Saxophonist Branford Marsalis says music
will be the key to rebuilding New Orleans
It's been a couple of weeks since the last installment of "Notes from the Net," and the backlog of items is even more of a hodge-podge than usual. But some things never change, and one of 'em is that we always try to start this feature off with a little something about Miles Davis. You'll need enough bandwidth for streaming video (sorry dial-up users) to check out this short profile of the trumpeter.
In the news: Drummer Jeff Hamilton was in town recently to perform at the Greater St. Louis Jazz Festival, but was only able to participate in Friday's events. Why? Because on the Saturday night of the Festival, he was being honored as a distinguished alumni of his old high school in Richmond, IN....Popular fusion favorites the Yellowjackets will make a return appearance in St. Louis in June to help wrap up Jazz at the Bistro's current season, but this week saxophonist Bob Mintzer and bassist Jimmy Haslip are in Boston teaching and performing with students of the prestigious Berklee School of Music. (If you'd like to get some that fancy Berklee-type schoolin' yourself, check out Berklee Shares, an online educational resource that offers free downloadable jazz instructional materials including MP3s, Quick Time files and PDF documents.)...Vocalist Erin Bode continues to mix travel dates with her gigs here in St. Louis, and later his month she'll be off to Minneapolis to play the Dakota, considered one of the top rooms in the Twin Cities.
McCoy Tyner, here last fall to play Finale with his trio, is hitting the road this spring and summer with a seven-piece band to celebrate the 45th anniversary of Impulse!, the 1960s label for which Tyner's former employer John Coltrane did some of his most memorable work. The House That 'Trane Built will be the name of a 4-CD compilation of some of the label's best stuff, and also the name of a forthcoming book by noted critic and journalist Ashley Khan that will recount Impulse's history. Verve Music Group, which controls the Impulse! catalog, is also planning 10 new compilation CDs reissuing material from some of the label's top artists, and an hour-long public radio special.
Jazzfest lives: As the first major music festival held in the city since Hurricane Katrina, the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival (Jazzfest for short) is, understandably enough, being seen as an indicator of how the city is doing, and thus is drawing even more coverage that usual from national media. For more details, see these three reports on the start of the fest, this one about day #2, and these two New York Times pieces from Jon Pareles...Meanwhile, Preservation Hall has reopened, and New Orleans native Branford Marsalis used the start of Jazzfest to talk about how music must lead the rebuilding of the community and to promote the Musicians' Village project now being developed in the city by Habitat for Humanity.
Opinions? They got 'em!: This article from the Associated Press makes it seem as though they're quite impressed by the Josephine Baker exhibit currently at the Sheldon Art Galleries...However, veteran jazz pianist and educator Jack Reilly is not so impressed by European jazz musicians or the coverage of them in the latest issue of Down Beat...Slate's Fred Kaplan thinks the committee that awards the Pulitzer Prizes for music needs to try a new approach and honor more jazz composers...And finally, did you know that the wisdom of famous jazz musicians can be applied to help you make better business presentations? Neither did I, until I read this recent post from Presentation Zen, which is entertaining and instructive even if you never plan to go near a copy of PowerPoint.
(Edited immediately after posting to fix the headline and remove a duplicate post. Edited again on 5/3/06 to remove some random characters. Edited on 5/406 to add a missing link)
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