By all accounts it was a stunning night:  80 minutes of pure jazz artistry from three Grammy winners. Bassist Christian McBride, pianist Brad Mehldau and drummer Marcus Gilmore convened April 13 before a sold-out house at The Gilmore in Kalamazoo, Michigan, to perform mostly Mehldau originals plus covers, the results of which can be seen here.

Melanie lives on! Although she died last year at 76, the hippie icon, who flower-powered her way to stardom at the Woodstock fest in 1969, is the subject of the new live album, From The Banks of the River Effra:  Crystal Palace 1972 from Cleopatra Records.

They’re out of Sussex County and they’re called Hundreds of AU. Their fourth album, Life In Parallel, drops August 22 (Iodine Recordings). The first single, “Scorched Earth Harvest,” is already out.

When Mike Ham started Radio Garden State (RGS) on the Internet in the tradition of off-shore free-form pirate radio stations unencumbered by corporate dictates and dedicated to the proposition on keeping The Garden State LOUD, he didn’t even know if a year later he’d still be in business. That was July 1 of last year. Well, here we are and now he has a crew of 19 still cranking out Jersey noise 24/7 “and we’ve only just scratched the surface,” he tells us.

Newark Mayor Ras J. Baraka held a press conference on Juneteenth (6/19) at Harriet Tubman Square Park downtown Newark to announce a partnership with Festivals United Newark (FUN) to present a multi-genre lineup of free cultural events.

This Friday, July 11, the debut Jewels Gold single will be released by TikTok’s music division, SoundOn.

The oldest settlement in Atlantic County down the shore is Somers Point, settled by Europeans in 1693. For the last 31 years, the Annual Somers Point Beach Concert Series has been free at the William Morrow Beach in Municipal Beach Park on Bay Avenue between Higbee and New Jersey Avenues.

The Bruce Springsteen Archives & Center For American Music (BSACAM) on the campus of Monmouth University in West Long Branch will hold a four-day symposium in celebration of the album that made Bruce a star. The events will be held September 4, 5, 6 and 7 with a conference, an art exhibit, and a screening of previously-unreleased footage shot during the making of the album in 1975.

The Wentworth Art Gallery in Short Hills, Essex County, will host System of a Down singer-songwriter-producer-multi-instrumentalist Serj Tankian, 57, and his collection of original musical paintings, mixed-media works and augmented reality art on August 24. Serj has been a visionary in music, poetry, visual art and political activism for the better part of three decades.

The three performances of the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra should prove fun as conductor Lawrence Loh will have to sync up the orchestra live in-concert as the Hollywood film How To Train Your Dragon explodes on the big screen behind them. Thus, the epic adventure film’s humor and fire-breathing action will be brought to stunning life.

The New Jersey Hall of Fame has announced its 2025 inductees. As always, they come from the fields of Arts & Letters, Enterprise, Performing Arts & Entertainment, Public Service and Sports. The induction ceremony will take place November 21 at The Rink @ The Arena of American Dream, its sprawling new facility erected last year off Route 3 in East Rutherford.

“Okoboji” is the lead-off single from Lily Vakili’s new Oceans Of Kansas album. She’s stepping out from her front-woman status of The Vakili Band and the results are nothing short of spectacular.

He usually comes out smoking with both guns blazing in bands like Hades, Non-Fiction, Cassius King and Patriarchs In Black but on the new Patriarchs In Black single, “Celestial Yard,” there he is playing guitar on a song with the kind of sincere melody that maybe Jackson Browne might write. Could it be?

The highly-anticipated Bruce movie—Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere—is set to open in theaters October 24. The trailer has just been released (see it here).

Singer-Songwriter Brendan Brophy—from Neptune in Monmouth County—also plays guitar, bass and keyboards. His new album—Let The Spaceships Come—is a collection of his originals as arranged by drummer Bruce Stephen Foster (from Oceanport), drummer-producer Steve Puntolillo (from Freehold) and Brophy.

The lineup for the FREE 2025 Essex County Summer Music Concert Series has been announced. It includes three nights of fireworks, five concerts in Brookdale Park and 14 concerts in various locations. And it all starts tomorrow!

The New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark has announced the lineup of events for its 2025-2026 Season of Dance which will include World Premieres by the New Jersey Ballet, the “rebellious arts organism” known as Pilobolus and its “Other Worlds Collection,” the Newark debut of “Tango After Dark,” “The Jersey Nutcracker,” the State Ballet Theatre of Ukraine’s new production of “Sleeping Beauty,” the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre, and the Fort Lee-based Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company,

Our favorite Hoboken chanteuse, Tammy Faye Starlite, will co-headline a concert June 25 at Bowery Electric in Manhattan benefitting Waggytail Rescue, the non-profit animal organization that rescues, rehabilitates and finds forever homes for our four-legged friends, both dogs and cats.

One of the seven never-before-heard Bruce albums coming in that big beautiful box we’ve been telling you about—Tracks II: The Lost Albums (Sony Music)—due June 27 is Twilight Hours, his homage to the Great American Songbook.

When Johnny Cash performed at San Quentin State Prison in 1958, it certainly changed at least one inmate’s life. In the audience for that performance was a 21-year old convict by the name of Merle Ronald Haggard. Seeing Cash sing had a profound effect upon Merle and inspired him to become a singer-songwriter as well. Upon release, he embarked on a music career and wound up being one of the great all-time voices in country music history.