Dorothy Donegan

The Explosive Dorothy Donegan is a 1980 album by jazz pianist Dorothy Donegan, originally released on Progressive Records, CD pressing from 1994 on the Audiophile label. She is joined by Jerome Hunter on bass and Ray Mosca on drums. This was recorded on 31 March, 1980.

The Incredible Dorothy Donegan Trio is a 1992 album by jazz pianist Dorothy Donegan. This was recorded live on a cruise ship during the 1991 Floating Jazz Festival aboard the S/S Norway "in various parts of the Caribbean sea." She is joined by Jon Burr on bass and Ray Mosca on drums, with special guest Dizzy Gillespie on trumpet.

Dorothy Donegan is the 1975 album by jazz pianist Dorothy Donegan. Recorded in November 1975 at The Best Of Harlem in Stockholm, Sweden, she is accompanied with bassist Red Mitchell, drummer Lars Bejbom and trumpeter Lars Allan. This is from a 1994 CD released by Four Leaf Records.

Dorothy Donegan, one of the great jazz pianists, was only sporadically documented prior to the mid-'70s. She cut two songs for Bluebird back in 1942; a few scattered numbers for Continental and a few obscure labels; five long out-of-print albums in the 1950s for Jubilee, Capitol, and Roulette; and just one LP during 1962-1974. This retrospective put out on CD by Rosetta is therefore quite valuable. Six of the 15 selections (which skip back and forth between 1953, 1957-1958, 1960-1963, and 1979) were originally released on obscure albums while the other nine performances were never out before. Despite the constant jumping of decades, there is a uniformity to the music, with Donegan often sounding in exuberant form. She explores stride, boogie-woogie, bop, blues, and classical music, sometimes during the same piece. This CD (which has lengthy and informative liner notes) is a perfect introduction to Dorothy Donegan's often-overlooked artistry.

Dorothy Donegan (April 6, 1922 – May 19, 1998) was an American jazz pianist and vocalist, primarily known for performing in the stride piano and boogie-woogie style. She also played bebop, swing jazz, and classical music. Donegan was born and grew up in Chicago, Illinois, and began studying piano in 1928. She took her first lessons from Alfred N. Simms, a West Indian pianist who also taught Cleo Brown. She graduated from Chicago's DuSable High School, where she studied with Walter Dyett, a teacher who also worked with Dinah Washington, Johnny Griffin, Gene Ammons, and Von Freeman. She also studied at the Chicago Musical College and the University of Southern California. In 1942 she made her recording debut.

The Explosive Dorothy Donegan is a 1980 album by jazz pianist Dorothy Donegan, originally released on Progressive Records, CD pressing on the Audiophile label. She is joined by Jerome Hunter on bass and Ray Mosca on drums. This was recorded on 31 March, 1980.

A brilliant virtuoso, Dorothy Donegan constantly switched between boogie-woogie, bop, stride, Art Tatum-style swing, and classical music sometimes in the same chorus. –Scott Yanow, All Music Guide

Kris Needs repositions the roots of Sonny Blount aka Sun Ra on three discs (60 tracks) spanning his earliest 1933 recordings of big band jazz and be-bop, thru the birth of Sun Ra and the "future shock" of his later visions. "CD1 (Pre-flight) features Sun Ra’s earliest recordings from the 1940s, playing piano for Wynonie Harris and Lil Green, jamming with Stuff Smith, and coaching or arranging for artists such as Andrew Tibbs, the Hambone Kids and the Dozier Boys with Red Saunders’ Orchestra. Other artists he worked with featured here include pianist Dorothy Donegan, Joe Williams, Jo Jo Adams and LaVern Baker. There’s also an intriguing brace of tracks displaying his experiments with mid-1950s vocal groups such as Nu Sounds and Cosmic Rays, while introducing berserk space-preacher Yochanan. All along, Ra was blueprinting his sonic spaceship until the time was right to launch under his own name in mid-1956 with effervescent debut single, ‘Saturn’, on his newly-established label of the same name. Saturn is also the planet he claimed to be his birth-place. CD1 ends with the first 1956 Arkestra sessions, picked up again on CD2 (Lift-off), which runs through early Saturn singles such as ‘A Call For All Demons’, then tracks from Sun Ra’s early albums Jazz By Sun Ra, Sound of Joy, Visits Planet Earth and Super-Sonic Jazz, his sound tangibly expanding through the stunning Arkestral manoeuvres of tracks such as ‘Sunology’. CD3 ( Future Shock) mixes tracks from Sun Ra’s twin landmark albums Jazz In Silhouette and The Futuristic Sounds Of Sun Ra, with intoxicating one-off singles such as ‘Great Balls Of Fire’, ‘Space Loneliness’ and ‘Big City Blues’, the massively weird ‘Teenager’s Letter Of Promises’ with singer Juanita Rogers, before signing off with Yochanan’s demented ’Message To Earthman’."

Kris Needs repositions the roots of Sonny Blount aka Sun Ra on three discs (60 tracks) spanning his earliest 1933 recordings of big band jazz and be-bop, thru the birth of Sun Ra and the "future shock" of his later visions. "CD1 (Pre-flight) features Sun Ra’s earliest recordings from the 1940s, playing piano for Wynonie Harris and Lil Green, jamming with Stuff Smith, and coaching or arranging for artists such as Andrew Tibbs, the Hambone Kids and the Dozier Boys with Red Saunders’ Orchestra. Other artists he worked with featured here include pianist Dorothy Donegan, Joe Williams, Jo Jo Adams and LaVern Baker. There’s also an intriguing brace of tracks displaying his experiments with mid-1950s vocal groups such as Nu Sounds and Cosmic Rays, while introducing berserk space-preacher Yochanan. All along, Ra was blueprinting his sonic spaceship until the time was right to launch under his own name in mid-1956 with effervescent debut single, ‘Saturn’, on his newly-established label of the same name. Saturn is also the planet he claimed to be his birth-place. CD1 ends with the first 1956 Arkestra sessions, picked up again on CD2 (Lift-off), which runs through early Saturn singles such as ‘A Call For All Demons’, then tracks from Sun Ra’s early albums Jazz By Sun Ra, Sound of Joy, Visits Planet Earth and Super-Sonic Jazz, his sound tangibly expanding through the stunning Arkestral manoeuvres of tracks such as ‘Sunology’. CD3 ( Future Shock) mixes tracks from Sun Ra’s twin landmark albums Jazz In Silhouette and The Futuristic Sounds Of Sun Ra, with intoxicating one-off singles such as ‘Great Balls Of Fire’, ‘Space Loneliness’ and ‘Big City Blues’, the massively weird ‘Teenager’s Letter Of Promises’ with singer Juanita Rogers, before signing off with Yochanan’s demented ’Message To Earthman’."