Jim Alfredson

you, me, Erik ... I didn't read it as an attack. If anything you should be upset at Kevin for his post. I remember the last months of the BNBB quite vividly. It was a total free-for-all. Many people were begging for moderation since there hadn't been any in several months. Try not looking at it behind rose-colored glasses. The place was dying. It was a good thing they pulled the plug.

If anyone is interested, this software does have the capability to host blogs for the members. I could install that package.

One thread will suffice. I'm sure the members here will help if they can, there is no need to keep posting the same request in every forum.

Yes, kind of. Quite a few new members have come over from AAJ, but only two have been a real problem.

That is definitely true and something I am not happy about at all.

FWIW, running this board has given me insight into how these kind of communities operate. I would agree fully with McCloskey that forums such as these are very male-dominated affairs. I am a member of at least 5 forums that I frequent regularly and they are all dominated by males. And any time you get a bunch of men together, the conversation invariably tends to get sidetracked into topics that 99% of those men would not repeat to their female counterparts. It's just the nature of the beast. The infamous Babe Thread is a prime example. What did it have to do with jazz? Absolutely nothing. It was completely sexist and useless and yet there was quite an uproar when I deleted it. Now, in fairness, jazz has always been a male dominated music. It is easy to argue that music in general is male dominated. How many women actually play instruments rather than just sing? I don't think it is hard to argue that if Norah Jones actually played straight-ahead jazz piano, she would be under intense scrutiny to be one of the baddest pianist ever or else she'd be ridiculed. How many female jazz pianists are there that DON'T sing? The backlash against her was simply because she was signed to Blue Note and a lot of people see Blue Note as some kind of Holy Grail of jazz greatness (they seem to forget that after it was bought by Liberty after Alfred Lion died, it released some serious turds). What does it have to do with the BN board? Well, to say it was shut down because of an inherent fear of females is stretching things a bit. It was shut down because there was no moderation and as anyone who has any experience with the internet knows, no moderation means people will post (usually anonymously) anything they want, hiding behind their aliases. I remember Aric's comment and found it to be extremely distasteful. But McCloskey might not realize that he was banned from the BNBB twice and he's been banned from here once as well (he's back under a pseudonym). A forum with no moderation gets ugly really quick. It tends to bring out the worst in people. Kevin's post is pretty much what I heard and is as close to the truth as you can get. The suits saw the site, saw the ugliness and were very upset. And I agree with the ad hominen attacks. That's uncalled for. Let's keep things civil.

Wow, you folks sure are possessive. I'm quite disappointed in how this discussion has gone.

Trios is co-owned by a musician and Herb knows how to treat his fellow players. Great, make that fantastic food, cool staff, nice stage and a beautiful restaurant / bar. They also have a killer breakfast buffet brunch on Sunday. The only negative is that a lot of folks were there obviously to be a part of the scene rather than listen to the music. It's not a listening room at all, but that's okay. We're used to it. It was still a nice place to play and I hope we'll be back soon.

Pt. II http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1bLq36ifU2g&feature=user

Holy frickin' shit! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EXaRCwq6WcQ

Was that Ed Begley Jr getting out of the limo?!

Why should they be? http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseacti...VideoID=5042753 The next act at that club:

The tangent was yours. You started talking about Giant Steps and telling me what I believe. I'm just setting the record straight.

Sure it is. If Tommy Flanagan had trouble soloing over the changes, then it must be hard! That's because the chart from Coltrane that he gave Flanagan had no tempo markings and Flanagan assumed it was a ballad, and so he practiced it that way. He could and I'm sure he did play it just fine later in life after having time to practice it. Yes, it's a hard tune to solo over, but you don't you think the reason Coltrane blew such a nice solo over it is because he practiced the living bejesus out of it before the session? A lot of those runs he uses are things he already worked out beforehand so he could make it over the changes. It wasn't like he wrote the chords and melody and then never actually tried soloing over it until the session.

Modern in what sense? You have to define your terms if this is going to go anywhere. Obviously the music speaks to me or I wouldn't listen to it or have bothered learning it. But I'm not your average person on the street. The thread is about why kids are not being exposed to jazz. I would argue that it might be because of people like you who think the best years of the music are behind it. If you believe that's so, why should young people be into it? Music, for most people, is something that relates to them and the time that they are in. It's a song that invokes a memory about a middle-school crush or a killer party they went to in college. That's all it is. So why would they care about some 50 year old "modern" jazz? I think there are a lot of neat things happening with the music, but unfortunately jazz is a four-letter word to most people. And rightfully so. They think it sucks because all they've ever heard is bad examples, or stuff that was way above their head, or they were turned off by people like you who say that the music they listen to sucks and jazz is the only real music (and only a tiny sliver of jazz at that). Please tell me more of what I believe, since you have me all figured out. You are one presumptuous dude. Your own admission that "I know what I like" extends beyond music, obvioulsy. I never said that. What musicians are you talking about? Sure. And by that token, you're proving my point that the greatest obstacle of modern musicians (noticed I didn't even confine it to jazz) is to find your own voice. The past that makes us what we are is OUR past, not somebody elses. Why should I sound like Jimmy Smith when I play? Am I black? Did I grow up in Norristown, PA in the 1930s? My experience, my past, is totally different. So therefor if I'm being true to myself, I should sound different than Jimmy Smith, right? Sure, I fall back on his stock licks sometimes. Sure, I love his music and so I listened to it over and over again. Sure, you study those musicians you love. First you emulate. Then you assimilate. Then hopefully you innovate. That doesn't mean re-inventing the wheel, it just means speaking with your own voice. And that's hard to do. Much harder than playing over Giant Steps.

I will add that, in my opinion, the biggest challenge for anyone calling themselves a jazz musician to overcome these days is finding your own voice.

I was responding to this: Bebop hard to overcome? There are books and books and books and videos and play-along CDs, all dedicated to learning how to play bebop. It has been analyzed, compartmentalized, reconstituted, dissected, cloned, and force-fed into academia. What's the big mystery? The language is over 60 years old! Which leads me to why I singled out the line about Giant Steps. If that's the ultimate test piece for most jazz musicians, than it's no wonder why jazz is dead. If everyone is still hung up on that song, which is itself 40+ years old, than how can we expect jazz to relate to our modern times and thus modern youth? This isn't the 1960s anymore. Fusion, funk, and free jazz are crap, but you just don't understand why kids aren't into (your kind of) jazz? Like I said, give me a break.

Does one have to improvise on Giant Steps to be considered a jazz musician? Does jazz have to be "hard to play" to be considered real jazz? I can guarantee that many of the fusion tunes you dismiss in one fell swoop are as hard to play over as Giant Steps. Does that mean they are suddenly good? With every post you make, you paint yourself as possessing a very narrow outlook.

If this is true, then I agree with Bev. Jazz deserves to die. Give me a break.

For any board members that might be in the South Bend (Indiana) area, tomorrow we will be at Trios Restaurant and Jazz Club, starting at 9pm. No cover. A nice article came out today in the South Bend Tribune http://www.southbendtribune.com/apps/pbcs....90464/1038/Ent# Tonight we're in Kalamazoo (Michigan) if anyone is from that area (Big Deal will be there!)

Man, the Jazz have the Pistons' number. After leading by as many as 15 last night, the Pistons lost and haven't won in Utah since 2002. Crazy game.

Yeah, Burke is getting quite a shimmery tone out of that thing, which is amazing considering how crummy Hammond's earlier speaker cabinets are. I had one that came with my BC(V) that had what looked like a 10" diameter by 14" grease canister on a spindle with openings on the side that spun in front of two speakers mounted in a V. A very primitive Leslie idea. You had to switch it from the speaker, though. Kinda made it pointless.