DOUG CARN
ARTIST PROFILE
The multi-faceted talents of pianist-organist-lyricist Doug Carn began to emerge onto the contemporary African-American music scene during his teenage years. His group the “Nu-Tones” played a variety of dances, proms and club dates during his high school years in St. Augustine, Florida.
On occasion they would back up acts like “Little Willie John” or open up shows in venues from Miami to Charleston that featured acts like the Five Royals and the Chantells.
Strongly influenced by the tradition of hard swinging, blues based “jump” bands from the Florida School for the Deaf and Blind that existed for more than a decade in the wake of the Great Ray Charles, Doug Carn started to forge a very special conception and mental picture of what Black music, jazz and velocity of swing was all about.
After studying the oboe at Jacksonville University, Doug went to Georgia State College in Atlanta. During the next few years Doug’s expertise on the Hammond B-3 organ took a giant “leap” forward as he literally “sat at the feet” of practically all of the great jazz organ masters. This was due to the fact that “Paschal’s La Carousel periodically brought in Jimmy Smith and the “Bird Cage” always presented artists like Jimmy McGriff, Charles Earland, Groove Holmes, Shirley Scott, Chester Thompson, Trudy Pitts, Gloria Coleman, Lonnie Smith, Jack McDuff, Johnny Hammond Smith and Billy Gardner on a regular basis.
The Environment, along with the dynamics of the civil rights struggle and the African-American “Black Cultural Revolution” provided a fertile ground for Doug’s continuing musical development. By the date of his eighteenth birthday, Doug had released his first LP “The Doug Carn Trio” on the Savoy label.
During the hey-day of the Vietnam era and the months after the assassination of Dr. King Doug and a dozen or so “jazz” artist from the Greater Atlanta area migrated to southern California in search of greater opportunities and recognition. These artist included people like Sidney Miller, Jr., DOC Soul Stirrer, Kiesa Brown, Billy Mitchell, John and Mike Bolivar, the Mighty Hannibal and Dee Dee Cantrell as well as Fred Wesly, George Harper and Ernest Vantrease, Doug soon found himself living in the same apartment building with Earth Wind and Fire, Mandrill, the Chambers Brothers, Janis Joplin, Famous Amos, and the soon to be Reverend Ike.
Because of this particular “Landmark” location in Hollywood, people like Joe Zawinul, Larry Young Jr., Tony Williams and other celebrated “sidemen” were occasional guests when they were in town for gigs at Shelly’s Manhole.
It was during this time that Doug recorded two albums, the first two on Warner Bros., with Earth Wind and Fire. Shortly afterwards, Doug recorded his first album for the newly formed Black Jazz label. That album Infant Eyes was an underground hit and caused much controversy as related to the politics of jazz and the appropriation of jazz by the “white” establishment of the time. However, Doug’s fan base continued to grow worldwide and all of the recordings of this period made the best seller charts of Billboard, Record World and Cash Box magazine.
By the time of Doug’s fourth LP for Black Jazz “Adams Apple” Doug had performed to the largest audience in the history the Village Gate and had made his Carnegie Hall debut.
During the next few years a fundamental change began to take place in the Black Community, on the cultural level, that is. This change was basically a move away from overly Afro-centric themes. This change was primarily due to two factors, the greater integration of American Society as a whole and the subsequent decline of the development of Black Institutions by Blacks for Blacks. Therefore, artist like Doug Carn, Pharaoh Sanders, Leon Thomas, Olu Dara, Carlos Garnette, Gary Bartz, Dee Dee Bridgewater and McCoy Tyner suffered greatly except those who were willing and able to change to a more “straight ahead” or standard direction.
Around this time, perhaps a decade or more, Doug practically ceased to perform as a band leader and worked mostly as a sideman with artist like Stanley Turrentine, Hank Crawford, Charlie Rouse, Junior Cook, Nat Adderly, Monk Montgomery, Houston Person, Marlena Shaw and Frank Morgan.
Then all of a sudden, a bunch of “new school” organ players started to appear. Eugene Ludwig came out with an album in 1975 and Downbeat magazine finally took the organ out of the miscellaneous category in its music polls. Now the Hammond B-3 organ groove had more or less “crossed over” and was gaining a new sense of popularity. Doug wasted no time in taking advantage of this new situation. For here we have a bunch new kid on the block getting all the “recognition” for what he and his peers had done already twenty years earlier. The show went on the road. First with the U Street project, with Wallace Roney, Gary Thomas, and drummer Steve Williams at the One Step Down in Washington, DC, then a five nation European tour of Sweden, Poland, Austria, Germany and Italy. These shows as well as Doug’s two performances at the Jazz Café in London and the Black Jazz recordings were reissued on CD in the U.S., England and Japan.
Now in his prime Doug Carn works out of Palm Florida and Savannah Georgia producing and performing shows in “his own” venues and Jazz festivals with artist Curtis Fuller, Eddie Henderson, Antonio Hart, Vincent Gardner, Charles Tolliver, Bill Pierce, Frank Lacey, Bill Saxton, Danny Mixon, Andy McCloud, Dave Valentine and Fred Wesly.
There have also been gigs with Kent Jordan, Marlon Jordan, Stephanie Jordan, Bunky Green, Ernestine Anderson, Benny Golson, Freddie Hubbard, Vanessa Rubin and Vincent Herring. A special note should also be given to recent club dates in New York with Cindy Blackman, at the Iridium, Lenny White at Birdland, Kenny Garrett and Joey D. Francesco at S.O.B.’s and Ben Dixon and Sonny Simmons at the Jazz Standard.
Like many talented and super-talented artist, Doug Carn re-invents himself from time to time. “ZingBop” “Carn’s” latest re-incarnation is positioned to be perhaps his greatest and strongest influence on the whole spectrum of Afro-American music. Never a jazzman with elitist or condescending views of other forms of Black music, he always incorporated elements of the blues, gospel, R&B etc… into his work. And now as ZingBop Doug breaks through the threshold of hip-hop and rap music with a most powerful thrust of energy and soulfulness, that leaves the listener simultaneously stunned and refreshed. This new move is primarily due to its timeliness, especially when viewed in the light of recent controversy surrounding the lyrical content of the music currently being perpetrated by the rap industry in general.
ZingBop can best be described as a romantic warrior, poet musician, with a keen political insight. It is somewhat ironic that several so called “old school” artist have been “sampled” by so called “new school” artists many times; yet there are no prominent old school rapper? ZingBop puts an end to the malady and will certainly create a trend that enriches and helps to sustain hip-hop and rap idioms into the near future and beyond.
The few sample tracks included in this myspace page should easily convince the most skeptical of ZingBop enormous potential to carry the music of today to a much higher level of value and appreciation than previously thought by supporters and detractors alike.
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Niuver en concert le jeudi 2 juillet au Sunset à 19h30 (début concert à 20h)
Débordante d’énergie sensuelle, Niuver captive par son charme, la beauté de sa voix, et un univers artistique d’une merveilleuse profondeur. Sur scène, elle fait ronronner sa guitare tel un félin rêveur et vous entraîne dans un sillage aux senteurs latines.
Loin de la salsa, Niuver emprunte au jazz, à la bossa et aux rythmes cubains d’hier et d’aujourd‘hui.
Le Sunset : 60, rue des Lombards - 75001 PARIS Tarif : 8 / 10 / 12 euros
Hey how is it goin, just a quick note to THANK YOU for the add. Keep an I out for us playing around your area, cuz we like to have fun and ROCK, and don’t forget our sched. And song list are on our profile page. THANKS AGAIN THE PAYSTER
Hey waTs good Wit u?... Jus passin through to inform u i have 2 new songs up "Im So" and "Im Gone".. I would preciate if u could give it a listen n let me kno wat u think...1o0o
Hello! Just wanted to drop in and let you know that pre-orders for my new jazz standards album "Bittersweet" are now taking place! The first 100 pre-orders will receive a signed and numbered copy! Release date is set for May 19th, but you will get your copy a few days earlier! Kate and I are very excited about the record, and we can't wait for you to hear it. Head over to www.bittersweetthealbum.com to pre-order! Thanks! ~Mark
I went to Bohemian Caverns in Washington, DC this weekend and Doug Carn was performing. He and his band were fired up and hit all the marks as they performed live for a very appreciative audiance. The singer, Ms. Farmer was fantastic! She melded right in with the muscians. Who, by the way were all owesome artists who settled right into Doug's jazzy style with what seemed to be effortless pleasure. I just wanted to commend Doug and the group for an amazing performance! I hope to see him in the area again very soon.
Hello Doug Carn Thank you for being a positive force in this world. Music is one of the few things left that has the power to bring people together from different cultures in a positive way. Please feel free to contact me any time. Darryl
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