(aus dem Jazzinstitut Darmstadt)
8 October – 8 November 2023 | Ausgabe 19/2023 (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 ...

Nate Chinen talks to composer, pianist and scholar Courtney Bryan who was just honored with a MacArthur Fellowship, colloquially known as "genius grant" (WRTI). --- Paul DeBarros tells the story of Jazz Alley, the premier Seattle jazz club since more than 40 years (Seattle Times). --- Robert Fröwein talks to Austrian trombonist and composer Christian Muthspiel (Kronenzeitung). --- Lewis Porter starts a new series on Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn's "Such Sweet Thunder" (Playback with Lewis Porter), and shares a rare interview with Duke Ellington from 1957 about the suite's world premiere (Playback with Lewis Porter).

Vinnie Sperrazza listens to drummer Ed Blackwell's first recordings (Chronicles). --- Lewis Porter continues his series on John Coltrane's "A Love Supreme" (part 4: Playback with Lewis Porter; part 5: Playback with Lewis Porter; part 6: Playback with Lewis Porter). --- Lewis Porter also shares a previously unknown interview with Sun Ra from 1965 (Playback with Lewis Porter), and he reports about an unreleased track from the album "Sonny Meets Hawk" with Sonny Rollins and Coleman Hawkins, an interpretation of "Three Little Words" that didn't make it on the original album (Playback with Lewis Porter).

Marlene Knoblock meets pianist Abdullah Ibrahim in his Bavarian home (Süddeutsche Zeitung). --- Eileen Vargas reports about the sale of Dave Brubeck's former house in Oakland, popularly known as the "tree house" (Hoodline). --- The Deutscher Jazzpreis (German Jazz Prize) is entering its fourth round. Applications can be submitted via the online portal from October 18 up to and including November 30, 2023 (Deutscher Jazzpreis). --- The president, artistic and administrative directors of Siena Jazz, the Italian academy that also houses the Arrigo Polillo Study Center, have resigned over disagreements concerning the funding for the institution (Siena News).

Sophie Emilie Beha talks to vocalist Friede Merz, bassist James Banner, and saxophonist Luise Volkmann about activism and jazz (SWR2). --- Gregor Dotzauer attends a tribute to Ornette Coleman's album "The Shape of Jazz to Come" performed in Ludwigshafen, Germany, by an all-star ensemble led by the saxophonist's son Denardo Coleman plus philharmonic orchestra (Der Tagesspiegel). --- David Sanborn interviews fellow saxophonist Sonny Rollins in an audio podcast (part 1: WBGO). --- Bert Noglik acknowledges the life and music of German guitarist Helmut "Joe" Sachse on the occasion of his 75^th birthday (MDR).

Ethan Iverson visits the new Louis Armstrong Center, sees some of the exhibitions there and reflects about the importance of Louis Armstrong and how his approach to both the music and the music business still means something today (The Nation). Ethan Iverson follows that article by a piece in his Blog in which he quotes from e-mails he received from Gary Giddins and Ricky Riccardi, pointing out the importance of Dan Morgenstern in acknowledging the art of Louis Armstrong, especially in his later years, and he reprints a 1970 Down Beat article that collects statements on Armstrong from 84 musicians from all phases of the music's development (Transitional Technology). --- Vinnie Sperrazza remembers five awkward conversations he had with drummer Paul Motion – a funny and highly recommended read (Chronicles).

Marcus J. Moore asks musicians, producers, writers about their favorite recordings by Thelonious Monk and gets responses from pianist Jon Batiste ("Introspection"), composer Miguel Atwood-Ferguson ("Nutty"), vocalist Arooj Aftab ("Reflections"), producer Andrew Winistorfer ("Ugly Beauty"), producer King Britt ("Evidence"), pianist Nikki Yeoh ("Trinkle, Tinkle), music supervisor Morgan Rhodes ("Let's Cool One"), bassist Anna Butterss ("Sweet and Lovely"), guitarist Mary Halvorson ("Crepuscule with Nellie"), vocalist and electronic musician Christina Wheeler ("Misterioso"), and pianist James Francies ("Round Midnight") (New York Times). --- Maxi Broecking talks to Canadian trumpeter Steph Richards about how she chose the trumpet as her instrument, about experimenting with sound and smell, about having worked with Butch Morris, as well as about conduction (die tageszeitung).

Roland Spiegel watches Tilman Urbach's documentary "Tastenarbeiter" about German pianist Alexander von Schlippenbach (BR Klassik). --- Jan Wiele attends drummer Terry Lyne Carrington's multimedia performance of "Seen/Unseen" (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung). --- Garth Cartwright talks to bassist Ron Carter about institutional racism in his youth, as well as about working with Miles Davis, Aretha Franklin, Roberta Flack, and James Brown (The Guardian). --- Jasmine Damian talks to Yousef Hilmy, founder and creative director of Minaret Records in Los Angeles, about the local jazz community he succeeded in bringing together (Los Angeles Times).

Obituaries

We learned of the passing of French critic Philippe Carles at age 82 (TSF Jazz), British trumpeter Jack Leatham at age 72 (The Guardian), German guitarist Ali Claudi at age 80 (Rheinische Post), Swedish producer and critic Lars Westin at age 75 (Orkesterjournalen), jazz expert Jim DeJong at age 81 (Chicago Tribune), critic Robert Bush at age 65 (San Diego 88.3 FM), trumpeter Tolton Rosser at age 91 (RocksNews), German bass clarinetist Michel Pilz at age 78 (Luxemburger Wort), photographer Ernest Gregory (Facebook: Atlanta Jazz Festival), sound engineer Gary Hobish at age 70 (NBC Bay Area), British filmmaker Dick Fontaine at age 84 (The Whickers), German promoter and discographer Manfred Selchow at age 87 (General-Anzeiger), visual artist Robert Irwin at age 95 (ArtNet News), trumpeter Jimmy LaRocca at age 83 (MSN), education administrator Lee Berk at age 81 (Boston Globe), actor and singer Richard Roundtree at age 81 (New York Times), Norwegian bassist Carl Morten Iversen at age 75 (Jazz i Norge), Cuban percussionist Oscar Valdés at age 85 (Latin Jazz Net), saxophonist Arni Cheatham at age 79 (Boston Globe), Japanese producer Masahiko Yuh at age 85 (Jazz Tokyo), guitarist Mike Denny at age 64 (Jazz Passings), Norwegian saxophonist Jens Arne Molvær at age 82 (NRK), guitarist John D. Thomas at age 69 (Jazz Passings), French trumpeter Pierre Dutour at age 78 (Jazz Passings), bassist/singer Joe Bany (Jazz Passings), drummer Pat Close at age 67 (The St. Pete Catalyst), as well as pianist and composer Carla Bley at age 87 (New York Times, BR Klassik, FAZ, The Gig, The Milkman's Musings, Der Tagesspiegel).

Last Week at the Jazzinstitut

18^th Darmstadt Jazzforum
The 18^th Darmstadt Jazzforum conference is over since over a month, and if you missed it in person or were only able to join parts of the streams, here is the chance to watch all of the papers and discussions – well, at least those on stage at Darmstadt's Hoffart Theater. The subject was "Destination Unknown: The Future of Jazz" (YouTube), and you can watch them all: papers by André Doehring, Harald Kisiedu, Richard Herzog, Magdalena Fürnkranz, Bettina Bohle, Frank Gratkowski, Teresa Becker, Kaspar von Grünigen, Monika Herzig, and Uli Kempendorff, with public talks with Niels Klein, Jorik Bergman, Peter Kemper and Thomas Meinecke, and with panels with Evi Filippou, Julia Kadel, and James Banner, with Camille Buscot, Esther Weickel, and Jonas Pirzer, with Akiko Ahrend, Mariana Bondarenko, and Jan Klare, all moderated by Sophie Emilie Beha. We are currently transcribing the panels and editing the papers, all of them to be published early next year in our book series "Darmstadt Studies in Jazz Research (vol. 18)".

Jazz awards
At Jazzfest Berlin last weekend trombonist Conny Bauer was awarded the prestigious Albert Mangelsdorff Preis awarded by Deutsche Jazzunion. The Jazzinstitut was represented in the jury (Deutsche Jazzunion). The Jazzinstitut was also represented in the jury that awards harpist Kathrin Pechlof this year's SWR-Jazzpreis next week, Germany's oldest jazz award (SWR). Both awards come with 15,000 Euro.

Funding Jazz? Why, how, who, where?
Wolfram Knauer has organized the next edition of the Mainzer Jazzgespräche (Mainz Jazz Talks) at Hochschule für Musik Mainz, this time focusing on funding for jazz musicians. The panel consists of Etienne Emard who heads the state of Rhineland Palatinate's music funding program; David Maier who coordinates culture for the city of Worms where he also serves as head of the Jazz and Joy festival there, while presiding over the Jazzverband Rheinland-Pfalz, a regional interest group for the music; as well as Gabri Maurer, saxophonist and member of the board of Deutsche Jazzunion. The event is directed both at the Hochschule's students and at a general audience; the students will set the tone with live music provided by a quartet led by pianist Leandro Hernández Waber and saxophonist Christoph Heimbach. If you're in the region, hurry, because the event is TONIGHT, Wednesday, 8 November 2023, at 7:30pm at Hochschule für Musik, Jakob-Welder-Weg 28, 55128 Mainz (Hochschule für Musik Mainz). Attendance is free.

Opening hours of the Jazzinstitut
The Jazzinstitut is open during our usual hours (Monday, Tuesday, Thursday 10am-5pm, Friday 10am-2pm). We also offer research assistance 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.