Hoboken Public Library presents Garden State Jazz Greats – Nelson Riddle Zoom Listening Session – September 13th at 6:30pm.

Come and join Jazz scholar Ben Young on Zoom as he explores the majesty, style, and genius of New Jersey’s own jazz greats. Many of these names you may already know and all of them you should know as each of these innovators have left their indelible imprint on world culture through the great African American creation of Jazz.

Ben Young will discuss the lives and contributions of each of these home state heroes along with the musical and historical context to help illustrate what made each of their unique and singular artistic visions have such an impact.

Nelson Riddle's is the second most important name on a bunch of records by a certain Frank Sinatra. Arranger Riddle (1921--1985) came from Oradell, but did most of his professional work for Capitol Records in California, where he was the arranger of choice for stars like Nat Cole and Frank Sinatra. We'll follow Riddle's story to ask the musical questions: How does an arranger get to be a star? What makes an arrangement swing? How does a big-band instrumentalist become an arranger? Musical examples from Ella Fitzgerald, Sinatra, Cole, Oscar Peterson, a handful of rarities from the 78-era, and a couple items from the disco (!) era.

Registration closes an hour before the start time. Zoom links will sent to the registants about 30 minutes before the start of the event.