Funding for the arts in The United States may be eliminated or drastically reduced if the Trump administration has its way, but an established arts showcase will be presented this evening, we hope not for the last time. The 2017 National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Masters will be honored at the John F. Kennedy Center Washington, DC. They are pictured above. Here are the NEA’s descriptions:
Dee Dee Bridgewater, vocalist, producer, broadcaster
Ira Gitler, author, editor, producer, educator
Dave Holland, bassist, cellist, composer, bandleader
Dick Hyman, keyboardist, composer, arranger
Dr. Lonnie Smith, organist, composer
All but Gitler, who is ailing, will be present and are expected to speak. Gitler’s son Fitz will represent him. At 7:30 p.m. Eastern time, the NEA will stream the event live on its website. National Public Radio will carry it at NPR.org/Music
From the NEA announcement:
The concert will include performances by NEA Jazz Masters Paquito D’Rivera and Lee Konitz, as well as Bill Charlap, Theo Croker, Aaron Diehl, Robin Eubanks, James Genus, Donald Harrison, Booker T. Jones, Sherrie Maricle and the Diva Jazz Orchestra, Peter Martin, Mike Moreno, China Moses, Steve Nelson, Kassa Overall, Chris Potter, Dianne Reeves, Nate Smith, Dan Tepfer, and Matthew Whitaker.
For further information, see the NEA site. If Rifftides readers watch or listen to the presentation, please jot a note or two and let us know your impressions by way of the comment function below.
Nice, but wrong link for NEA!
I hope Rifftides will make special comment on the award to Ira Gitler, for his exceptional writings (e.g. From Swing to Bop) and his elegant, richly informative album notes and reviews—for over a half-century, at least.
What a fabulous evening. The tickets were free, but needed to be reserved in advance, and then picked up at the box office beginning two hours before the show. To our relief, the actual tickets, when we picked them up, were for reserved seats, saving us from having to queue up early twice, and allowing us to catch the free set from Paquito D’Rivera at 6. I had no idea he was so funny. At one point he started talking about how people think Mozart is Austrian, but that he and Wynton Marsalis had researched the matter and figured out he was from New Orleans. Sure enough, D’Rivera then played part of Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto. “Does that sound Austrian to you?” Not the way he played it.
The Diva Jazz Orchestra began playing before the actual show started, soon after the audience began filing in. That was a nice touch. I won’t give a blow by blow of the whole show, especially since it’s already archived online, but the whole thing, which was supposed to last about 90 minutes, happily ran more than double that. It was a joyous and moving evening,
Thanks goodness Ira Gitler has been honoured in this way – as is said in the video he did it all, and for so long, without any byline in a National publication. The great book, “Jazz Masters of The ’40s”, is his masterpiece – and he is responsible, at least in some part, for the resurgence of Dexter Gordon…. and for placing Charlie Christian in his proper place, too… I think him the best, ever, in his field… The greatest to receive the NEA award in this catagory.
Anyways – I wish to corraborate Mr. Shoemaker’s totally legitimate point. The list you give, here, of West Coast players, is really, with the happy exception of the genius himself, Bill Holman, comprised of masters whose careers were, for the greater part, made in the East.
It’s sad to think Jimmy Rowles, Conte Candoli, Bill Perkins, Maynard, the great Bud Shank, Shelly Manne, Monty Budwig, Russ Freeman, Lennie Niehaus, Bob Florence, the genius Clare Fisher, the incredibly great Gene Puerling, Herb Geller, Red Mitchell, the truly great Mundell Lowe, Jack Sheldon, or Art Pepper & Shorty Rogers (can I be right about Art Pepper and Shorty? Shame if I am) never received the acolade due them. Others too…
At least Bobby Huthcerson did (Hubert Laws, too). I guess Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter and Freddie Hubbard were all West Coast dwellers at one point or other – but their achievements were almost always on the East.