Jazz developed in the United States, but it has long been an international music and many of its most prominent players are from other countries. The Dane Svend Asmussen is coming in for even more attention than usual lately. Attention is far from new in the career of the remarkable violinist, but when a musician is halfway through his tenth decade and still swinging, he gets extra notice. One who notices is Will Friedwald. He writes about Asmussen in today's Wall Street Journal. Here's the … [Read more...]

Regarding the "Where We Are" item below, Rifftides reader Cyril Moshkow writes Looks like the info is not exactly complete, as many people read through RSS aggregation (which does not include logging in.) For instance, I am reading Rifftides in Moscow, Russia, but almost never directly -- it is aggregated in my blogroll. That's a good point, Cyril. Unfortunately the site meter doesn't calculate RSS deliveries, so we cannot know how many people sign on by that means. Be sure to visit Mr. … [Read more...]

Rifftides readers are all over the world, more concentrated in some countries than others. We don't hear much from Cuba or Outer Mongolia, for instance. Here is a list of nations where readers have logged on to Rifftides in the past week. Australia Brazil Canada China Czech Republic France Germany Ghana Iceland Israel Japan Netherlands New Zealand Portugal United Kingdon United States By most accounts, there are 195 countries on earth. Sixteen are represented in that list. The Rifftides staff … [Read more...]