Jazz News
(aus dem Jazzinstitut Darmstadt)

25 March - 7 April 2021 | Ausgabe 07/2021 (English)

We read the morning paper for you!                                     

Dear jazz friends,

The Jazzinstitut's JazzNews keeps you up-to-date with news of the jazz world, which we collect, summarize, and issue via e-mail about once a week. This service can also be accessed on our website (www.jazzinstitut.de), where it is updated on a daily basis.

If you need bibliographies of the musicians named in our JazzNews, please click on our website’s Jazz Index page. This is a bibliographical reference to jazz-related books, magazines, journals and other sources that you can access without charge. If you don't find the name(s) you’re looking for, feel free to e-mail us! We will send you Jazz Index digests of articles about musicians as they make the news.

Now, have fun reading about the jazz week that was!

... brief news ...

Sheryl Nance-Nash looks at the jazz scene in places usually off the major US jazz map such as Richmond, Virginia; Columbia, South Carolina; Buffalo, New York; Norfolk, Virginia; Madison, Wisconsin; Tulsa, Oklahoma; and Rochester, New York (New York Amsterdam News). --- Karl Lippegaus talks to the Danish guitarist Jakob Bro (NRW Jazz).

Heinrich Schwazer talks to the Italian pianist Franco D'Andrea about listening to Andrew Hill's recordings during the pandemic, about African music and the influence of Thelonious Monk, about his initiation to jazz through Louis Armstrong, about his start in jazz with a German-speaking band in Upper Addige (South Tyrol) although he himself never really learned German, about the aging audience for jazz and the need to attract younger people to the music, as well as about his interest in 1960s free jazz and the influence of both Anton Webern and John Coltrane on his music (Südtiroler Tageszeitung). --- Joshua Barone remembers the composer Kurt Weill in whose compositions from the Weimar era of 1920s Germany he sees qualities that equally fitted his later career for the American musical theatre (New York Times).

Peter Kemper listens to saxophonist Pharoah Sanders' latest album (FAZ), and so do Marcus J. Moore (The Nation) and Richard Williams (The Blue Moment). --- Dan Kelly remembers the Kansas City pianist and singer Julia Lee (The Kansas City Star). --- Dave Itzkoff talks to the trumpeter Doc Severinsen about a new documentary about his life and career, about 30 years as musical director of The Tonight Show, about how he dealt with his alcohol and drug addiction, as well as about still discovering something new about the trumpet after all these years (New York Times).

Martin Chilton remembers the singer Astrud Gilberto who is famous for her bossa nova interpretations but had a career after her successful album with Stan Getz, who never felt comfortable being labeled a jazz singer and also recorded with artists as diverse as Stanley Turrentine, James Last, and George Michael before taking "indefinite time off" performing in 2002 and spending her time campaigning against cruelty to animals (U Discover Music). --- Andreas Hartmann talks to the German electro DJ Mathias Modica about jazz being the music of the day in London, Los Angeles and Berlin, about his own musical road which touched jazz, Stockhausen and Nono, about "Krautjazz" and how jazz might soon be the most recognizable sound color of the musical diversity heard in Berlin (Der Tagesspiegel).

Micha Hörnle looks back at the last 70 years of the SWR Radio Big Band in Germany, founded in 1951 as Südfunk-Tanzorchester (Southern Radio Dance Orchestra) (Rhein-Neckar-Zeitung). --- Mitch Myers remembers the saxophonist Albert Ayler in an essay reprinted from 2004 (Magnet Magazine). --- Marcus A. Woelfle talks to the German saxophonist, composer and journalist Günter Buhles (Neue Musikzeitung).

Michael Toland talks to the trombonist Andre Hayward about his roots in gospel music, about working with Roy Hargrove and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, as well as about the jazz scene in Austin, Texas, where he moved in 2011 (Austin Chronicle). --- Marcus J. Moore talks to the bassist and singer Esperanza Spalding about her new project "12 Little Spells", about the compositional process for her latest release, "Triangle", about the medicinal powers of music, as well as about her own Songwrights Apthecary Lab label "where she, other musicians and practitioners in music therapy and medicine will explore how songwriters blend therapeutic sounds into their work" (New York Times).

Matthieu Jouan tells the story of the Nigerian drummer August Agbola Browne who moved first to London, then to Warsaw in 1922 where he purportedly recorded in 1928, married his Polish wife in 1932, worked with a number of dance orchestras in the 1930s, and was the only Black participant in the Warsaw Uprising of 1944. After the war he worked in the Departure of Culture in Warsaw until he emigrated to London in 1958 (Courier d'Europe Centrale). --- Bert Noglik looks at the life and musical career of the German trumpeter Manfred Schoof on the occasion of his 85th birthday (MDR).

Nadja Sayej talks to the producer Quincy Jones about the idea of Qwest TV, a video streaming platform he started some years ago (Forbes). --- Paul Zollo reports about a documentary revealing that the Grammy-winning saxophonist Dave Koz "is not a real person, but an elaborate hoax perpetrated by veteran British actor Sir Richard Leighton" (American Songwriter). Only when looking at the date of the announcement for the film (April 1, 2021) does one gets an idea of the magnitude of this revelation.

Will Layman talks to the pianist Jon Batiste about his genre-crossing activities in the last year, about the example of Nat King Cole as a piano-playing and singing TV personality mixing musical genres, about the creativity of hip-hop, and the importance of dance for his music, about some of his recent collaborations, as well as about his latest album "We Are" (Pop Matters). --- Ari Shapiro talks to the multi-instrumentalist Angel Bat Dawid about how the film "Amadeus" made her discover Mozart's music at the age of 4 whose clarinet concerto made her want to play that instrument, about Blackness being central to her music, as well as about the inspiration she got from George Clinton's music (NPR).

Obituaries

We learned of the passing of saxophonist Aaron Martin Jr. at the age of 73 (Capitol Bop, Washington Post), the pianist Frank O'Brien at the age of 78 (Newsday), the British bassist and synthesizer pioneer Malcolm Cecil at the age of 84 (U Discover Music, NME), the drummer Buddy Deppenschmidt at the age of 85 (The Philadelphia Inquirer, Washington Post), the Canadian saxophonist Bernard Stepien at the age of 74 (Ottawa Citizen), the flutist and bassist John Starr at the age of 68 (The Baltimore Sun), as well as the French film maker Bertrand Tavernier at the age of 79 (Variety, Neue Zürcher Zeitung, New York Times, The Guardian).

From the World of Jazz Research

openwork – Call for Papers
openwork is a new peer-reviewed journal that publishes research into experimental music, art and scholarship. Currently, openwork is looking for contributions (from artists, activists, curators and scholars) that develop critical theories of listening. Openwork is particularly interested in contributions that explore the rich dimensions of listening beyond audio- or anthropocentric frames, delving into listening practices that unsettle and redefine space, time and relation. More information: openwork proposals.

Last Week at the Jazzinstitut 

(New) books we read
Among the books on our desk the last couple of weeks was "Rabbit's Blues. The Life and Music of Johnny Hodges", by Con Chapman; as well as the screenplay "A Jazzman's Tale- A screenplay memoir of 1950s jazz trumpeter and pianist Charles Freeman Lee", by Annette Johnson (see the Jazzinstitut's book review page).

17th Darmstadt Jazzforum "Roots_Heimat. Wie offen ist der Jazz?"
We are reminded of aspects of our next Darmstadt Jazzforum's topic everywhere. For instance, Peter Slavid reports about the initiative Black Lives in Music that tries to raise awareness for Black musicians in the UK (London Jazz News). Larry Blumenfeld reviews Allen Lowe's new book "'Turn Me Loose, White Man', or: Appropriating Culture: How to Listen to American Music, 1900‐1960" (Wall Street Journal). Gerdo von Randow writes about cultural appropriation (Die Zeit). And George E. Lewis moderates two panels (one in English, the other in German) about "Afrodiasporic Experimentalism" at MaerzMusik festival in Berlin both of which can be viewed online (MaerzMusik).

One of the panelists of the Berlin event is the musicologist Harald Kisiedu who will also be participating in our 17th Darmstadt Jazzforum conference (30 September - 2 October 2021) that has by now been retitled a number of times. It's final title narrows the discussion to "Roots_Heimat: Wie offen ist der Jazz", using two terms, "roots" and "Heimat" that may seem exchangeable to some, yet contain quite different connotations, especially to German musicians, listeners, fans. We have invited a number of scholars, journalists, and musicians, and we will include three panels talking about issues of identity in jazz in general, about how important it is to honor the music's origin while jazz has been adopted as a national treasure all around the globe, and about how the music addresses valid questions of identity especially in Germany. We will keep you updated in the next issues of our newsletter and on our website (17th Darmstadt Jazzforum).

The Louis Armstrong International Continuum
That Jazzinstitut will be participating in the "Louis Armstrong International Continuum" conference organized by Columbia University on 8-9 April 2021. The Jazzinstitut's Wolfram Knauer will be one of the presenters along with scholars and musicians such as Dwight Andrews, Gina Belafonte, Daphne Brooks, Ron Carter, David Chevan, Tongo Eisen-Martin, Jackie Harris, Stefon Harris & Blackout, Emily Lordi, René Marie, Wynton Marsalis, Ingrid Monson, Jason Moran, Dan Morgenstern , Robert O’Meally, Ainissa Ramirez, Ricky Riccardi, Bobby Sanabria, Howard Schain, Robin Bell Stevens, Brianna Thomas, Chris Washburne, Cornel West, and James Zollar. The virtual symposium and concert is free and open to everyone. Pre-registration is required (Louis Armstrong Educational Foundation, Columbia University; registration).

Jazzinstitut at JazzAhead
Iris Hetscher talks to the trade fair JazzAhead's head Sybille Kornitschky about what's planned, who can participate and how (Weser-Kurier). The Jazzinstitut will definitively participate in this year's digital JazzAhead from 29 April - 2 May 2021 (JazzAhead). We will be available to talk about aspects of our daily work as an information and documentation center, and we will provide insights into some of our services such as the Wegweiser Jazz database mapping the German jazz scene, musicians, clubs, festivals and much more (www.wegweiserjazz.de).

Current opening hours of the Jazzinstitut
Until 18 April 2021 the Jazzinstitut is closed to the public. After that we will be open by appointment only. Research slots will be given out with exact time slots for one visitor at a time. At the same time we continue our offer for research help by phone, e-mail or video-call. If you would like to schedule a video call, please send an e-mail to make an appointment and give us an idea what you want to talk about. We will then reply with a link for a Webex video session for your meeting.

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The Jazzinstitut is an institution of the City of Sciences Darmstadt | Das Jazzinstitut ist eine Einrichtung der Wissenschaftsstadt Darmstadt