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One-third of the Winter, 2024 collection of jazz poetry is made up of poets who have only come to my attention since the publication of the Summer, 2023 collection. What this says about jazz music and jazz poetry – and this community – is that the connection between the two art forms is inspirational and enduring, and that poets are finding a place for their voice within these virtual pages.
...Seven poets combine and art of jazz with an act of love…
...A collection of Connie Johnson’s poetry is woven among her audio readings, a personal narrative of her journey and music she considers significant to it, providing readers the chance to experience the full value of her gifts.
...This edition features poetry chosen from hundreds of recent submissions, and from a wide range of voices known – and unknown – to readers of these collections. The work is unified by the poets’ ability to capture the abundance of jazz music, and their experience with consuming it.
...Nine poets, nine poems on the leading figure in the development of bebop…
...This is the 14th extensive collection of jazz poetry published on Jerry Jazz Musician since the fall of 2019, when the concept was initiated. Like all previous volumes, the beauty of this edition is not solely evident in the general excellence of the published works; it also rests in the hearts of the individuals from diverse backgrounds who possess a mutual desire to reveal their life experiences and interactions with the music, its character, and its culture.
....This collection of jazz poetry – the largest yet assembled on Jerry Jazz Musician – demonstrates how poets who are also listeners of jazz music experience and interact with the spontaneous art that arises from jazz improvisation, which often shows up in the soul and rhythm of their poetic language.
...A broad collection of jazz poetry authored by an impressive assemblage of regular contributors and established poets new to this publication – all of whom open their imagination and hearts to the abundant creative experience they derive from this art.
...Over 60 poets from all over the world celebrate their love of jazz…in poetry.
...Molly Larson Cook’s abstract-expressionist paintings accompany the 50 poets contributing to this collection. Her art has much in common with the poetry and music found within it; all three art forms can be described as “landscapes of the imagination,” created by artists from all over the world who are inspired in a meaningful way by jazz music, and whose work can be uniquely interpreted and appreciated (or not!) by those who consume it.
...“It’s not exclusive, but inclusive, which is the whole spirit of jazz.”
-Herbie Hancock
.
And…this spirit is not limited to the musicians, because celebrating jazz is rich in creative opportunity for writers and visual artists as well. The 54 poets who contribute to this poetry collection are living proof of that.
As always, thanks to the poets, and I hope you enjoy…
Joe
...Few artists inspire creativity like Miles Davis. This collection of poetry by 50 poets from all over the world is evidence of that.
...A collection of the poet Erren Kelly’s unconstrained, improvisational and provocative poetry written during the era of COVID
...In this winter collection of diverse themes and poetic styles, 55 poets wander the musical landscape to explore their spirit and enthusiasm for jazz music, its historic figures, and the passion, sadness, humor and joy it arouses.
...In this fifth collection of poetry reflecting these times, 33 poets offer their perspectives…
...Jazz and poetry have always had a symbiotic relationship. Their creative languages share the common soil of imagination and improvisation, from which their audiences discover inspiration and spirit, and perhaps even a renewed faith in life itself.
This collection features 50 gifted poets from places as disparate as Ohio and Nepal, Estonia and Boston, Guyana and Pittsburgh, each publicly sharing their inner world reverence for the culture of jazz music.
...On the cusp of an election of consequence the likes of which America hasn’t experienced for 150 years, and in the midst of continued Black Lives Matter protests and an indisputable surge of COVID, 29 poets sharing perspectives from all over the world contribute to this volume of poetry reflecting our tumultuous, unsettling era…
...An invitation was extended recently to poets to submit work that reflects this time of COVID, Black Lives Matter, and a heated political season. In this third volume, 33 poets contribute…
.... . “Clifford Brown” is a painting by Warren Goodson, a Saxapahaw, North Carolina artist whose work is driven by his appreciation for Black culture. With his gracious consent, Mr. Goodson’s art is featured throughout this collection. . . _____ . . “Poetry is eternal graffiti written in the heart of everyone.” -Lawrence Ferlinghetti … Continue reading “A Collection of Jazz Poetry — Summer, 2020 Edition”
...23 poets contribute 26 poems that speak to the era of COVID, Black Lives Matter, and a heated political season
.... . photo by Tengilorg / CC BY . . While Playing A Vinyl Record Music lightens blue mood. It softens mind like feather floating towards earth, then brushes against cheek, chin and ear. Body sways with Jazz in air. A tickle on skin, sensations cradled in ears, harvesting goodness like wheat to enjoy … Continue reading “Poetry by Jerrice Baptiste and Moe Seager”
...33 poets from all over the globe contribute 47 poems. Expect to read of love, loss, memoir, worship, freedom, heartbreak and hope – all collected here, in the heart of this unsettling spring.
...The winter collection of poetry offers readers a look at the culture of jazz music through the imaginative writings of its 32 contributors. Within these 41 poems, writers express their deep connection to the music – and those who play it – in their own inventive and often philosophical language that communicates much, but especially love, sentiment, struggle, loss, and joy.
...Twenty-eight poets contribute 37 poems to the Jerry Jazz Musician Fall Poetry Collection, living proof that the energy and spirit of jazz is alive — and quite well.
(Featuring the art of Russell Dupont)
.
...In this month’s collection, with great jazz artists at the core of their work, 16 poets remember, revere, ponder, laugh, dream, and listen
.... . In this collection, nine poets contribute ten poems celebrating jazz in poems as unique as the music itself . . . . I Am Jazz . I Am Jazz. It is my nature to evolve, to change and adapt. I’m restless. I move towards a future I cannot see or predict. … Continue reading “A collection of poetry celebrating the culture of jazz — January, 2019”
...So many great poetry submissions of late, for which I am incredibly thankful. The spirit within every poem received — whether published or not — is evident and cheered and appreciated.
Here are three recent arrivals…
Happy Thanksgiving, peace and blessings to all.
_____
The Keyboard Player
by Robert Nisbet
Daily, he worked from nine o’clock till five.
His life and family and things were fine.
For some the moment, the anticipatory one,
...In anticipation of Valentine’s Day, I recently invited many of our contributing poets to submit work that combines the themes of jazz music and love, with the result being a collection of voices expressing their own contributions to the language of love…
Dozens of writers submitted over 100 poems, and the best of the submissions — 29 poems by 18 poets — are found on the following 12 pages. Advance through the selections by utilizing the page monitor at the bottom of each page.
Many thanks to everyone who submitted their work.
JJM
...THE PENCIL OF NATURE
Imagine Talbot walking into a museum today-
how his eyes would pop at a toy fork
stuck in a cardboard refrigerator
or a towering hotel lobby,
its plaza digitally erased of people
and its colors pumped up
THE BUNKER
An overgrown trail is abruptly halted by a set of rusting metal gates,
Secured to a crooked post by a battered padlock and feeble chain.
A grey guard tower lies out of sight, studying the unfolding scene intently,
From the dense undergrowth where fresh raindrops glisten in the new-born sunlight.
A call-out for submissions for upcoming poetry collections to be published on Jerry Jazz Musician
...A woman sits in a window frame
of old carved birds, listening to her
grandson in his jeans playing fig leaf music
in her home in Koshidekha,
a village in Nepal.
“Community Bookshelf” is a twice-yearly space where writers who have been published on Jerry Jazz Musician can share information about their recently authored books.
...Even if you never drank black coffee, that won’t stop you from drinking in the feelings that filter across a room whenever Sarah Vaughan sings Black Coffee. One could drown in that bottomless, inky liquid, that heartache-laden brew,
...I’ve never seen much of Spain.
A business trip to Barcelona.
A commuter ride to Girona. Salvador
Dali’s museum. A stop in Sitges
where ivory beach sand abets
a shimmered turquoise sea.
Her first note wails amber
smoke near overhead pipes above
the guitars. It wavers
and rolls r’s better than spring.
Poets honor jazz as an international music in five atmospheric poems
...Writers talk about influential life experiences with writing, literary figures who inspired their work, overcoming creative and economic challenges, and where they fit in today’s publishing model.
...A collection in which over 30 poets communicate their appreciation for jazz music in poems no longer than seven lines.
...The poet imagines being a monarch butterfly, inspired to movement by the music of Django Reinhardt
...An appeal for contributions to support the ongoing publishing efforts of Jerry Jazz Musician
...A story about two American musicians in Paris for the summer–both of whom are on the brink of a breakdown.
...Spring rains watercolor the earth leaf, daffodil, violet,
then soften to a blue-gray mist,
and clear. Day’s begun transitioning, sky-bright blue to
lapis lazuli. Moon dreams in the north.
There is a great banging coming from inside the brewery
while out here in the sun my blood knocks at the blue
ceilings of my veins like an irate tenant in the apartment
one floor down unprepared for that first blast of Lee
Morgan’s trumpet
I remember a Polish jazz combo I once saw in a movie
about Jews and nuns and suicide. It was after the war
and the band played in basement clubs –
My striking wife
is the cat’s strut—
cello sass
with a syncopated
escalator to
move
It sounded like, “Che ate Pat’s grandma”!
And I’m like…. Before I forget, the “Check Engine”
A myriad of styles and experiences displayed in eight thoughtful and provocative poems about jazz music…
...We’ll have a little brunch for you —
pecan-crusted French toast,
oysters, smoked salmon,
a charcuterie board.
David Rife’s essay/reviews about jazz-themed novels and stories. In this edition, Rife writes of three novels that explore challenges of the mother/daughter relationship.
...While small group swing was shunned by the jazz critical establishment for being too flamboyant and too close a cousin to the emerging (and despised) rock and roll, Richards makes the case that small group swing players like Illinois Jacquet, Louis Jordan, Big Jay McNeely, Joe Liggins, Red Prysock, T-Bone Walker and Ray Charles played a legitimate jazz that was a more pleasing listening experience to the Black community than the bebop of Parker, Dizzy, Bud Powell and Monk. It is a fascinating era, filled with major figures and events, and centered on a rigorous debate that continues to this day – is small group swing “real jazz?”
...Trading Fours with Douglas Cole is an occasional series of the writer’s poetic interpretations of jazz recordings and film. This edition is written in response to the music of Wayne Shorter.
...These poems are new submissions by five poets relatively new to Jerry Jazz Musician, and are an example of the writing I have the privilege of encountering on a regular basis.
...The 19 poets included in this collection effectively share their reverence for jazz music and its culture with passion and brevity.
...Trading Fours with Douglas Cole is an occasional series of the writer’s poetic interpretations of jazz recordings and film. This edition is influenced by Stillpoint, the 2021 album by Zen practitioner Barrett Martin
...Takes on love and loss, and memories of Lady Day, Prez, Monk, Dolphy and others…
...A year-end compilation of jazz albums oft mentioned by a wide range of critics as being the best of 2023
...This story — a finalist in the recently concluded 64th Short Fiction Contest — harkens back to Richard Brautigan’s fiction of the ’70s, and explores modern day co-worker relationships/friendship and the politics of for profit “Universities”
...In this interview, Alyn Shipton discusses Cab Calloway, whose vocal theatrics and flamboyant stage presence made him one of the country’s most beloved entertainers.
...This trumpeter was in the 1932 car accident that took the life of famed saxophonist Frankie Techemacher (pictured), and is best remembered for his work with Eddie Condon’s bands. Who was he?
...How can somebody so blue, Grant, be named
Green? How can the ocean current
and its waves? Simple. Immediate. Each note comes
from you slow as underwater speech. Say
a fish tank and pufferfish hugging the glass. Imagine
being trapped. Gravel pumped through the gills
In Becoming Ella Fitzgerald: The Jazz Singer Who Transformed American Song, the book’s author Judith Tick writes that Ella “fearlessly explored many different styles of American song through the lens of African American jazz, [and] treated jazz as a process, not confined to this idiom or that genre,” and who “changed the trajectory of American vocal jazz in this century.” Ms. Tick. who is professor emerita of music history at Northeastern University, talks with about Ella – and her book – in this wide-ranging October 23, 2023 interview.
...News about upcoming publishing dates, collections, and recent posts…
...Hammers in a construction site
sound like a band warming up,
weird solos by a bunch of drummers.
Jimmy Smith comes down draped in groove,
sermonizing your stride,
clouds chest-out like they know something.
A man standing in front of a house,
shouting, I got nothing from you!
I don’t know where it starts, he said, but can you imagine
watching They Cloned Tyrone and the music playing,
almost the whole dance club version of Love Hangover,
I can’t even watch anything, my mind looks through the settings,
the dialogue is like a crowd talking in a club and I want to listen in,
go into that Diana Ross whisper singing love voice
My eyes were faster dreaming
a drum kit in bed with me
Rapid Eye Movement Disorder
disturbing my sleep and my wife
moving away with her cellphone
camera watch my arms begin to move
Earlier this year I invited poets to submit jazz-themed poetry that didn’t need to strictly follow the 5-7-5 syllabic structure of formal haiku, but had to at least be faithful to the spirit of it (i.e. no more than three lines, brief, expressive, emotionally insightful).
This collection, featuring 22 poets, is a good example of how much love, humor, sentimentality, reverence, joy and sorrow poets can fit into their haiku devoted to jazz.
...Trading Fours with Douglas Cole is an occasional series of the writer’s poetic interpretations of jazz recordings and film. In this edition, the poet connects the recordings of Jessica Williams’ “Little Waltz” and Gene Harris’ “Summertime.”
...Ella Fitzgerald is whispering
to me: “sit here and enjoy your dinner with my
sweet honey voice,” eternal bloom of time,
filling the corner of the street where I eat
with a Golden Age long gone but that remains
like an idea, lingering, like the steam of a
hot bath leaving
traces of fingers on the mirror
“Community Bookshelf” is a twice-yearly space where writers who have been published on Jerry Jazz Musician can share information about their recently authored books.
...Vivaldi, especially “The Four Seasons,”
keeps showing up in forms of jazz:
a hint, a structure—but try unraveling
any musical DNA you go straight back
to singing and to drum, voice and poetry—
Smooth. Jazz. Chill.
Write. Think. Build.
Listen. Vibe. Poetically
design.
Spend time with jazzy
sounds elevating the
mind. Jazz is smooth.
Jazz is chill.
News about recent and upcoming features to be published on Jerry Jazz Musician
...During that electric dawn
when I first heard
a bracelet of notes
which traced a subtle rhythm
within an hourglass of music
and sharpened the silence with sound,
he was/
a flightless bird/
bright as sky/
full of natural lies/
and sweet conflict/
when speaking the/
jazz
Two poems devoted to Steely Dan’s 1977 recording of “Aja”
...The poet recalls an evening when he serendipitously encountered jazz in “The Point” neighborhood of Boston
...All damn day/
talk — talk — talk/
I told him, son/
why not fit those fingers/
down that damn gullet/
and make it a proper/
squawk squawk squawk —/
When the water and sand dance, whence (whence?)/their music? What is that music? What /jazz, what syncopation surfs itself in?
.... . “Guy Ryan,” a short story by Alice Sherman Simpson, was a short-listed entry in our recently concluded 62nd Short Fiction Contest, and is published with the consent of the author. . This story is a chapter from author’s book-in-progress, One For Sorrow. . . ___ . . photo by Lalesh Aldarwish/via Pexels … Continue reading ““Guy Ryan” – a short story by Alice Sherman Simpson”
...The poet writes a profile of the jazz drummer Elvin Jones, inspired by a photograph by Lee Tanner
...A remembrance of incidents in the Bronx, Harlem and at Bop City…
...The poet describes the clear, crisp sound of listening to jazz music on vinyl
...Poet musings on Ellington — and big band music, by the poets Claire Andreani, Russell duPont, Laurinda Lind and Terrance Underwood
...Several poems devoted to the pianist Ahmad Jamal, who died on April 16, 2023 at the age of 92.
...The poet writes about the significance of Miles Davis’s “Kind of Blue”, and why it is the “it” jazz recording…
...The poet reflects on loss, fate, remembrance, and hopefulness
...The poet writes about the origins of our personal blues, and how they can affect us…
...In this edition, the poet writes about attending a McCoy Tyner performance (or “ceremony”), and hearing the musician’s one word philosophy of music.
...The poet’s humorous look at the importance of musicians showing up, and on time, for their performance!
...The poet tells the complex and tragic story of jazz pianist Bud Powell
...A sampling of recent submissions from six poets who, until now, have not had their work published on Jerry Jazz Musician
...A wealthy art dealer discovers that his grandfather purchased art confiscated from Jewish families before and after World War II, and meets an elderly woman who was affected by the grandfather’s actions.
...The poet writes about the complexity of pianist Cecil Taylor’s music, and the liberation he feels from listening to it
...The poet writes of how the desire for love can be distilled into one golden wail of a Billy Strayhorn declaration.
...Picasso paints a portrait based on what he sees in his model’s soul, much to the ego-centric subject’s chagrin
...“Blow by Blow” is a portrait of Berkeley, California in the 1970’s, and the fusion jazz that was finding its way onto the scene at that time.
...Four poets share their appreciation for jazz in poems seven lines or fewer
...The poet reveres the power and beauty and historical significance of Black women, and reads his poem
...The poet brings in the new year, with the virtuoso sounds of pianist Art Tatum
...“The Weeping Tree” arises from the poet listening to (and watching) Sinne Eeg & Thomas Fonnesbæk perform “Willow Weep For Me”
...The fierce resistance…to Revelation! Disordered
listeners. The forest clearing in the thicket… The
Universe expanding on the Theme… The
Future finally right
now?
Musicians
make conversation
around the notes
warm up before leaving terra firma,
say goodbye to familiar places.
Soar.
“Fire From Heaven” arises from the poet Douglas Cole listening to John Coltrane’s 1964 album A Love Supreme
...That inner sense of freedom,
a natural balance
with an impulse
to preserve the day,
as the equinox
tilts from a window
with a view of leaves on fire.
In five separate poems, poets write of Robert Johnson, Beethoven, Ornette Coleman, Duke Fakir and The Band
...Mr. Donnelly’s “The Sweatshop” is a memoir about about his time working in a music accessory sweatshop by day, and slogging it out on the club circuit by night…
...As if the stars contained wood ticks
on fire. As if there were forests within
forests. Trees within stones. Stones
folded over into water.
The most secret nocturnal animals
walk around during the day, unseen.
It’s
sittin’ in the corner knowing what others don’t get and smile-noddin’ over scotch and coda after a day bounced you about like Buddy’s snare and high hat clamped you down to sweet Georgia brown dirt in the Summertime wailed by Sidney Bechet
“The Ghost Note” arises from the poet listening to “From Paris With Love” from Melody Gardot’s 2020 album Sunset in the Blue
...The poet’s tender remembrance of his father’s passion for the clarinet
...Through the art of meditation,
I become transfixed—transported
to the days of Baldwin & Joplin,
the Black Renaissance of Harlem— the resurrection
of a muse, Langston Hughes,
...He’s a-stagger the patrilineous
hillside grove wonder tunnels
street black ribbons going bower-deep
with sunlight glitter punctuations
feeling the great payoff on the way
The poem “Convergence” rises from listening to the 1960 album, “Stan Getz Quartet at Large”
...Mr. Cole’s suite consists of eight poems, all interpretations from songs on pianist Tommy Flanagan’s album Sunset and the Mockingbird Suite
...Set forth beautiful one
open sea and open sky
as far as your eye can see
full wind filling the sails
pushing those hesitant steps
three at a time before
the cymbal crash of wave
Tonight, I am alone,
lost in a dream,
and the dulcet tones
of Grappelli’s violin
glide lazily across
the twilight of my mind,
Horace Silver’s got a grove. Just listen to that left hand,
like a heart skipping a beat or jumping up to a double-beat,
like beholding something so beautiful you can hardly believe it.
In the cold vastness of space without end,
we swirl through time, around the sun,
alone, unknown, unknowable, lonely
collections of stardust, certain we matter,
but vague as to why and how, unable
to prove our value, yet convinced we must
Trading Fours with Douglas Cole is an occasional series of the writer’s poetic interpretations of jazz recordings and film. This poem is written to the 1957 Coleman Hawkins recording of “Juicy Fruit.”
...In a dream,
I walked by
what once were
rows of brownstones,
along 52nd Street;
past the ghosts
of Jimmy Ryan’s,
Spotlite, The Onyx
and 3 Deuces.
“What I have to say now stays between us.”
The Chairman’s face flushed a little. I sensed one of his rants was coming, and I was not disappointed:
“In my opinion, Jakub Hoch is a pseudo-liberal loudmouth of minimal talent who has no place as Musical Director of this orchestra.”
...I had a little radio up on top of the refrigerator, and I turned it on as the sunlight went and the world filled up with darkness. I listened to a jazz station and smoked a cigarette and blew the smoke out the window.
...On my walks alone lately I fantasize
that I’ll come across a woman my age
give or take a few years.
She’ll be listening to Miles, or Monk,
or Horace Silver, and reading
one of my poetry books.
Dim dusk breaks down
the receding light and one after another
strands of the passing hour unravel
leaving behind an existence beyond time
that opens the doors to another world:
It’s late in the evening in a foreign metropolis
One of the best things about my life is that in the course of it I had the chance to see the great Blind Lemon Jefferson on eleven different occasions. This was especially gratifying because for me he was the finest blues singer who ever lived, even better than Robert Johnson or Charlie Patton or Bessie Smith.
...Almost sixty years
have passed yet
it could be today
she sings murder
oppression
protest in the streets
school children
sitting in jail
My father played baseball
and was a hot prospect,
so the story goes,
pursued by the Braves
until the accident that left him
with eyes that saw two of everything –
“Tough to tell which ball to swing at,” he’d say.
On my birthday in 1917, Jazz
was first recorded.
The time of Jelly Roll Morton was at
hand—the king of Blues,
It was the sixties.
“It’s cool,” he said.
“You’ll dig it.”
A row of attached
and run-down
brick three-stories
on a dark side-street
An interview with The Art of Jazz author Alyn Shipton, whose book is an exploration of how jazz influenced sheet music art, album art, posters, photography, and individual works of fine art.
...On the day Miss Lena took her reward
I’m breaking bread w/Eddie
who shoveled her sidewalk as a kid
and picked Miss Ella’s roses.
High-fived Cootie runnin’ scales ’n
JB takin’ the bridge.
Hunkered down
listening to Coltrane’s
Once in a While
and the smooth flow
of his sax, a whiskey
beside me, thinking
of those Jazz-infused
moments before life
began to drift away.
Feelin’ Kind of Blue.
Improvised textures,
made in heaven,
escape elucidation
and drift off
into the ethereal.
Way back in the ‘40s,
she had a cat
black as night
and named it . . .
Well, you know.
This was the ‘40s
Never up first, he was always
downstairs first, his four little boys
aligned like ascending angels
up the polished staircase, already
dressed, eager to see the tree,
To where have our better angels flown
Instead of wings, ghoulish shadows darken our skies
So___ past the book stalls and flower carts
And down the Champs-Elysees stretch
naked tables and vacant chairs
Updates and news about content recently and soon-to-be published.
...Nineteen fifty-nine –
1-9-5-9 – things changed.
Coltrane took Giant Steps –
Miles was Kind of Blue
and Brubeck played
with Time.
“Nah,” Mucka says to the guy in the funny hat, a couple of seats down. “We’re from Massachusetts, an hour or so from here. My friend here….” He leans back so the guy can look around him to see me….”he wanted to come down, see if we could, you know, the whole jazz thing . . . . festival …. thing.”
...I have to admit, Portland has kicked my ass this summer.
Two fires continue to rage here. I’m sure you’ve heard about this city’s Black Lives Matter demonstrations that have also sparked pesky vandalism by dozens of mostly White activists. While their activities seem banal enough – a dumpster fire here, a picnic table on fire there – this behavior shamefully threatens to commandeer BLM’s objectives and gives life to a cynical and evergreen pre-election message stoking White suburban fear. The vandalism tests the patience of even the most tolerant and hopeful of local citizens.
Now mix in the fires of climate change – hot, powerful winds fanning flames on a drought-laden state – and the result is living in, for now, the epicenter of the world’s worst air quality.
...The author discusses the enigmatic and extraordinary pianist, composer, and band leader, whose most notable achievements came during a time of major societal and cultural change, and often in the face of critics who at times found his music too technical and bombastic.
...The Saturn V mega rocket had a problem with syncopation from the get go. The uber squares shipped in the highest foreheads and keenest flat tops money could buy but the translunar queso bullseye refused to step and fetch it.
...rain’s elegant tap dance
across rooftop across
windowpane has sorrowful
joy of old
folk tune plucked
“Doc, here’s my dizzy symptom:
I’m buying these skinny books
like they’re jazz CD’s—
rackin’ ‘em up on the changer,
five at a time, punchin’ in
‘All Disks’ and ‘Shuffle,’
even in winter, she is a fire blazing, her eyes are
like the the clearest lake or the best dream or
like an opal, where night finds its song
After a New Year
not the first sunrise
not the first cold bus
not the first trip along the Ohio
not the first day at work
not any of those things
there is nothing special about this morning
And the clouds
unfastened their seat belts
and fell across the roads and rivers
so Pittsburgh looked like it was a flying pig
In a Jerry Jazz Musician interview, Con Chapman, author of Rabbit’s Blues: The Life and Music of Johnny Hodges – the first-ever biography of the immortal musician – talks about the enigmatic man and his unforgettable sound.
...The “before and after” work featured in this post utilizes a combination of Russell Dupont’s love for jazz, art, and photography, and when combined with modern digital technology, results in a rare way to experience the art of the music.
...It’s all about the jazz…
Sonny Fortune at Boomer’s
Illinois Jacquet on 58th Street
Duvivier and Cheatham at Highlights
. . Rahsaan Roland Kirk at the Jazz Workshop, San Francisco April, 1967 (photo by permission Veryl Oakland) . . FROM FLYTOWN When I die I want them to play the Black and Crazy Blues, I want to be cremated, put in a bag of pot and I want beautiful people to smoke me … Continue reading “Poems for Rahsaan Roland Kirk — by John L. Stanizzi”
...Gary Giddins, Jimmy Heath, Fred Hersch, Joe Hagan, Maxine Gordon, Tim Page, Veronica Swift and Marcus Strickland are among the 25 writers, musicians, poets, educators, and photographers who responded to our question, “What are some of your favorite record album covers of all time?”
...On March 11, 2019, .Jerry Jazz Musician.will publish the 50th.winning story in our thrice-yearly Short Fiction Contest. To celebrate this landmark event, we have asked all the previous winners (dating to 2002) to reflect on their own winning story, and how their lives have since unfolded.
This week’s edition covers authors of winning stories #’s 29 – 34
...There’s a pawnshop in Tarzana
Called Thrifty Pawn & Loan.
And propped up in the window
Is a haunted saxophone.
The tag says “50 dollars-
A sweet and honeyed tone”
But fifty bucks ain’t all you pay
I had them
all down
pat
from the winged
Studebaker
to the old
Henry J
Chantal Doolittle wasn’t like anybody else she knew. Who else, for example, would stand transfixed before a record player or stereo, still as stone while listening to music — not merely attending to it — her very cells taking in the song, calculating and absorbing. “That girl is special,” Nana Esther always said.
When she was a kid and Motown was the thing, Chan would sing Marvin Gaye’s tunes to her grandmother in their high ceilinged apartment, where, more often than not it was soul music, the harmonizing voices of The Four Tops, The Temptations, The Supremes, drifting in from the surrounding windows and disappearing into the sky that was perennially a washed out gray, as if there was an invisible flag always at half mast, hanging outside heaven. From the time she was five or six, all Chan had to do was hear a song once and she would know it. She knew all the Motown tunes word for word, and sang them right on key, perfectly, which is why Nana Esther dubbed her, “my little songbird.”
Of course, there was nothing little about Chantal, but, being her grandmother’s one and only, she was “a little one” to her. Chantal was tall, big for her age, and when she developed as a young woman, busty too. She stood out even before she opened her mouth, due to her attitude. Her nana had taught her to be “confident as a man,” and she had seemingly
...In a little town in Illinois, in a bar near the Wisconsin border, one man blew honey-dripping sounds from his saxophone. A woman’s body swayed in time with the sweetness emitting from that horn. She kept time with the beat and moved like melodic notes going up and down the scale. I imagined blowing musical sounds into her ear.
I crossed the wooden dance floor where she whirled, grabbed her hand and began to spin. Like musical notes, one black, one white, we danced all night. I softly sang into her ear, “Imagine how we’d dance in bed.”
She laughed in a low contralto voice, and changed it to a soprano when the high notes flowed.
...When my doctor released me from the asylum in Saint-Remy, he warned me to stay away from absinthe or my hallucinations would worsen. I didn’t tell him I had no need for absinthe to hallucinate. I often had company, even when there wasn’t anyone with me.
I’d spent some of my time in the asylum playing billiards. Everyone assured me that I was a natural, the best player they’d ever seen. Maybe, instead of painting, I’d play billiards for a living. As soon as I walked past the gates of the asylum,
...Clad in white tie and tails, dancing and scatting his way through the “Hi-de-ho” chorus of “Minnie the Moocher,” Cab Calloway exuded a sly charm and sophistication that endeared him to legions of fans.
In Hi-de-ho, author Alyn Shipton offers the first full-length biography of Cab Calloway, whose vocal theatrics and flamboyant stage presence made him one of the highest-earning African American bandleaders. Shipton sheds new light on Calloway’s life and career, explaining how he traversed racial and social boundaries to become one of the country’s most beloved entertainers.
...Before there was Elvis, there was W.C. Handy, the man who made the blues. Here is the first major biography in decades of the man who gave us such iconic songs as St. Louis Blues, The Memphis Blues, and Beale Street Blues, and who was responsible, more than any other musician, for bringing the blues into the American mainstream.
David Robertson charts W.C. Handys rise from a rural Alabama childhood in the last decades of the nineteenth century to become one of the most celebrated songwriters of the twentieth century. The child of former slaves, Handy was first inspired by spirituals and folk songs, and his passion for music pushed him to leave home as a teenager, despite opposition from his preacher father.
...Long recognized as America’s most brilliant jazz writer, the winner of many major awards — including the prestigious National Book Critics Circle Award — and author of a highly popular biography of Bing Crosby, Gary Giddins has also produced a wide range of stimulating and original cultural criticism in other fields. With Natural Selection, he brings together the best of these previously uncollected essays, including a few written expressly for this volume.
...Lost Sounds is the first in-depth history of the involvement of African Americans in the earliest years of recording. It examines the first three decades of sound recording in the United States, charting the surprising role black artists played in the period leading up to the Jazz Age.
Applying more than thirty years of scholarship, Tim Brooks identifies key black artists who recorded commercially in a wide range of genres and provides revealing biographies of some forty of these audio pioneers. Brooks assesses the careers and recordings of George W. Johnson, Bert Williams, George Walker, Noble Sissle, Eubie Blake, the Fisk Jubilee Singers, W.C. Handy, James Reese Europe, Wilbur Sweatman, boxing champion Jack Johnson, as well as a host of lesser-known voices.
...Often overshadowed by San Francisco, its twinkling sister city across the Bay, Oakland is itself an American wonder. The city is surrounded by and filled with natural beauty — mountains and hills and lakes and a bay — and architecture that mirrors its history as a Spanish mission, Gold Rush outpost, and home of the West’s most devious robber barons.
Oakland is also a city of artists and blue-collar workers, the birthplace of the Black Panthers, neighbor to Berkeley, and home to a vibrant and volatile stew of immigrants and refugees.
...Philadelphian Francis Davis is the author of several books, including The History of the Blues, Bebop and Nothingness and a forthcoming biography of John Coltrane. A contributing editor of The Atlantic Monthly, he also writes regularly about music for the New York Times, among others.
...
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