Nothing that is worth knowing can be taught.—Oscar Wilde Jazz is like writing. It can be learned but not taught.—Paul Desmond … [Read more...]

An Occasional Series Jenney is famous for eight-bars of trombone improvisation on Artie Shaw's 1940 recording of "Stardust." Several months earlier with his own band, he played a full-length solo on this little-known version of Hoagy Carmichael's classic song. … [Read more...]

Recommendations in the center column, under Doug's Picks: CDs by a trumpeter, a bassist and an arranger A DVD documenting the birth of a piano A book of stories about a brass phenomenon … [Read more...]

Pianist Jack Reilly will be at the Johns Hopkins Medicine Center in Baltimore today to pay musical tribute to the memory of the doctor who saved his life. For details, go here. … [Read more...]

Rifftides reader Don Frese recommended this item from Bill Crow's "The Band Room" column in Allegro, the newspaper of New York Local 802 of the American Federation of musicians. The late British tenor man and club owner Ronnie Scott once told me that he was standing one day on the platform of a tube … [Read more...]

The November 4 post below and coverage elsewhere about James Moody's illness generated so much concern that it has created a problem in the Moody household. Here is part of a message from Moody's wife Linda. Would you mind posting that people should leave Moody messages on Facebook? Our computers … [Read more...]

The news about James Moody is not good. He has been aware of it for some time, but kept it private until this week. No one who knows him will be surprised that he is at peace with the decision he has made. Here is the first paragraph of George Varga's story in The San Diego Union Tribune. Jazz … [Read more...]

As noted in a Rifftides review last week, record companies from abroad often come to the United States to make CDs of American musicians. Conversely, it is not unusual for Americans to record when they are touring overseas. Either way, some of the best work of US artists is done for labels that … [Read more...]

At 7:45 pm PDT, 97 trick-or-treaters—and counting. Boo From Pennies From Heaven (1936) … [Read more...]

Mark Stryker, music critic of the Detroit Free Press, sent this note: Thought you might be interested in this— a couple months ago I recall a comment on your Mitch Miller/Bird post including a reference to the Australian Jazz Quartet/Quintet. The vibraphonist from the group, Jack Brokensha, a … [Read more...]

A year ago almost to the day, a Rifftides post called "The Art Of Art Farmer" featured three videos from Farmer's 1982 concert at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC. It also had some of my musings on the great trumpeter and flugelhornist. Two of the videos were later disabled by those … [Read more...]

Gail Pettis is an orthodontist turned singer (you may supply your own puns) who has commanded considerable notice in her brief new career. She has won awards, toured in Europe and Japan and recorded two albums praised by critics, including this one. Pettis's warmth and intelligence translate into … [Read more...]

By any assessment, jazz in the 21st century is a minority music. Depending on whose statistics are accurate, it accounts for somewhere between 1% and 3% of record sales, right in there with string quartets and Gregorian chants. Some of the music's best American players find that they are in greater … [Read more...]

Last night, millions of Americans watched the San Francisco Giants submerge the Texas Rangers in game one of the World Series. They also saw Tony Bennett sing—of course—"I Left My Heart in San Francisco" and at the 7th inning stretch, "God Bless America." If you missed it or if you are in … [Read more...]