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Rifftides

Doug Ramsey on Jazz and other matters...

Kickstarting The Jazz Session

July 17, 2013 by Doug Ramsey

For many years, among the Other Places on the Rifftides blogroll has been Jason Crane’s The Jazz Session. Crane uses his radio experience, knowledge of music and focused curiosity to help readers and listeners understand jazz and jazz musicians. That is, he did until a few months ago when Jason Cranecircumstances ended five years of The Jazz Session. The program had guests—hundreds of them—as varied as Maria Schneider, Sonny Rollins, Marian McPartland, Wadada Leo Smith, Terry Gibbs, The Dirty Dozen Brass Band and Darcy James Argue. Now, Crane is planning a comeback and asking for help by way of a Kickstarter campaign. I asked him what brought about the hiatus and why he’s going public to get the show back on the road. Here is some of his reply:

I took some time off from the show and moved from New York to Alabama for financial reasons. I loved asking questions that got beyond the mechanics and uncovered the passion, the thought, the inspiration behind the music. Why do musicians do what they do? Answering that question was at the heart of the 417 episodes that aired from 2007-2012.

In looking back at the show, I’m still convinced that finding out what inspires jazz musicians is a valuable mission, and I’d like to get back to doing that work. The show had listeners in three-dozen countries and members in two-dozen. It was downloaded more than 2.5 million times. I think that means that people find this work valuable. And that’s why I’m asking folks to support it.

When I was on Crane’s show a few years ago, I thoroughly enjoyed Jason’s company and the experience. Each time I’ve heard The Jazz Session, I have learned from him and his guests. Crane’s page at the Kickstarter website (that’s a link) has a video of his pitch and details about the campaign.

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Doug Ramsey

Doug is a recipient of the lifetime achievement award of the Jazz Journalists Association. He lives in the Pacific Northwest, where he settled following a career in print and broadcast journalism in cities including New York, New Orleans, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, Portland, San Antonio, Cleveland and Washington, DC. His writing about jazz has paralleled his life in journalism... [Read More]

Rifftides

A winner of the Blog Of The Year award of the international Jazz Journalists Association. Rifftides is founded on Doug's conviction that musicians and listeners who embrace and understand jazz have interests that run deep, wide and beyond jazz. Music is its principal concern, but the blog reaches past... Read More...

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Doug’s Books

Doug's most recent book is a novel, Poodie James. Previously, he published Take Five: The Public and Private Lives of Paul Desmond. He is also the author of Jazz Matters: Reflections on the Music and Some of its Makers. He contributed to The Oxford Companion To Jazz and co-edited Journalism Ethics: Why Change? He is at work on another novel in which, as in Poodie James, music is incidental.

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Blogroll

All About Jazz
JerryJazzMusician
Carol Sloane: SloaneView
Jazz Beyond Jazz: Howard Mandel
The Gig: Nate Chinen
Wonderful World of Louis Armstrong
Don Heckman: The International Review Of Music
Ted Panken: Today is The Question
George Colligan: jazztruth
Brilliant Corners
Jazz Music Blog: Tom Reney
Brubeck Institute
Darcy James Argue
Jazz Profiles: Steve Cerra
Notes On Jazz: Ralph Miriello
Bob Porter: Jazz Etc.
be.jazz
Marc Myers: Jazz Wax
Night Lights
Jason Crane:The Jazz Session
JazzCorner
I Witness
ArtistShare
Jazzportraits
John Robert Brown
Night After Night
Do The Math/The Bad Plus
Prague Jazz
Russian Jazz
Jazz Quotes
Jazz History Online
Lubricity

Personal Jazz Sites
Chris Albertson: Stomp Off
Armin Buettner: Crownpropeller’s Blog
Cyber Jazz Today, John Birchard
Dick Carr’s Big Bands, Ballads & Blues
Donald Clarke’s Music Box
Noal Cohen’s Jazz History
Bill Crow
Easy Does It: Fernando Ortiz de Urbana
Bill Evans Web Pages
Dave Frishberg
Ronan Guilfoyle: Mostly Music
Bill Kirchner
Mike Longo
Jan Lundgren (Friends of)
Willard Jenkins/The Independent Ear
Ken Joslin: Jazz Paintings
Bruno Leicht
Earl MacDonald
Books and CDs: Bill Reed
Marvin Stamm

Tarik Townsend: It’s A Raggy Waltz
Steve Wallace: Jazz, Baseball, Life and Other Ephemera
Jim Wilke’s Jazz Northwest
Jessica Williams

Other Culture Blogs
Terry Teachout
DevraDoWrite
Alex Ross: The Rest Is Noise
On An Overgrown Path

Journalism
PressThink: Jay Rosen
Second Draft, Tim Porter
Poynter Online

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