Jazz News
(aus dem Jazzinstitut Darmstadt)

8 - 21 July 2021 | Ausgabe 14/2021 (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 ...

Raimund Jäger talks to pianist Peter Madsen about his career, about life in Vorarlberg, Austria, a region that reminds him of his Wisconsin home near Lake Michigan, as well as about looking forward to touring again after the pandemic (Kronen-Zeitung). --- Dan Ouellette remembers clarinetist Tony Scott who mastered bebop on his instrument and then became a pioneer of New Age music (U Discover Music).

Adrija Roychowdhury recalls the time when American soldiers were stationed in Calcutta during World War II and how that presence resulted in increased interest in all things American, including jazz (The Indian Express). --- Thomas Kapitel talks to German bassist Jens Loh about his youth in the Bodensee region, about his first jazz heroes, as well as about how he dealt with the pandemic (Südkurier).

Jesús Ruiz Mantilla talks to singer Rubén Blades about his near-involvement in Panama politics, about realpolitik in Latin American countries today, about his Panama heritage and how it affected his political views, about starting out in the USA without dreaming of making it as a musician, as well as about writing his memoir which will include how to pronounce his last name (El Pais). ---Jürgen Scharf talks to German saxophonist Gabriele Maurer about her current music studies in Hungary, about music helping her to "implement thoughts on an emotional level to reduce prejudices and intolerance", as well as about future plans for a project involving instruments like lyra and harp (Südkurier). Gabriele Maurer will be one of the panelists at our 17^th Darmstadt Jazzforum in late September, early October (Roots | Heimat. Wie offen ist der Jazz?).

Ed Masley talks to drummer Lewis Nash about his mentor, pianist and bandleader Charles Lewis whom he considers family and whose influence goes beyond music, and he talks to Charles Lewis about how he noticed the young drummer and how jazz education not only needs technical facility but also authenticity, after which both musicians remember some of the gigs they played together in the Phoenix area and some of the music they performed (Arizona Republic). --- Nate Chinen remembers the late pianist Frank Kimbrough who receives a tribute by more than 65 of his associates recording nearly 60 of his pieces, and he talks to pianists Elan Mehler and Craig Taborn, trumpeter Ron Horton, bassist Ben Allison, as well as saxophonist Joe Lovano about what Kimbrough and his music meant to them (New York Times).

Ted Gioia remembers pianist Austin Peralta who recorded with Ron Carter at age 15 but was dead at 22 (The Honest Broker). --- Uwe Bogen remembers German pianist and bandleader Erwin Lehn as Lehn's daughter marries at age 65 (Stuttgarter Zeitung). --- Sean J. O'Connell looks back at the life and music of guitarist Kenny Burrell (KCET). --- Natalie Weiner talks to jazz historian Ted Gioia about writing and revising his book "The History of Jazz" (Tulsa Public Radio). --- Richard S. Ginell listens to his choice of "the essential Herbie Hancock" (San Francisco Classical Voice).

Obituaries

We learned of the passing of the saxophonist Sam Reed at the age of 85 (The Philadelphia Tribune, Philadelphia Inquirer), the pianist Tracy A. Love at the age of 86 (Portland City Daily), the South African vocalist Tsepo Tshola at the age of 67 (News 24), the bandleader and composer Elliot Lawrence at the age of 96 (Showbiz 411, JazzWax), the Austrian promoter Josef Aichinger at the age of 66 (Wiener Zeitung), as well as the bassist Juini Booth at the age of 73 (Buffalo News, Pitchfork).

From the World of Jazz Research

Louis Armstrong
On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of Louis Armstrong's death, Ricky Riccardi, the director of research collections at the Louis Armstrong House Museum, has published a collection of condolence letters to Satchmo's widow, Lucille Armstrong, after his death in 1971, signed by celebrities such as Bing Crosby, Dr. Martin Luther King, Richard Nixon, Joan Crawford, Lauren Bacall, Diahann Carroll, Johnny Mercer, Ronald Reagan, and many others (Virtual Exhibits, Louis Armstrong House Museum).

Last Week at the Jazzinstitut

30^th Darmstadt Jazz Conceptions
The Jazz Conceptions workshop started in 1992 and has since become a major event in our city's concert calendar. Last year the workshop's founder, bassist and composer Jürgen Wuchner died, and shortly thereafter we had to cancel the 2020 workshop due to the pandemic. This year we re-started, smaller in size, in bigger rooms, with fewer ensembles, and with concerts only in the open air. The weather seems to be on our side, thus, all week there will be sessions all over town, and the legendary final concerts on Friday and Saturday will take place in the courtyard of the cultural center Bessunger Knabenschule. We cut the number of participants in half, we selected the biggest spaces we could get (including three rooms at our local music academy and the close-by Bessungen church), and we ask all musicians for regular Covid tests. It's the pandemic version of our workshop, then, and yet, it feels like a bit of jazz normalcy returned. This year's teachers are Peter Back (sax), Maike Hilbig (bass), Stephan Meinberg (trumpet), Axel Pape (drums), and Uli Partheil (piano) (Jazz Conceptions). Johannes Breckner talks to Uli Partheil (Darmstädter Echo).

Darmstadt Jazzkalender
We have been publishing the Darmstadt Jazzkalender for the past 25 plus years, a monthly, later bi-monthly leaflet listing jazz concerts all over our city. We stopped when the pandemic halted all public events last year, and now that concert life is rebooting, we decided to change the platform: Our Jazzkalender will be published online only, with more information and with links to the bands and musicians. It will focus on events in and around our city, organized by quite different venues from the centrally located Stadtkirche (city church), the concert hall Centralstation, the cultural center Bessunger Knabenschule all the way to the local Darmstädter Jazzclub and the Förderverein Jazz initiative that organizes most of the concerts at our own venue (Darmstädter Jazzkalender).

Current opening hours of the Jazzinstitut
The Jazzinstitut is open to the public by appointment. 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.