SF CHRONICLE, Sunday Datebook

Barbara Dane didn’t have any plans to record another album. Well into her 80s, she could look back with satisfaction on a brilliant, self-directed career that saw her collaborating with jazz patriarchs like Louis Armstrong and Earl “Fatha” Hines, receiving fan notes from Langston Hughes and Ella Fitzgerald, and serving as the ringing voice for half a century of progressive causes.

But then a jolt of inspiration hit while listening to Bay Area jazz pianist Tammy Hall, and Dane thought: “I have to work with this woman! Continue reading...