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2024.10.14 Ken Wessel on Badal Roy
Here's another Ph.D. topic for you: Miles Davis vs. Ornette Coleman. Both blazingly original innovators lived most of their lives in Manhattan and they were [...]
2024.09.16 Lewis “Flip” Barnes on William Parker
Let's present an award: who would you say has been the most prolific artist on NYC's forward-looking music scene and who has contributed the most to [...]
2024.08.19 Melvin Gibbs on Sun Ra
Tonight (8/19) bassist/composer Melvin Gibbs joins host Mitch Goldman for a Deep Focus on Sun Ra with unheard rarities from the WKCR archives. [...]
2024.07.08 Matt Garrison on Miles Davis 1981
People love to talk about Miles Davis reinventing himself and reinventing the music. They talk about the First Great Quintet in the fifties, the [...]
2024.06.24 Eric Person on Art Blakey
Listen to any song by Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers. There will be no question in your mind about who is driving the bus or who is riding on [...]
2024.06.10 Vernon Reid on Gil Scott-Heron
We don't hear enough about Gil Scott-Heron these days. And when we do, we often get the same few crumbs: his invention of a sort of proto-hiphop, some [...]
2024.05.13 Gary Lucas on Rahsaan Roland Kirk
"Who has the hippest chops in the world?"
If you're going to ask that question on a record, you had better have the nuts to back it up. I mean, [...]
2024.03.18 Graham Haynes on Woody Shaw
What confers greatness? There are many pathways, the most obvious being distinctive playing. Are there others? What about brilliant [...]
2024.02.19 Frank London on Mongezi Feza
The stories that Black South African musicians tell about life under apartheid are searing. Such oppressive and demeaning conditions are difficult to [...]
2024.02.05 William Hooker on Sonny Sharrock
Not all of our heroes have streets named after them but this one does. So, will we be playing recordings of Sonny Sharrock on Deep Focus this Monday [...]