I think I read somewhere that his appearance at the very first JATP concert was as a sub for Oscar Moore. Also he tells a funny story about Charlie Christian in the Sony Christian box set.

(Makes fun of the weight of his early guitars, not of Christian.)

[Bright Moments]

don't wanna miss this! tomorrow les paul turns 92!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY LES!!!