The Jazz Break at Noon is KRTU’s weekly, mid-day program. Hosted by Music Director Kory Cook, the program is an educational listening session highlighting major artists, styles, and themes from jazz music’s rich history. From rare recordings of the 1930s to today’s most progressive sounds, the Jazz Break at Noon takes you on an educational sonic journey through jazz history.
June 29 - July 3:
Humanity in Music with Andrew Hill
In 1975, pianist and composer Andrew Hill recorded his piece titled “Blue Black,” referencing the multitude of hues and shades of original African people. Hill believed these different grades of color are meaningless until put into music as a color. Heavy compositions, unique concepts, and lines of particular genius from 1960’s innovator, Blue Note recording artist, and American icon Andrew Hill. Listen this week on the Jazz Break at Noon.
July 6 - July 10:
Jazz & The Live Experience: The Venues
Many of the small and intimate rooms which serve as the acoustic environment for countless recordings in jazz were thankfully produced and preserved for our appreciation and listening enjoyment. Venues like Keystone Korner in San Francisco, CA, The Lighthouse in Hermosa Beach, CA, Village Vanguard, Blue Note, and Small's in NYC to homegrown spots like Jazz, TX and the Carver Community Cultural Center in San Antonio, TX introduced listeners and audiences to the leading jazz artists of yesterday and today. Vintage, archival, and new live recordings from the top venues in jazz, all this week on the Jazz Break at Noon.
July 13 - July 17:
Jazz & The Live Experience: The Festivals
Jazz impresario and Newport Festival founder George Wein stated in a recent newsletter that his concert productions provide equal opportunity moments for audiences worldwide while creating decades of magical, musical moments, since 1954. Wein is one of the many honorable promoters dedicated to bringing us jazz and improvised music in the summertime to parks, theaters, and otherwise unconventional spaces across the world. We'll take you from Newport to Copenhagen and Cape Town. From Montreal to Montreux. Jazz at the festival, all this week on the Jazz Break at Noon.
July 20 - July 24:
Trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith: A Journey in Sound
Since the early 1970's, Wadada Leo Smith's creative output has been extraordinary. The composer, trumpeter, and bandleader's music reflects an aggrieved spirit with triumphant stamina. Smith's work on the Finnish TUM record label presents multiple volumes of dedicated works to resistance, protest, unity, the environment, and some of his favorite composers like Thelonious Monk and Ornette Coleman. The complex and earthy, multi-part structures and musical poems of Wadada Leo Smith this week on the Jazz Break at Noon.
July 27 - July 31:
The Roots of Jazz Guitar with Charlie Christian
Born July 29, 1916, in Bonham, TX, guitarist Charlie Christian took the electric guitar out of the rhythm section and into the spotlight with a single-string technique and amplification that rocked the Benny Goodman sextet and orchestra out of the 1930's and into the new era of be-bop and modern jazz. Christian's tremendous influence on other guitarists and the instrument's role in jazz is incalculable. Whether it's the 1950's jazz sound of Barney Kessel and Mary Osborne, the blues of B.B. King, or the rock-n-roll of T-Bone Walker and Chuck Berry, we'll hear Christian and his deep impact on the electric guitar, all this week on the Jazz Break at Noon.
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