Howard Mandel's Urban Improvisation
The deaths of multi-instrumentalist Joseph Jarman, best known as the face-painted shaman of the Art Ensemble of Chicago, and Alvin Fielder,
re-conceptualizing drummer, remind us that artists’ contributions to music extend beyond recordings and awards. Read my essay at NPR Music, commissioned by Nate Chinen of WBGO, on the enduring legacies of Jarman and Fielder, both founding members of the still thriving Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) NY and Chicago).
Keyboardist and synthesizer specialist Jim Baker has led the collective quartet Extraordinary Popular Delusions playing every Monday night in obscure Chicago venues for the past 13 years. My article on EPD, which features saxophonists Mars Williams and Edward Wilkerson Jr. (they switch off), multi-instrumentalist (bass, guitar, trumpet) Brian Sandstrom and percussionist/drummer Steve Hunt — all of whom have extensive creative music experience — was published today in the Chicago Reader — which I last wrote for in the 1980s.
Photos here by Marc PoKempner, from the free-form improv ensemble’s current regular gig, in the upstairs loft of the Beat Kitchen (they start around 9 pm, usually end by 11). No cover, no minimum (they put out a tip jazz), no limits — same as their interactive performance as part of painter Lewis Achenbach’s Jazz Occurrence at the Apple Store on Michigan Avenue, 6 pm. on January 24. See you there?
Marshall Allen, ageless 94, leads the Sun Ra Arkestra
If you liked Black Panther, listen to the music that introduced and embodies Afro-Futurism. Photojournalist Marc PoKempner captured a bit of the celestial magic of the Sun Ra Arkestra (est. circa 1954) during its November touchdown in New Orleans’s Music Box Village. This picturesque venue is an assembly of little houses which MPoK says “each has some sound producing capability – bells, chimes, horns, drums.” (Above: Marshall Allen, Arkestra leader since 1995. All photos here Marc PoKempner copyright 2018).
Marc continues, “It’s next to the bridge on the upper side of the Industrial Canal, surrounded by a fence made of recycled corrugated metal. Since last time I was there, they’ve added loads of interesting lighting, and smoke generators that add to the magical atmosphere – perfect for the Arkestra.”
Vincent Chance, who plays French horn in the Arkestra (and elsewhere), commented, “The concerts there were pretty amazing. The audience was knocked out by both shows, we played two days there and had two days before to familiarize ourselves with the instruments from their installations.” Preparation is good for liftoff!
Sun Ra was a visionary who gifted the Earth with his sensibility, forevermore. During winter holidays and times of social crisis — or really, whenever — traveling the spaceways with his sounds and messages in mind is recommended as an enhancement, inspiration, provocation and/or escape.
John Szwed’s biography Space Is The Place: The Life and Times of Sun Ra is recommended for further reading about the singular bandleader/composer/arranger/poet/entrepreneur/satirist/philosopher, named by his Earthling parents at birth Herman Poole Blount. I’ve written about him, including liner notes for the Complete Performance resulting from his meeting with John Cage, and a 1991 concert at Inter-Media-Arts. Still, my favorite of Sun Ra’s many albums is Secrets of the Sun. The Omniverse being one, start anywhere.
 Blues have been heard in Chicago for about 100 years — and blues guitarist Jimmy Johnson has been alive for 90 of them. Johnson, born just four years after Papa Charlie Jackson was reported busking with his guitar on Maxwell Street, celebrated his entry to ninth decade last Wednesday night at Space in Evanston, and proved to be as powerful and thrilling a player/singer as he’s been since the 1970s, when he played second to Otis Rush and Jimmy Dawkins.  (All photos in this post © Harvey Tillis)
But he’s been a front man, too, since at least 1978, and Johnson excelled in that role at his party, slinging barbed, biting lead lines in alternation with his compelling vocals, synced with taut rhythms from guitarist Dave Specter, bassist E.G. McDaniel, keyboard player Brother John Kattke and drummer Mike Schlick. There was not a thing old about their set — the band thoroughly invigorated material well-chosen for variety, including “You Don’t Love Me, Baby,” “Little By Little,” “Turn On Your Love Light,” “Chicken Heads” (which was a big hit for Bobby Rush, which I previously misattributed to Jimmy’s r&b-singing brother Syl Johnson), and “People Get Ready,” the great gospel-influenced anthem Curtis Mayfield wrote for the Impressions in 1965.
Originally from Holly Springs, Mississippi, where he was steeped in gospel, Johnson moved to Chicago with his family in 1950, worked as a welder and made music avocationally as electric Chicago blues emerged from Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf, Buddy Guy and the other masters recorded by Chess Records — turning pro in ’59, just as the second “West Side Soul” generation including Rush, Junior Wells and Magic Sam emerged. His Delmark Records debut, Johnson’s Whacks, established his style — which besides cutting single note slashes is characterized by his high, keening voice, and no slack beats.
One of the tricks Johnson pulled at Space I’d never heard anyone do: a reverse-falsetto — a chorus sung in a range forced significantly below his natural pitch. How he did that, I don’t know. But Specter asked Johnson onstage for a few of his long-life secrets.
“Well, I think you’re taking care of yourself if you don’t drink — but I know the club here makes its money from selling alcohol, so everybody drink up!” he said. “And we all like to eat what we want to eat, right? But I’m telling you, you gotta sacrifice about some of that food, stay healthy by eating better,” he advised. “One other thing — if you live long enough, you’re going to get arthritis. Doesn’t matter if you hit 90 and don’t have it. If you live to 95, you’ll have it by then.”
Johnson blew out a single candle on a cake as the crowd sang “Happy Birthday,” and then he played some more blues. His most recent recording is with Specter, an homage version of “Out of Bad Luck,” dedicated to Magic Sam, on Tribute, Delmark’s 65th anniversary release. Let’s hope for more from this evergreen bluesman (and of course Mr. Specter, carrying it on).
Twilight, Millennium Park bandshell lawn; photo by Marc PoKempner
The 40th annual Chicago Jazz Festival, four days free to all of unfettered, usually joyous music held in beautiful downtown Millennium Park, started last night with stars of of the local scene celebrating  “Legends and Lions”. Add “Ancient to the Future” to set the tone for a weekend of exciting, civically-supported music here — and similar outpourings of jazz and blues — America’s vernacular musics — are offered throughout the U.S. this Labor Day weekend.
A quick search turns up music fests in the next days from Augusta, Georgia (Labor Day Jazz Weekend – Candlelight For A Cause (August 31 – September 2, 2018) to Stevens Point, Wisconsin (the Riverfront Jazz Festival, Sept 1 and 2), from JasAspenSnowMass and the Vail Jazz Party (Aug 30 – Sept 3) to Pensacola, Florida’s Gold Coast Summer Fest – Jazz Edition.
I’ve blogged about Labor Day jazz blowouts before, and most I previously cited still exist. The Bedford, Texas Blues and Barbeque Festival is happening, for instance, as is the Big Muddy Blues Festival on three stages over two days at Laclede’s Landing near St. Louis’ Gateway Arch. The Grand Hotel of Mackinac Island continues its Labor Day Jazz Weekend promotion. The DC Blues Society’s 29th annual Blues Fest is in a new venue, the Wunder Garten, on Labor Day itself.
There have been a few suspensions (Memphis) or transformations (Tanglewood in the Berkshires discontinued its festival, but Sept 1 will present the Wynton Marsalis Quartet featuring Ellis Marsalis, his father). New York City’s estimable, two-neighborhood Charlie Parker Jazz Festival was last weekend — but New York City, like Chicago and some other cities can fairly be said to always be jazz festing, so there are good options there or in New Orleans, L.A., Seattle, Portland OR, Austin, Nashville . . .
Orbert Davis – Gary/Chicago Crusader
In Chicago the City’s Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events kicked it’s support up a notch for the 40th festival, which has traditionally been curated by a committee of the Jazz Institute of Chicago. DCASE improved the run-up to this year’s main events by offering financial support to venues that last week offered shows free-of-cover.* DCASE commissioner Mark Kelly also added Wednesday night to the previously scheduled four-day fest, having Orbert Davis of the Chicago Jazz Philharmonic organize a calvalcade program of trumpeters (Art Hoyle, Bobby Lewis), vibists (Stu Katz, Joel Ross, Thadeus Tooks), saxophonists (Ari Brown, Pat Mallinger), pianists (Bethany Pickens) and singers (Kurt Elling, Tammy McCann) hailing past heroes such as Louis Armstrong, Lionel Hampton, Von Freeman and Fred Anderson, Willie Pickens and Eddie Jefferson.
The Detroit International Jazz Festival, Chicago’s rival, likewise highlights its jazz history and connections –Â Alice McLeod Coltrane’s works performed by her saxophonist son Ravi; turns by saxphonist Tia Fuller, violinist Regina Carter in a 25th anniversary reconvening of the women’s quartet StraightAhead, fusion bassist Ralphe Armstrong, a Curtis Fuller-dedicated jam session, Joan Belgrave singing, a band representing Detroit-based record company Mack Avenue (and also out-of-towners: Esperanza Spalding, Teri Lynne Carrington, Dr. Lonnie Smith, Omar Sosa, Eddie Daniels, Pat Martino and so on).
Not to say Chicago is without “special guests” from elsewhere: singer Dianne Reeves, pianist Kenny Barron, orchestra leader Darcy James Argue, pianist Barry Harris with alto saxophonist Charles McPherson and fund saxist Maceo Parker are among the imports. Even so, headliners including Elling and Ramsey Lewis and the tribute to Muhal Richard Abrams are Chi-centric. Which is just fine, as the current talent is comparable to any based anywhere.
*I caught solo pianist Craig Taborn at Constellation; French horn player Vincent Chancey’s quartet with bass clarinetist Jason Stein, bassist Joshua Abrams and drummer Mike Reed at the Hungry Brain (Reed runs both the Brain and Constellation; he booked a “Dog Days” series across the two, which are a block distant from each other). At the Green Mill, Jeff Lindberg’s Chicago Jazz Orchestra played the finale of it’s summer Mondays, and Patricia Barber’s regular stand was full but as usual. At the Jazz Art Record Collective, alto saxist Greg Ward and trumpeter Russ Johnson played the front line of Miles Davis’ high-energy Live/Evil with appropriate fire, while keyboardist Rob Clearfield, guitarist Matt Gold, bassist Matt Ulery, percussionist Quin Kirchner, drummer Makaya McCraven all surprised me — Arthur Wright sketching throughout, Harvey Tillis taking photos. . ).
Hear some jazz and blues! BBQ and kiss summer goodbye.
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Terry Riley’s 1964 ingenious, joyful and warm composition “In C” can now be performed by anyone with a laptop, regardless of their previous musical or technological experience. On Sunday 8/12/18, the Loyola University Technology Ensemble (LUTE) organized a participatory concert of the sublime communitarian piece — which comprises 53 brief melodic figures, to be played in loose succession and synchronization, usually to the steady pulse of ringing Cs played on the piano to keep the beat –Â at Access Contemporary Music‘s third annual Thirsty Ears Festival.
LUTE has created a performance app, which is free to download and open-source, self-explanatory and very easy to use. It includes Riley’s original directions as well as the notation, but every phrase is available by clicking a button to make it sound, and another to advance to the next (or previous) melodic cell. Participants can individually (and instantaneously) select among about 40 pre-set voicings that replicate instruments, synthesizer patches and common sounds; move the figures up and down among three octaves; shift them by an eighth note, or slow to half-time.
According to Riley, any number of people can perform “In C” (though he suggests 35 as optimal) using any instrumentation. Besides the classic original recording from 1968 released by Columbia, there are a dozen versions of “In C” on Youtube, including one by New York City’s Bang on a Can chamber ensemble and a luscious version from Mali. Every performance is different, but it’s hard for anyone making an honest attempt to fail at establishing the composition’s spritely spirit, intriguing layers and gradual changes.
A handout provided by LUTE (which is directed by David B. Wetzel and Griffin Moe) explained, “‘In C’ is an exploration of a musical process and an opportunity to listen and explore various combinations and musical interactions as the piece unfolds . . . In our version we wanted to see what would happen if everyone in the ensemble played an instrument that required no particular skill to operate, leaving the players attention fully available instead to the 
task of listening and collaborating with others.”
Using the app turned out to be a delightful experience. I was among about a dozen laptop “players” contributing our sounds to this afternoon event in the airy chapel of All Saint’s Episcopal Church (simultaneously on a stage outdoors pianists Matthew Hagle and Ariella Mak Nieman played Faure nocturnes, Chopin études, and pices by Bach, Haydn, Brahms, Tchaikovsky and Debussy; an all-ages audience roamed around two blocks of vendors and sponsors’ tables). Since I hadn’t brought an auxiliary speaker, I had to listen hard just to hear what was coming from my MacBook Air. Indulging my customary
contrarian jazz-oriented sensibility, I kept trying to smear the figures across the pulsating time-frame, or fit them into off-beat spaces for syncopated or time-delayed effect. I hope that didn’t disturb other participants, or betray Terry Riley’s concept, and I don’t think it did. “In C” is marvelously capacious music, rewarding to hear and even more so to be part of. With LUTE’s app, you might enlist friends to sit for a bit and give it a spin.
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K-rAd and his Euro-rack at Sushi Dokku; photo by Marc PoKempner
K-rAd freely improvised and spontaneously composed an original, pulsing, burbling, chiming, floating and ripping, multi-layered, deep and flowing funky-bassed, percussion-lively suite over about three hours last night (7/25/18), using his elaborate, sound-unbound Euro-rack synthesizer setup to stir, smooth and spice social interactions in a seemingly unlikely Chicago venue for such a thing.
Down an alley, through a back door (see the bright red arrow) down in a basement of Sushi Dokku in Chicago’s fashionable W. Randolph Street dining district, a small crowd of not-necessarily music-seeking patrons seemingly in their late 20s sat at booths or a horseshoe bar sipping sake, picking at small plates, chatting, flirting, a couple necking. They were clearly easy, maybe pleased and perhaps somehow moved by the electronic music, which filled the room actively, vividly. This wasn’t subtle Eno-esque ambiance, more like Terry Riley’s mirrors on Rainbow in Curved Air reflecting shards of guitar-keyboards from In A Silent Way with James Jamerson‘s loping Motown dance lines underneath and marimba, gongs, super-fast figures, anything else of sonic possibility liable to bubble up or flash forth any moment. Often yet not always there was a perky, steady beat and streaming sequencer figures but no other recurring structure to speak of, hence no expectations, and no guidelines (words, “melody,” song form, defined harmonic field) for listeners to grab onto.
Attendees may not, however, have been trying to grab on or listening at all, so much as being in their own space, oblivious if still possibly influenced by their sonic surroundings. Put me in mind of the mythic days (before my time) when big, showy Hammond B-3 organs ruled at neighborhood corner taverns. As such, this solo synth show, orchestrally even more grandiose, felt like future jazz, present tense.
under Sushi Dokku, photo: Marc PoKempner
K-rAd aka Chris Grabowski is the expert soundman of the Green Mill, a jazz haven — his deft attentions have served not only an elite of U.S. musicians but also the Mill’s every-night, all year ’round audience. He understands the ebb and flow dynamic between performer and audience, but wasn’t doing anything specifically to shape his soundtrack beyond his own impulse/whim. “It nice to play here,” Grabowski said, “they seem to like it,” with a sweep of hand encompassing everyone in the joint, and he’s happy it’s a regular gig — he’s here every other months (“Someone else doing modular things on off-months, I think.”). It doesn’t advertise, though. K-rAd can most easily be found on Facebook, but is modest about upcoming appearances there, too.Â
He kept an eye on the room while focusing mostly with his ears on the waveforms coursing, modulating, filtered and reverberating at his fingertips’ not very dramatic patch, button-push and dial (sorry I didn’t take an inventory of Grabowski’s equipment, which he mentioned took more than two years of acquisition and construction, but it may be proprietary information, anyway). The nearly palpable physicality of electronic music, as I heard it, made the air kind of tingly. (But then, I’ve been spending a fair amount of time lately obsessed with a Korg Minilogue). My pals and I split a shrimp tempura, a flight of assorted sakes and can of Kikusui Aged Funaguchi. Yes, I’d go back.
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Cecil Taylor in 2014, photo by Sánta István Csaba
The brilliant, challenging, perplexing and incomparable pianist/improviser/composer Cecil Taylor died April 5, 2018, at age 89. Here’s what I wrote of him to celebrate his 80th birthday:
Cecil Taylor, unique and predominant, 80 years old 3 27 09
Cecil Taylor is the world’s predominant pianist by virtue of his technique, concept and imagination, and one of 20th-21st Century music’s magisterial modernists. A figure through whose challenges I investigate the avant garde in Miles Ornette Cecil — Jazz Beyond Jazz, he turned 80 on March 25 (or maybe on the 15th), and tonight, Saturday, March 28, “Cecil Taylor Speaks Volumes” — and presumably performs solo —  at Merkin Concert Hall.
Taylor belongs to no school but his own yet has influenced and generated a legion of followers on piano and every other instrument, too. He identifies with the jazz tradition, many of whose most ardent adherents have regarded him since his 1950s debut insultingly, incredulously, quizzically, disdainfully, reluctantly, regretfully or not at all. But he does not limit himself, or his defininition of the jazz tradition: he draws from all music’s history and partakes of the whole world’s culture.
He has earned significant critical acclaim —
“…Cecil Taylor wants you to feel what he feels, to move at his speed, to look where he looks, always inward. His music asks more than other music, but it gives more than it asks.” – Whitney Balliett
— and an international coterie of serious listeners, yet he has been ignored, feared or rejected by most people. Many pianists with more conventional approaches to their instrument, composition, improvisation and interpretation enjoy greater acceptance and financial reward.
Jazz, at least, has tried to come to terms with Taylor, whereas America’s contemporary classical music world, to which he has has just as much claim of status, has shown not a bit of interest. Taylor embraces atonality but bends it to grandly romantic purposes; he is a master of polyrhythms, counter-rhythms, implicit and suspended time, which he deploys in lengthy, complicated yet spontaneous structures; he is a bold theorist and seldom acquiescent, though frequently collaborative. There is simply no other musician like him, although he has a few peers — with most of whom he’s concertized and recorded.
It seems inadequate to merely wish Cecil Taylor “happy birthday.” How should we celebrate? Here, from Ron Mann’s 1981 documentary Imagine the Sound, is a fine clip of the Maestro.
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Given all the noise, the National Endowment for the Arts’ $25 mil for arts, literature and education announced Feb. 7 may 
have been overlooked. But these funds and the projects they support, nationwide, should be noted. From more than $3 million going to initiatives strictly labeled “Music” (exclusive of “Musical Theater” or “Opera”) here’s my subjective selection of 50 grants referencing “jazz” and beyond.
The largest amounts among them go to Carnegie Hall to celebrate
Philip Glass’s 80th birthday ($85k and there’s a second grant on this theme, of $30k to the Pacific Symphony in Irvine CA ); to the Kennedy Center to present NEA Jazz Masters ($65K — I just heard Jazz Master pianist Randy Weston perform there, new arrangements of circa WWI music of James Reese Europe, a worthy program), and to the New Music America Foundation, ($60k to support the estimable and invaluable website NewMusicBox.org).
Most of the grants are far less. I believe there’s enormous return to the public on $10,000 to $15,000 spent on underwriting festivals, concert series, unusual performances, installations and education programs in communities from Northville, Michigan to Lorman, Mississippi, Woodstock NY (and Manhattan, Chinatown, Brooklyn) to Minneapolis-St. Paul, Chicago, Oakland, LA, Toledo, Juneau, Pittsburgh, Sioux Falls, Ann Arbor, Santa Cruz, Louisville, Phoenix, and so on.
Sound investments, each one of these events (and many more supported by the NEA — really, see what good our taxes do, so cheaply. By comparision, $25 mil is the “relatively miniscule” (Time magazine, Jan 3 2018) amount just approved to fund development of a new road-mobile, ground-launched cruise missile, which Time reports is prohibited by Cold War agreements.
Oh, never mind. Here’s an entr’acte, then the grants.
I hasten to repeat — this is a selection out of hundreds of NEA supported programs. Jazz, new and unusual music are also funded, if indirectly, in grants categorized as going to dance, folk and traditional arts, local arts agencies, media arts, museums, presenting and multi-disciplinary works. Every state from Alabama to Wyoming as well as the District of Columbia got funds. Support continued funding for the NEA.
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The first Jazz Congress co-hosted by Jazz at Lincoln Center and JazzTimes magazine Jan 11 and 12, 2018 and the 14th annual 
Winter JazzFest Marathon produced in downtown Manhattan Jan 12 and 13, offered contrasts and prompted crosstalk. It wasn’t like these were conventions of different parties, but different narratives were going down.
The Congress’s sessions included JALC managing and artistic director Wynton Marsalis speaking on race and jazz, women in jazz announcing “yes, we’re here,” and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar keynoting about his love of the 
music. It was a schmooze fest for managers, publicists, presenters, musicians, writers, photographers, recording company execs and die-hard fans, who enjoyed themselves in JALC’s comfortable and scenic spaces.
The WJF produced by Bryce Rosenbloom’s Boom Collective presented some 100 concerts in 11 venues, showing rather than telling who’s doing what in the marketplace of rhythmic-driven vernacular songs and improvisation. It was flush with fervor, attended by folks with obviously wide-open ears.
Here’s Marsalis despairing that black people don’t support jazz, that the young are ashamed of the swing beat, that black music is willfully ignored by music conservatories, that white people can’t dance. Pianist/writer Ethan Iverson mostly nods in agreement, announcing that jazz is black music but we’re all Omni-Americans (the late Albert Murray’s admirable assertion).
Jazz And Race: A Conversation – Jazz Congress 2018 from Wynton Marsalis on Vimeo.
No single clip can encompass the creative/political/sonic thrust of 2018 WJF — which after Marathon weekend continued another five days, with star-heavy tributes to Alice Coltrane and Geri Allen, for instance — but here’s a taste from the WJF appearance of singer Jose James at le Poisson Rouge, revisiting Bill Wither’s 1972 folk-rock-r&B hit “Use Me” (which Esther Phillips covered that same year,
and the Portuguese-Australian-Netherlandquintet Mn’Jam Experiment has more recently, with improvised video). A purist might disavow any of these three versions as jazz. Whatever. I like it.
The best WJF sets I heard were —
Pace Wynton Marsalis, who truly does travel the spaceways trying to stir up mainstream audiences for “jazz” and has been singing his downbeat tune for a while, here was considerable evidence “jazz” is healthy, provided we allow “jazz” to be defined by people interested in (as well as artists exploring) what its variable parameters suggest it might be. “Jazz,” our most immediately engaged of art forms is, from my experience at WJF, my usual perspective in Chicago and global correspondence, responding with openness, daring, unbowed energy and spirit to social, economic and technological developments in real time, virtually everywhere.
The acts I cite above and others at the Marathon — flutist Jamie Baum’s Septet introducing new material; the Sun Ra Arkestra interacting with its 40-Â
year-old soundtrack on the Ra-on-film spectacle Space Is The Place; a clangorous attempt by out-jazz/black rock trio Harriet Tubman plus ringers to update Ornette Coleman’s iconic suite Free Jazz — as a matter of course featured multi-racial/religious/ethnic/gendered personnel. Exception proving the rule: saxophone terror James Carter’s Electrik Outlet, four guys who didn’t get the memo re: backing off on sexual innuendo.
 I walked the Marathon route from the New School’s Tishman Auditorium to Subculture on Bleeker and Lafayette, in New York University territory, and everywhere were audiences of wide age span and diverse ancestry. Perhaps not as many, not as young or diverse, not as easily drawn in as we of the hardcore would like, but it’s not a scene in downturn, either — except maybe financially. Which is, of course, a catastrophe, since even jazz musicians (and jazz journalists) have to eat.
Of course, this was Manhattan during a special week in musical presentation, facing an international audience. The convention of the Association of Performing Arts Presenters — those who book artists for your elite venues — was going on, and globalFEST, and other showcases like the club Birdland’s multi-night stand of Vijay Iyer’s sextet of heavies from his critically hailed ECM album Far From Over were scheduled with this in mind. True, ching-ching-a-ling swing as established in the 1930s was not the predominant WJF beat. But I did hear drumming — by Tyshawn Sorey, Matt Wilson, J.T. Lewis and Ms. Tinnin, check ’em out — that swung hard, informed by Art Blakey, Max Roach, Dannie Richmond, Tony Williams, and others of the tradition.
Jamaaladeen Tacuma, photo by Mitch Myers
I prefer music that takes its momentum from the bottom up, rather than float moodily and ethereally, so that’s what I pursued. There were probably WJF sets that didn’t grip or groove, but everyone I heard was thinking about form and substance, and hoped to engage listeners rather than assume their attentions.
There was music at the Jazz Congress. The JALC’s rotunda stage, with floor-to-ceiling windows viewing Columbus Circle and Central Park, had student groups mostly serving as backdrops. But then the Congress was meant to be a venue for bringing up if not working out issues affecting the music’s current ecosystem. The emphasis was on hot topics and casual bump-intos.
So I heard NPR and DownBeat contributor Michelle Mercer moderate a panel on “Women in Jazz” (as distinct from the one she moderated for the JJA’s Jan. 13 Jazz Media Summit on women in jazz journalism). On it, trumpeter/teacher/activist Ellen Seeling explained what it’s taken to get Marsalis’s Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra to institute blind auditions and published notification for jobs. Trumpeter Ingrid Jensen and writer John Murph commented on their work lives, being mostly positive but reporting fulltime awareness that biases about gender, race, sexual orientation, class, etc. might affect professional relationships. Drummer Terri Lyne Carrington, honored by the Congress with its Bruce Lundvall Visionary Award, spoke of mentoring middle school girls learning to play jazz as well as later — and perhaps even earlier — students.
Abdul-Jabbar, beloved for his basketball prowess and unforced charm, in his keynote address (starting in this video at 42 minutes in), told of loving the music. Nothing new there, but he got a standing ovation. There were also presentations by producers of the NPR/WBGO/Jazz at Lincoln Center radio-and- video show Jazz Night in America and independent programmers forums organized by JazzWeek. It’s good to see people from all across the US — Randall Kline of SFJazz, John Gilbreath of Earshot Jazz in Seattle, Tom Guralnick out of Albuquerque, Terri Pontremoli from Cleveland’s Tri-C Jazz Festival, Mark Christman of Ars Nova Workshop, Philadelphia as well as colleagues from France (journalist/broadcaster Alex Duthil), Zurich (Intakt Records producer Patrick Landolt), Toronto (Jane Bunnett and Larry Cramer), London (John Cummings), Bremen (Peter Schulze of JazzAhead!), and lots of East Coast-based associates.
The Jazz Congress replaced the Jazz Connect conference formerly run by JazzTimes and the Jazz Forward Coalition. Coalition principals such as Don Lucoff (DLMedia, PDX Jazz/Portland OR) and Peter Gordon (Thirsty Ear Records) addressed the Congress, too. A good time was had. And then to hear music in New York City! With jazz of the WJF calibre available to record and tour, listenership could grow, if the sector figured out a business model. For all the talk at the Congress, little of it focused on tapping new income streams. At the JazzFest, the plan was, “We’ll play, you’ll come.” Yeah, if folks find out about it, and the show’s not too far from home.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. weekend ’18 was a big one for jazz in NYC with the first Jazz Congress at Jazz at Lincoln Center, a glorious Winter Jazz Fest, artists showcases at the conference of APAP (the Association of Performing Arts Presenters) and diverse independent venues — but not least of all the first ever (?!?) panel discussion of gender issues by four women who are professional jazz journalists (documented to vlogger Ms Michal Shapiro).
Above, Jordannah Elizabeth
Michelle Mercer
Michelle Mercer, of NPR and DownBeat’s Hotbox reviewing section, author of books on Joni Mitchell and Wayne Shorter, moderated a candid 90-minute session with Jordannah Elizabeth (Amsterdam News, Ms. blog, author, lecturer and educator; ethnomusicologist, educator, writer and radio producer Lara Pelligrinelli, and Natalie Weiner, associate editor of Billboard, podcast co-host and writer on sports as well as jazz.
Lara Pellegrinelli – NewSchool.edu
Natalie Weiner – WBGO.org
“Women in Jazz Journalism” was the morning opener of three discussions in a daylong Jazz Media Summit, free to the public, at the Jazz Gallery on January 13, produced by the Jazz Journalists Association. Some 60 people attended the discussions, many participating — including WBGO’s director of content Nate Chinen, singer Joan-Watson Jones, cellist Akua Dixon, flutist Andrea Brachfeld, Capital District media activist Susan Brink, saxophonist Roxie Coss, public relations expert Carolyn McClair and veteran jazz journalists such as David Adler, Steve Griggs, David Grogan, James Hale, Willard Jenkins, Ashley Kahn, Jimmy Katz, Jim Macnie, Bill Milkowski, Russ Musto, Don Palmer, Ted Panken, Greg Tate, Neil Tesser.
The Jazz Congress, Jan 11 and 12, produced by Jazz Times magazine (as it did the Jazz Connect Conference this congress has replaced) and Jazz At Lincoln Center – drew some 400 attendees from the international cadre of music makers and sustainers for intense schmoozing, a keynote speech by Kareem Abdul Jabbar, and also panel discussions. The Winter JazzFest Marathons on Friday and Saturday nights featured more than 50 performances in almost a dozen venues, from 6 pm to after 2 am. Both events to be covered in my next post. For now, consider the works of women in jazz journalism.
Photographer-writer-author Ken Franckling has painstakingly compiled a compendium of more than 400 jazz artists and associates from around the world who died in 2017, with links to obituaries of most of them. Posted at JJANews.org.
Muhal Richard Abrams – © Santá István Csaba
It’s a striking document and useful resource, though Franckling says, sadly, “The list seems to get depressingly longer each year.”
Maybe that’s because jazz itself — at least as so recorded and promoted — is now more than 100 years old and the
Roswell Rudd ©Santá István Csaba
post-WWII generations that gave the art form its fervent audiences and inspired players for the past 70 years are inevitably thinning.
But as Franckling depicts in his recent book Jazz in the Key of Light, energy and brilliance yet abound. My own 2017 experiences
Willie Pickens, photo by Marc PoKempner
of jazz in schools, nightclubs, festivals and grassroots events across the country, in Europe, Asia, South and Central America, in general media manifestations and the stubbornly independent underground suggest the music is everywhere, really, if often overlooked and underfinanced.
That said, I’m going to miss a lot of those creative artists who died during the past 12 months — especially Muhal Richard Abrams, 
Geri Allen, Nat Hentoff, Bern Nix, Roswell Rudd and Willie Pickens, all of whom I’ve often listened to, enjoyed and learned from.
Luckily, as their unique expressions and ideas have been documented, we will be able to summon something of them, spirits and thoughts, again and again. A primer —
Muhal Richard Abrams,  Mama and Daddy Compositions with improv take surprising turns, as played by aspontaneous, multi-hued ensemble.
rations by a quintetfeaturing her one-time husband trumpeter Wallace Rooney and a mentor, alto saxist Ornette Coleman.
players of the ’30s to the ’60s. The Nats heard them talkin’, and made sure we could, too.
humble, contrary and lyrical, contributing most memorably to Ornette Coleman’s peerless electric Prime Time.
vivid, playfully rough and tumble, modernistic fun.
religious and Christmas music. There’s also a duet with Marian McPartland, an album with Elvin Jones on tour, and his contribution to Eddie Harris’ hit version of “Exodus.” Time rewarded.
Willie Pickens, photo by Marc PoKempner
Pianist Willie Pickens, 86, a powerful, lyrical and generous modernist who performed, taught and mentored young musicians from Chicago starting in 1959, died of a heart attack on Dec. 12 while at Jazz at Lincoln Center in New York City, readying himself to play at Dizzy’s Club Coca-Cola with 29-year-old trumpeter Marquis Hill. Having heard him often in the past three years, I can attest that Pickens was at the height of his creativity, and a warm, engaging presence in every public context.
For instance, at the 40th anniversary party of Southport Records (which put out his debut cd as a leader, It’s About Time!, in 1986) at the Green Mill last Nov. 5, Willie performed a stunning rendition of “Giant Steps,” John Coltrane’s chord-running piece, and then improvised piano duets with composer George Flynn. The two tangled seriously, thornily, although they’d only had talk-through preparation. Willie said afterwards that he’d had to stretch.
However, extending himself seemed to come naturally for this gentleman, who taught music in Chicago’s public schools from the mid ’60s until the mid ’90s, when he went on international tour with Coltrane drummer Elvin Jones’ Jazz Machine.
Prior to then he’d gained a reputation and fans without leaving town very often. He earned admiration as a frequent collaborator with well-known jazz stars passing through Chicago, often gigging at Joe Segal’s Jazz Showcase.
Pickens’ style is hard to pin down, but typically flowed readily, richly, as if from a reservoir of knowledge and inspired imagination. He seems to have been influenced by or akin to such jazz innovators as McCoy Tyner, Thelonious Monk and perhaps Herbie Nichols. Although his hands were not large, notes, phrases and chords all rolled out from them with firmness and fullness. He was melodically and rhythmically exciting, and harmonically investigatory. I never heard him play with less than total involvement. Like here:
Pickens is heard on saxophonist Eddie Harris’ 1961 hit version of the theme from “Exodus”; he recorded with Marian McPartland as well as with Elvin Jones, and A Jazz Christmas (on Southport), which led to his 2016 Kennedy Center “Jazz Piano Christmas” concert. According to Howard Reich in the Chicago Tribune, Pickens had a spiritual side, reflected in his oversight of an annual Christmas benefit concert at Hyde Park Union Church. He initiated the jazz program at south side Kenwood Academy High School in the ’60s, taught for years at Northern Illinois University, founded the Ravinia Jazz Mentor program in north suburban Highland Park in 1995 and intended to continue work in Ravinia’s Reach Teach Play Education program when he returned from New York. He had appeared at the Hyde Park Jazz Festival, and at Jazz Institute of Chicago events including its summer Straightahead Jazz Camp. He had a welcoming smile.
Chicago has a long legacy of important, creative and popular pianists — think Jelly Roll Morton, Earl Hines, Nat “King” Cole, Ahmad Jamal, Herbie Hancock — and Willie Pickens has a place in that line. His daughter Bethany Pickens is also a pianist, and teaches at Kenwood Academy High School. The two played Christmas song, jazzily, at the Kennedy Center in 2016, on two pianos. That was something like standard operating procedure; here’s their 2015 performance at Chicago’s Piano Forte, originally broadcast live by radio station WDCB.
Willie Pickens will be missed, and remembered.
howardmandel.com
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