Archives for June 2006

It was not my intention to open a forum covering the range of abuse of the English language. At some point, we'll have to move on, but this is too much fun to cut off yet. If we had stopped, I wouldn't have been able to mention what happened at dinner tonight in Seattle. I thanked the waitress for … [Read more...]

It's Jazz And Other Matters, remember? We'll get back to jazz before long. Rifftides readers have my mind on words, and Seattle has my mind on the splendid weather they're having here and the hike I took around Green Lake. When the weather is good, as it is most Junes, there is no more … [Read more...]

A Rifftides reader named Deborah writes in response to the Clifford Brown item: Ah. The penny just dropped. I am a fairly new listener to jazz, and sometimes I feel like I'll never get up to speed. The first album I ever bought was John Lewis-The Wonderful World of Jazz and it remains an all-time … [Read more...]

Reaction has begun coming in to the more or less lighthearted Rifftides posting about annoying, overused phrases. Here's a note from Bill Holman. Doug, Your response to "if you will' is the same as mine. Nancy is still taken aback when, while we're watching TV, I blurt "I won't!". How about "as we … [Read more...]

In 1975, Mike Levy, the publisher of Texas Monthly, and Gregory Curtis, a staff writer, visited me in my office at KSAT-TV in San Antonio. They were on a tour to create good will for the fledgling magazine, which was even then attracting national notice for its quality. In the course of the … [Read more...]

"That said..." ."..the likes of..." (He has played with the likes of Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, Charlie Parker and Andres Segovia.) "...looking to..." (The President is looking to cut taxes.) "...Indeed." Mindlessly intoned by anchors as a way of demonstrating sophisticated understanding. Or … [Read more...]

Terri Hinte has been fired by Concord Records. Her name will not mean a thing to most of you, but her work has indirectly benefited serious jazz listeners for decades. The news of her dismissal is of intense interest to many writers because Ms. Hinte is the very model of what a record company … [Read more...]

A Rifftides Reader who identifies himself only as David P. sent a link to his internet radio website, which is called Poolside Jazz: Cooler Than The Cool Side Of The Pillow. The music I heard there in a half-hour visit was cool only in the slang sense. In succession, David P. played Fletcher … [Read more...]

Barbara Nessim, the artist known for her Rolling Stone, TIME and New York Times Magazine covers, among other works, has a fascinating website tracking her output from the beginning of her career in the 1960s to the present. It includes a piece of video showing Nessim's hands as she invents place … [Read more...]

The Jazz Journalists Association announced its annual awards last night in New York. Roy Haynes was honored for lifetime achievement in jazz. Sonny Rollins was named musician of the year, Dafnis Prieto up and coming musician of the year, Thelonious Monk Quartet with John Coltrane at Carnegie Hall, … [Read more...]

After Fathers Day activity (a present, a card, a few phone calls) subsided, I listened to two CDs, one because the publicist for the band keeps calling and asking if I've heard it, the other because I try never to go longer than a month without a Harry Allen fix. Harry Allen Allen is a … [Read more...]

Alec Wilder (1907-1980) wrote sonatas, suites, concertos, operas, film scores, ballets, art songs, woodwind quintets, brass quintets and music for French horn. In his composing, he was as prolific as he was ingenious and eclectic, but his work was politically incorrect in the sense that it did not … [Read more...]

When I set out on a short bicycle ride yesterday, I had every intention of being at the computer by noon and writing the rest of the day. I ended up cruising along the Yakima River, and it captured me. The stream was swollen with snow melt from the Cascade mountains. This photograph shows the river … [Read more...]

Jim Wilke, who produces and hosts the splendid Jazz After Hours program carried by radio stations across the land, is also an accomplished performance and recording engineer. He frequently combines his specialties in Jazz Northwest, a broadcast he does once a week on KPLU-FM, the Seattle-Tacoma jazz … [Read more...]

Following yesterday's posting about Jeremy Steig's Flute Fever (see the item below this one), Bill McBirnie was moved to expand on his enthusiastic evaluation. To wit: Even though I am a self-declared disciple of Hubert Laws, Flute Fever is, without qualification, my favourite jazz flute recording. … [Read more...]

The fine Canadian flutist Bill McBirnie writes: I am so glad to hear someone acknowledge what is truly a masterpiece...Flute Fever...with Jeremy Steig (flute) and Denny Zeitlin (piano). When will this album ever be re-issued on CD?! That question has been asked frequently over the years (by me, … [Read more...]

Tag in a Jazz At Lincoln Center news release: Brooks Brothers is the official clothier of the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis … [Read more...]

Richard M. Sudhalter, the gifted cornetist, biographer of Bix Beiderbecke and invaluable jazz historian, needs help. Following a massive stroke nearly three years ago and a recent diagnosis that he has MSA (multiple system atrophy), Dick's medical bills have mounted to proportions that he cannot … [Read more...]