Don Sickler

This week (more precisely May 20 through May 24) has important anniversaries we want to honor so we’ve expanded our usual five new entries this week to cover ten celebrations. May 20 is the birthday of drummer/composer Victor Lewis (born in 1950 in Omaha, Nebraska). In honor of Victor’s birthday, here’s his great composition Seventh Avenue . For the drummers among...

The week of May 13th we’re celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the Johnny Griffin and Matthew Gee album “Soul Groove,” recorded for Atlantic Records in two sessions (May 14 and May 16, 1963). I couldn’t decide which one of Matthew Gee’s great soulful groove compositions to put up. Since Renee was recorded on the May 14 session and Here on...

Noting some anniversaries … I found it very interesting that on the same day, May 9, in two different years (1954 and 1966), Elmo Hope was in a studio, recording. Maybe So was recorded May 9, 1954. Roll On was recorded May 9, 1966 (Elmo’s last recording session). On May 12, 1964, organist Don Patterson recorded Up In Betty’s Room...

Jazzleadsheets.com’s calendar revealed some important birthdays the last week of April. Two composers are already on jazzleadsheets.com (Johnny Griffin and Tommy Turrentine). This is a perfect time to post another composition for each of them and to introduce the new ones. April 21, 1932 SLIDE HAMPTON One of the great trombonists who is also an important composer and arranger. Wikipedia...

We want to add more titles from composers who are already on jazzleadsheets.com, but we’re also trying to add more composers to the site. Looking at the calendar this month we found birthday anniversaries of two new-to-jazzleadsheets.com artist/composers, and we also found some recording anniversaries. We’re celebrating the middle week of April with these: April 16, 1923: Trombonist Bennie Green’s...

April 1, 1963, was the recording date of trumpeter Kenny Dorham’s landmark album Una Mas. We’ve had the title composition of the album available on jazzleadsheets.com for some time. When we realized the 50th anniversary was coming up, we geared ourselves up to make sure that we’d have both of Kenny’s other originals, Sao Paulo and Straight Ahead, on jazzleadsheets...

Soul Time - Bobby Timmons Another delight, this time in 3/4, from Bobby Timmons, which he recorded on three occasions. We’re also offering Bobbby’s complete piano voicings. Freffie - Elmo Hope Another great “II-V” blues melody to add to your repertory. Read more about it in our notes. Gone To See T - Bertha Hope - new composer to jazzleadsheets.com...

The Feelin’s Good - Hank Mobley Recently I got a very nice email from one of our customers, Steve Christian: “I wanted to express my gratitude for the wonderful resource you have created …” He went on to say great things about Hank Mobley music, and asked: “I hope you have plans to release more of Hank’s treasures in the...

Jodi - Dexter Gordon A gorgeous ballad by a master of ballad playing. Please, Let Me Share This With You - Dexter Gordon (music) / Rachel Gould (lyric) Lyrist/singer Rachel Gould’s touching lyric creates a new valuable addition to the singer’s repertory. Blue Wail - Kenny Drew A great addition to your blues repertory: an intriguing melody with lots of...

Here are some new titles: 400 Years Ago Tomorrow - Walter Davis Jr. I was asked several months ago for this lead sheet, so first of all I apologize for the delay. Walter was such a great composer, always with his own distinctive voice. As I’m sure you can tell from the audio clip, this is a great one! Pianists, note that...