danasgoodstuff

https://www.change.org/p/unt-jazz-program-rename-kenton-hall-at-unt?utm_content=cl_sharecopy_22926594_en-US%3A1&recruiter=1121149850&recruited_by_id=22c3d860-b1a2-11ea-bad7-6574c66e65d5&utm_source=share_petition&utm_medium=copylink&utm_campaign=psf_combo_share_initial&fbclid=IwAR1dtL47sxGqSP3JzMSv7b6AAusoRFNMofsAExtokn7rp0AQ44GSBU0Gl6A I know at least one of our regulars went to UNT, but all are welcome to comment. It's not unconnected to events in the wider world, but let's try to keep this as non-political as it reasonably can be. A comment from a friend of a friend: Colin Avery Hinton Yesterday at 10:22 AM This post is difficult for me to write as I risk alienating myself from my alma mater and a few of my mentors, but after several days of thinking about it I believe it needs to be written. This is a long read. CW - rape, racism Kenton Hall at University of North Texas needs to be renamed. Kenton's MULTIPLE racist comments in published magazines over the course of a decade are NOT okay. On top of that, an entire book has been written by his daughter wherein she alleges Stan repeatedly raped her from ages 11-13. The arguments I see against this seem to come from a few places - 1) But he did a lot of great things for jazz education! 2) I worked in Kenton's band for X number of years and I never heard him say/do anything racist. 3) These youngsters just don't know the history of the music or Kenton's legacy! or 4) This is a "hit job" that is surfacing because of liberal politics and what one person referred to on Jay Saunder's post as "the church of woke" and then complained about tearing down statues of Christopher Columbus, and 5) Making light of rape allegations. I'll address all of these. First, a bit of info about myself since I've been receiving a multitude of friends requests from staff/faculty/students at North Texas that I don't personally know. I am a drummer/composer/percussionist/educator in Brooklyn, NY. I attended UNT from 2006-2011. I never played in the One O' clock, but sat in the Two or Three for three years (the running joke was that I was the Three O' Clock "house drummer"). I make a living playing and teaching Black American Music and have been very fortunate to play regularly with many of my idols since relocating to Brooklyn in 2011. When I started at UNT in 2006, there was only one black professor. He taught the trombone studio and was also split between his responsibility teaching in the classical section of the school. I maybe had one interaction with him in my five years of attendance. In 2008, UNT hired Brad Leali, who I worked, talked, and hung out with extensively. While I was at North Texas, I would say there were less than 15 black jazz students at the school when I was attending. I've thought about this a lot and I honestly struggle to remember even 10, but I'm going to give the program the benefit of the doubt since I didn't know everyone. I also remember less than 15 women jazz instrumentalists in the school while I was attending. These numbers matter because UNT is a HUGE music program. The jazz program had nine big bands (seven of them had two rhythm sections), and a tenth sometimes-big band that did repertoire, three guitar ensembles, three vocal ensembles, a fusion ensemble, a latin-jazz band, multiple brazilian/afro-cuban ensembles, and a south-indian ensemble, and there was still a huge portion of the school that wasn't able to audition into ensembles. That puts BIPOC and women representation at well under 5% of the student body... UNT was an overwhelmingly white male music school. I've also seen the argument pop up where someone has said "many people of color attended North Texas! We're very inclusive and diverse!" For every time I see that comment appearing in the future I will post a random picture of an all white all male One O' Clock lab band from a different year. This will not be difficult to find. Why does that matter for this argument? In promoting a school as being inclusive and diverse (and trying to get more BIPOC and women involved), this stuff matters. If I'm a high school aged BIPOC/woman musician that is looking for a good and affordable music school to attend for college, and say I'm looking at two options - UNT, and for this example let's say University of Michigan, this is what I would see... UNT promotes the legacy of Stan Kenton, someone who openly published racist comments in major publications and has a rape allegation hanging over him... and UofM, who had Geri Allen as a main professor for years... It's not a hard choice. 1) Kenton did a lot of great things for jazz education. Yes. This is undeniable. He helped build the program at North Texas and make it the school it is today. He also used his band to recruit people straight from the One O' Clock to give them work straight after college. He was one of the first people (if not the first) to begin the summer jazz workshops that are now so prevalent across the country. He left his entire library of charts to UNT - great! I played tons of them. There is no question that Kenton was invested in music education, but like all of us (especially white people who play Black American Music), Kenton had blind spots. These are glaring and huge if you look at his letters to publications, especially when he accuses a new trend of "white people being a minority" in Black American Music. The irony... 2) Utmost respect for those of you who worked in Kenton's band. That is great that you had that opportunity. However, if you take these comments directed at Kenton as a direct attack on yourself... ask yourself, "Why"? Finding out that your idols did some really shitty things SUCKS. Trust me - I've found out more than I care to think about. Also, as a mentor and friend of mine that worked with Kenton pointed out, just because YOU (a white person) never experienced Kenton being racist/saying racist things, does not mean it did not happen. Also important to note - white people can (and often) do racist things. This does not inherently make you a racist. The dichotomy of "if someone does or says something racist, they are racist, and racists are bad" is wrong. White people are all inherently racist as we benefit from a power system meant to benefit us (and marginalize everyone else), so that argument is out the window. White people often do stupid racist shit without realizing how bad it is (I have been guilty of this and still am). While that does not mean that X person is a racist to the likes of a nazi, klan member, etc, it is still something that needs to be addressed, as it is hugely harmful to the BIPOC community. 3) Regarding the history of the music and Kenton's influence on UNT... I am in my 30's and am someone who is known as having an extensive record collection and somewhat of an encyclopedic knowledge of records. I know the history of the music and of Kenton's legacy. I'm angry... so I'll be blunt. If you come at me with this "you're young and don't know anything" bullshit regarding the history of the music or the legacy of certain people, I WILL respond. And I will be very fucking pointed. For every question like this I receive, I will respond with something like "Name one member of the AACM", "Name one member of BAG", "Tell me what either of those acronyms, stand for"... or we could even go simpler and just say "name one member of the Cecil Taylor's Unit Structure band and tell me why it's important". I have very little tolerance for this kind of attitude and will respond accordingly. 4) Regarding this being a "hit job" or angry "woke people". Times are changing and people have less tolerance for ignorance. Yes, the arts are full of problematic people. There are ways we can still celebrate their contributions without holding them on a pedestal or making them a central figure of an institution that claims to uphold "diversity and inclusion". Kenton's legacy will live on without having the main classroom named after him. 5) Jay Saunder's blasé response to Stan Kenton's daughter's allegation of sexual abuse and rape against her are alarming and upsetting for so many reasons. I don't really know what to say about that one other than this.... do better. Your past students deserve it. The legacy of the school deserves it. Every woman you EVER taught deserves it. Thank you for reading all of this. Long story short - UNT... you can do better. I respect this school immensely and my five years spent there made me into the musician I am today. If you take these comments about Stan and his legacy personally... ask yourself why? This is about the future of education and of the school... and quite frankly this shit doesn't fit into that equation anymore. Times are changing. Enough is enough. Happy Juneteenth. Black Lives Matter. Defund the Police.

I passed on a Studebaker dealer promo pack that featured a recording by Miss Suzuki once, I love Studebakers but it was too much $

I think we've done this before, but IMHO the trio with Crosby and Fournier was major, both in its influence and its inate goodness; but the musical and social context they existed in doesn't exist anymore so that may be hard to hear for folks coming at it backwards. It is about arrangements not blowing. They create their own space in the landscape of the times. The Sounds and early (Young/Holt) Ramsey Lewis seem blatantly derivative, but in a good way. Quintessential Piano Trio, not just as an instrumentation but as genre. Nothing else he's done that I've heard engaged me at all. But that band had it going on. YMMV.

Ooh, a mono copy...is that real mono or just a fold-down? Or have I been spending too much time on the Hoffman Forums?

I own Children of Ibeji (Brazilian folk tunes) and Man of the forest (Villa-Lobos tunes), I kept them but haven't bought any more FWIW.

It's a plaid thing. Wonder if Rufus Harley ever heard this, or something like it? Love the low register honks!

Oh I agree that Dialogue is as much Hill's and Chambers' record as Hutcherson's, that's part of what made Blue Note in the '50 & '60s what it was. And Sam Rivers and Richard Davis. Yes there are more typical/more purely Hutch records, but Dialogue benefits from its collaborative nature. There certainly are fine recordings in the '70s, but to me they are just scattered islands of excellence without a center or a direction. YMMV.

Bobby Hutcherson – Cirrus (Blue Note, 1974) This is a fine album, but it still ain't Dialogue, not hardly.

Good analysis, only mildly annoying dude. And hardly the worst solo ever, as he says towards the end. I've played worse and so have any number of name musicians and it's an alternate, so they knew it wasn't good and the master, at least the snippet they played, sounds far better. As he also says towards the end.

You guys are making me glad I have next to no musical education and play strictly for my own amusement! Law school wasn't bad compared to this (actual lawyering is another matter, but I got the heck away from that as soon as I could).

"Loaded Rats", what a great band name! And, of course they do!

Horrifying.

Got that on LP a long time ago, it is all that and more.

I did a lot of listening putting this thing together in my head, and one of the things it did was give me a greater appreciation for Donald Byrd. And the amount of work that went into getting to that groove, it didn't just happen. It's a shame Pentecostal Feeling wasn't issued right away (it was years after Watermelon Man) and as the lead track on that album. But I think it was the 4th DB led session of '61 so it's understandable that they held it back.

Yes, but to my ears what I hear as 'that sound' predates SW - "Watermelon Man" and Donald Byrd's "Pentecostal Feeling" are earlier and in the same bag to me...I've thought about this a lot, I've even mapped pout an imaginary boxed set of BN Groove Things (which makes the concept a little looser than 'boogaloo', but no shuffles and no going back to a steady walking 4 for the solos after a groovy head, alternating vamp and walk/shuffle that's fine) AND to my surprise, although Billy is the most common drummer on it and on the two I mentioned above, it's not by nearly as much as I would've guessed, even if you disallow Idris, etc.

2 months later - long, hidden incubation, unless employee got it from somewhere/someone else.

"I Thought About You", "Everything Happens to Me", "The Good Life", can all be interpreted to fit this mood, IMHO, YMMV.

His prose certainly is well beyond parody, in a bad way (just to be clear). But then Ornette's prose is a little weird too. didn't stop either of them from making some amazing music. Hundred years from now, what will folks think - will they be glad for Braxton's exhaustive documentation?

Hmm, no. Not sure why you would think or say that. Let's leave my family out of it.

So, John Henry all over again and again and...the steam hammer always wins, but not in the hearts and minds and myth?

Met him once, back in the day. Nice guy IIRC. Be interested to hear him now. Not HUGELY, but interested.

If Mr. Teasing is just teasing and saying that our attempts to predict the future of jazz now are just as absurd as past attempts seem to us now, then of course, but he's not likely to just say so. If he's suggesting that there was some lost opportunities and/or paths left less than fully explored back them, well sure but I don't think he and I would be on the same page regarding which might have been or still could be worth further exploration now. "kitschvictions" not very nice, but somewhat insightful. "And is this not the essence of jazz? Sophisticated music delivered with a veneer of elegance and urbanity? " Um no, I don't think so. It's deeper than that, and more complex, and it might have a veneer (or not) but its essence is not on the surface. Which is not to say that something with that kind of veneer can't have more going on beneath the surface, but it's no guarantee that it will. And to me, true sophistication knows when to be simple and direct.

This, and folks who don't get this...well, they just don't get it.

That's some prime Pres, even with idiot-stick yakking all through. Anyone have any idea who, when and where. The regular working band with Jesse Drake and Roy Haynes? When Pres comes back in around the 9 min mark there's some very nice playing.

Wasn't at least one of them on a Mosaic? 1965 IIRC with Larry Young on piano? Kinda loosey goosey? But once Alfred was gone?