NEW YORK (AP) -- Jazz pianist and composer Hank Jones, whose 70-year career included a stint as Ella Fitzgerald's pianist and Marilyn Monroe's accompanist when she sang "Happy Birthday" to President John F. Kennedy, has died, his manager said Monday. He was 91.

Jones, who won a Grammy lifetime achievement award last year and received the National Medal of Arts in 2008, died Sunday night

LONDON (AP) -- Sir John Dankworth, the British jazz composer, saxophonist and band leader, has died. He was 82.

Jazz singer Dame Cleo Laine — who married Dankworth in 1958 after meeting during an audition for a spot with his band — announced her husband's death before the finale of an anniversary concert at The Stables, the theater they founded together.

Monica Ferguson, the theater's chief executive

NEWPORT, R.I. – Grammy-winning singer Chaka Khan leads the list of entertainers at the Newport Jazz Festival, which celebrates its 55th anniversary this weekend.

Chaka Khan will be joined by the George Duke Trio at the International Tennis Hall of Fame when the event kicks off Friday.

The future of the festival was uncertain this year because of financial problems with the event's new producers. So, founder George

BOSTON – Jazz composer George Russell, a MacArthur fellow whose theories influenced the modal music of Miles Davis and John Coltrane, has died.

His publicist says Russell, who taught at the New England Conservatory, died Monday in Boston at age 86 of complications from Alzheimer's.

Russell was born in Cincinnati in 1923 and attended Wilberforce University. He played drums in Benny Carter's band and later wrote "Cubano

BOSTON (AP) -- Jazz composer George Russell, a MacArthur fellow whose theories influenced the modal music of Miles Davis and John Coltrane, has died.

His publicist says Russell, who taught at the New England Conservatory, died Monday in Boston at age 86 of complications from Alzheimer's.

Russell was born in Cincinnati in 1923 and attended Wilberforce University. He played drums

Amidst the current flurry of releases from young guns redefining the boundaries of jazz, this compilation gives a timely reminder of the established jazz values they are questioning. The Modern Jazz Quartet had a long, distinguished career because generations of listeners found their music cool and easy on the ear.

Their combination of piano, vibraphone, bass and drums gave the MJQ an instantly recognisable sparse sound that was

Jazz musician Chuck Mangione took to the stage in New York on Friday night to raise money for the families of his two former bandmates who were killed in a plane crash in February.

Gerry Niewood and Coleman Mellett were among passengers on the jet which came down near New York's Buffalo Niagara International Airport killing all 49 people on board.

The band's concert in Buffalo the following night was canceled as a result of the loss.

And Mangione has kept