© 2024 New England Public Media

FCC public inspection files:
WGBYWFCRWNNZWNNUWNNZ-FMWNNI

For assistance accessing our public files, please contact hello@nepm.org or call 413-781-2801.
PBS, NPR and local perspective for western Mass.
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Jazz Beat #22 - Joey DeFrancesco

Joey DeFrancesco
CREATIVE COMMONS
Joey DeFrancesco

Joey DeFrancesco plays the Springfield Jazz and Roots Festival on Saturday, August 6th. Joey was still in his teens when he was hailed as a Young Lion and keyboard phenom who helped revive the Hammond organ’s prominence in jazz in the late 1980s. He was renowned around Philadelphia when Miles Davis heard him on a Philly TV show in 1987, and the following year Davis featured the 17-year-old on a five-week tour of Europe. (See Joey D performing “Tu Tu” with Miles on the NEPR Jazz Blog: Miles Davis and the Young Philadelphians. ) Tom and Joey D touch on his work with Miles, his thoughtful reflections on the Miles Davis biopic “Miles Ahead,” the legacy of the Hammond B3 in his hometown, the foundational role of bebop in modern music, and spirituality in jazz. 

Tom was honored by the Jazz Journalists Association with the Willis Conover-Marian McPartland Award for Career Excellence in Broadcasting in 2019. In addition to hosting Jazz à la Mode since 1984, Tom writes the jazz blog and produces the Jazz Beat podcast at NEPM. He began working in jazz radio in 1977 at WCUW, a community-licensed radio station in Worcester, Massachusetts. Tom holds a bachelor's degree from UMass Amherst, where he majored in English and African American Studies.


Email Tom at tom_reney@nepm.org.
Related Content