ghost of miles

sumptuous as all get out. could not have been better done....see why you had to do it now. THANKS Hey, thanks, I'm really glad that you liked it. It should be archived by tomorrow afternoon.

Well, yeah, I feel his pain too. But the specific music he's dogging on is a syptom, not the cause, and I can't help but feel that he's not "getting" the fundamental musical changes (perceptual changes, really) that rap/hip-hop (and lots of other musics) were foreshadowing/reflecting long before the gangsta element came to the fore. Like I said earlier, bemoan the moral decline of society all you want. I'll be there with you (withihnn reason and up to a point). But frame it as such and don't come out with all this "this ain't what I was taught that music was in school" bullshit. You can't teach nuthin in school until it's already happened, so if what's happening right now ain't what you taught in school, best that you draw upon a principle that you should have been taught in school but probably weren't - namely, that today is tomorrow's history - and take it from there, not get all wigged out that the neat road map that you thought was going to unfold suddenly just got blown out the window. Look - I'm old enough (two can play this game!) to remember the early days of rap's first commercial peep throught the cracks. The shit was fun (and it swung like mofo), and the social commentary (when it existed) was delivered with a sense of righteousness. I also well remember the intrigue I felt by the musical methods being used - the sampling, the sequencing, the layering, the collages, all that stuff. This was a new way of looking at and feeling time and one's relationship to it, and it was (and still is, I think) an inevitable perceptual shift in the wake of both the increased power, scope, and omnipresence of electronic communications and digital "reality", where anything can be (or give the illusiona of being) literally anything, at any place, at any time. You can't fundamentally alter the nature of "perceptual reality" like this and expect people, especially young people, not to change as a result. You just can't. Absolutely, the toll/fallout of Reaganomics on the inner-city was immense (and in my mind, morally criminal). But since we're not in the Po;itical Foeum (yet), I'll drop that and go here instead - where inner-city culture goes, the tastes of mainstream American youth culture inevitable follows (the more things change...). And where the mainstream popular American culture goes, Madi$on Avenue inevitably is there to sniff their a$$. That's the weigh of the world. And here we are. Mr. Drew's decency as a human being comes through loud and clear in his article, but like so many jazz musicians, their impotence is at least partially their own fault. Rather than being in sync with their times, they've set themselves apart and/or above them. Jazz has never been a teen-age music (the Jazz Age & the Swing Kids notwithstanding), but it has always had its finger on the pulse of what was happening within its "native" community. Other than the M-Base crew and a few others, who among the "jazz community" was looking at the Hip-Hop Revolution from a perspective of it being the Next Step In African-American Musical Evolution? And how many were following the Jazz Reagan (WM) down his road of claiming the glories of the past as triumphs that they were somehow entitled to claim as their own? What are we suppose to do, Save The Children by taking them to hear a recreation of Fletcher Henderson at Lincoln Center? Give me a fucking break... Shit just don't work that way. Never has, never will. You wanna change the streets, you gotta have street cred. You want street cred, you gotta earn it. You wanna earn it, you gotta get down in it, not preach down to it. It may or may not be too late to save the children. God knows I hope it's not. But it sure as hell is too late to think that ii-Vs and such are the key to doing so. Mr. Drew better wake the fuck up. We're in agreement more than you seem to think, but I think simply saying that gangsta rap is a sympton rather than a cause is dangerously close to the sort of thinking that Mr. Drew Jr. is exhibiting. I mean, c'mon, how many stories have we read about Bird lamenting that he felt he'd had a hand in furthering the use of heroin among bebop musicians? I'm NOT judging Bird for that, or saying that Bird was somehow therefore a "bad" person... simply saying that the part of Mr. Drew Jr's screed that attacks the glorification of crack and cocaine culture is something that anybody who's spent any time living in the inner city may not dismiss so easily--and also saying that the message of artists can shape culture as well as reflect it. I probably have about a dollop of street cred compared to some, if not many, of the folks here, but what I saw in Indpls.'s "Dodge City" neighborhood was pretty awful (and what I saw working one summer as a door-to-door surveyor). It's a complex problem that's going to require complex responses... but part of the answer IS in pushing role models such as Malcolm X and hell, even the much-maligned Wynton, over the guys you read about in QUEENS REIGNS SUPREME (recent book about the hiphop industry), where surviving a barrage of gunshots is indeed seen as a great aid to commercial success. You're right, Drew Jr. should have come at this from a different angle. That's basically what I said in my post... and I've heard musical merit in a lot of the gangsta rap I've listened to. But last time I checked, it's not (or shouldn't be) so square to be upset about an ideology that glorifies sexism, hypercapitalism, hard-drug culture, and murderous violence. Whether it's a crafty, insidious political leader or a musical messenger propagating that ideology, I'm going to oppose it. There are plenty of rappers who oppose it as well. To somehow absolve an artist of any responsibility for his or her message because they are merely "symptoms" or reflections of the culture... coming full-circle here to say it's just as wrong as Mr. Drew Jr.'s scattershot assault on hiphop.

I feel some of Drew Jr.'s pain, and I'm not willing to write off all of his screed to simple "time is passing me by" fogeyism. His anger, I think, is motivated more by what crack & cocaine have done to many African-American communities in the past 20 years. (Hasn't had a happy impact in a lot of white communities either.) That anger leads him to focus primarily on gangsta rap, inducing a blindness to the many interesting things going on across the broad spectrum of music these days. In any case, the social/political/economic changes that have gone down in the past 25 years aren't gonna be solved by Mr. Drew Jr. or anybody else soon... if in any of our lifetimes. So I sympathize with his despair; but I'm not betting on his community-outrage solution, except as a small, small part of the answer.

Up for broadcast in 20 minutes on WNIN-Evansville and one hour and 20 minutes on WFIU. Because the August 21, 2004 Night Lights show already focused exclusively on McLean's collaborations with Grachan Moncur, I didn't include any in this program. Ditto for a certain hardbop hero (show already planned and now postponed). Speaking of Moncur, I just picked up the BYG CD reissue that came out this week. No chance to listen yet--anybody else get it?

I had planned to do a different McLean program this summer, but that's been postponed... This week on Night Lights we offer a special tribute to the late alto saxophonist, Jackie McLean, who passed away on Friday, March 31, 2006. McLean came up in the Harlem jazz scene as a teenager in the late 1940s, befriending and playing with bebop progenitors Charlie Parker and Bud Powell. In the 1950s he worked and recorded with Charles Mingus, Miles Davis, and Art Blakey, in addition to making his own records as a leader for Prestige. A struggle with drug addiction slowed his development, but it also aided his convincing portrait of an addicted musician in the play and movie The Connection. His recordings for the Blue Note label in the 1960s are considered to be some of the finest examples of the era’s hardbop and avant-garde jazz. McLean was also one of the pioneers of the jazz-education movement, developing a jazz-studies program for the University of Hartford in Connecticut. I have always told people that Jackie McLean is one of the “patron saints” of Night Lights; his sharp, bittersweet sound had an intensity that seemed to reflect a passionate apprehension of life in all of its aspects. As one jazz fan said to me regarding his death, “Jackie has always been what this music is all about, to me. He was a man that always put his guts on the line when he played.” “We’ll Keep Loving You: Jackie McLean” will air this Saturday evening at 11:05 on WFIU and at 9 p.m. Central time on WNIN-Evansville. The program will be posted to the Night Lights archives Monday afternoon. Next week: "Songs of Peace."

Tonight on Afterglow we're featuring music from a new Mosaic collection of Gerry Mulligan's 1957 recordings, highlighting the baritone saxophonist's collaborations with Annie Ross and a reunion date with trumpeter Chet Baker, as well as the extraordinary Gerry Mulligan Songbook (with an all-star cast of saxophonists that included Lee Konitz, Allen Eager, Zoot Sims, and Al Cohn) and a date made with a string quartet. We'll also hear music from Mel Powell and Peanuts Hucko's 1945 meeting with Django Reinhardt in newly-liberated Paris, Ray Nance's haunting version of "Take the A Train" from his 1969 album Body and Soul, Buddy Rich's take on "This Time the Dream's On Me" from Buddy Rich Sings Johnny Mercer (yes, Buddy sang, too... who knew?!) and more. Afterglow airs at 10:05 p.m. tonight on WFIU and at 10 p.m. Central Time Saturday night on WNIN-Evansville. The program will be posted to the Afterglow archives Monday afternoon.

Katchor's name actually came up recently in a thread about Horace Silver's autobiography (as a result of a joke having to do with the Forward, if I recall correctly). JULIUS KNIPL blew me away when it came out as a book... liked the BEAUTY SUPPLY DISTRICT followup quite a bit, too. There's actually a Katchor illustration on an old R.E.M. album--in the booklet for OUT OF TIME.

I'd think and hope that jazz fans would be even more sensitive to this kind of crap, esp. given the backstory we've encountered once again on Jackie McLean's woes in the 1950s and early 1960s. Look, everybody who has a self-destructive problem with anything--drugs, alcohol, gambling, whatever--has the onus upon themselves to turn the corner on it--every day, for the rest of their lives. But throwing them in the slammer generally doesn't help. Suspending them from playing doesn't help, either. (In fact, I think Strawberry struggled most when he wasn't playing... most of his publicized relapses happened in the off-season or while he was suspended. I always felt that playing made it easier for him to get on with life.) Rather than say, "F*&% Dwight Gooden," I'd say, "F*&% this culture." It practically breeds addiction these days, if you ask me.

Right on. Most addicts relapse in recovery, many quite a few times. Some never make it. People like Gooden & Strawberry may have had all sorts of resources that a guy on the street or a middle-class housewife might not have, but they also had unrelenting public scrutiny... and still do. God help every addict out there if every relapse they ever had was broadcast all over the freakin' world.

Clem, at this point I feel fairly safe (though maybe I shouldn't) as our station has a pretty tight relationship with the IU School of Music, and such a format change here, if attempted, would all but spark a riot. (I'm only half-kidding.) Therefore we're a bit cocooned from the merciless radio landscape that's evolved... but I was just reading Current on my lunch-break, and public-radio audiences declined slightly from 2003 to 2005--first time that's happened, evidently, in a long time. Listener & underwrite $$ were up, but they can't foresee that trend continuing if the audience keeps dropping. Certainly programmers and station managers have a big responsibility to come up with compelling programming--I think in the past there was a somewhat lazy "you need to support us because we are a good thing" mentality, and an expectation that people would support public broadcasting. We can't do that; we need to give reasons for listeners and underwriters to support us, to EARN that support. "Here's what you're getting," etc. However... big however... OTOH, if public radio is simply going to act like commercial radio, albeit slightly more educated, than we'd better go back & rip up the mission statement. I have a good friend who's worked in this biz for 20 years, in a number of capacities, and I have enormous respect for his take on things; but he & I divide somewhat over this. All I can say is that I really feel for the folks at WBEZ who do music programming, and that it only makes me want to work harder.. not just out of anxiety, but out of a desire to keep jazz on the airwaves--to some degree, anyway--and to draw both jazz lovers and casual jazz "likers" alike. Part of the problem is that the core audience for jazz is graying, and younger listeners have to be drawn in, in a culture where jazz is rapidly turning (in my perception) into a museum music in most people's eyes (or ears). Addressing that issue is a whole 'nother ballgame.

They're picking an extra frequency and making that all-talk as well? That's really perturbing.. because the "second-signal solution" has always promised room for both formats.

I interviewed DeVeaux back in 1998 and met him when he came to Bloomington to do a book signing. Any idea what he's working on now? At the time he was contemplating doing a sequel of sorts that would deal with the rise of hardbop in the 1950s.

Hey - nothing says "America" like a bunch of loud yammering idiots! True enough... I should hasten to add that I've never held the attitude. as a programmer, that "jazz is good for people and they should listen to it." I DO think jazz is good and that people should listen to it... but a "eat your vegetables" approach is a drag. Far better, I think, to simply start with enthusiasm, passion, and knowledge, and brew your mix accordingly. Programmers have a big responsibility to come up with compelling ways of presenting the music--and to do so without pandering or appearing to do so. I think about this a lot, because I want the music to have a future as well as a past... and I want to do whatever limited good I can as a DJ to keep it alive and on the airwaves.

Been listening to the 1988 CD that A & M put out... it's since come out again, hasn't it? Yeah, it is a great one... and somehow I overlooked it until recently.

Well, once upon a time... Look, I know that public radio has to act somewhat like a business--and to serve its listeners. But at the same time, part of the mission of public radio is not to act like a business. The very charter of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting states that and emphasizes the need of public broadcasting to preserve American cultural treasures and heritages. If that ain't jazz, then pass me a whiff of what yer drinkin', son... and don't tell me that all the yak-yak bound to replace it is a cultural treasure or heritage.

They don't even have that much jazz to dump, do they? Four programs? For what--more talk? And didn't they just wrap up their spring fund-drive? I'll bet the folks who pledged during the jazz shows will have a real warm, fuzzy feeling. Seems to be like it's about time to put jazz radio on the Endangered Species list. If there's a station in your neck of the woods that plays decent jazz, please support it.. the pressure on stations to go all news/talk is intense.

Nelson Algren, THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN ARM.

Spellman definitely (and understandably) treats the subject with guarded sensitivity, though my between-the-lines reading made me think that Kirk Jr. might still be alive at the time of that book's writing (mid-1960s). Rollins' remark indicates that he must have died young, or relatively young.

Okay, this seems to confirm what I thought might be the case. A Sonny Rollins quote from Downbeat: Damn. I'm glad that Jackie, Sonny, and some of the others did survive what Jackie called "the heroin plague."

I've always been intrigued by the story of Andy Kirk Jr. (yes, son of the bandleader) and in recent days, revisiting A.B. Spellman's piece on Jackie McLean and Ben Sidran's interview with McLean, I've become intrigued again. In the Sidran piece Jackie talks about wanting to write a book about lost-legend jazz musicians and mentions Kirk Jr.; he speaks quite highly of him in the earlier Spellman article, too. Evidently Charlie Parker was a fan too, but Kirk Jr. dropped out of music by the time he was 20; Spellman alludes to "emotional troubles." What eventually happened to him? I think it's Spellman who describes his sound (presumably through talking to Jackie) as having a "delicate lightness."

Is this a quote from Jackie?

Hey all, I'm putting together a tribute to Jackie Mac for this week's Night Lights... wish I had 42 hours to do it. In the meantime, here's a program devoted to the McLean/Moncur recordings, from the early days of the show--no website yet at that point, but I found the old e-mail description: Program is archived as "Destination Out" for Aug. 21, 2004.

NPR did something on Jackie on Sunday Weekend Edition. Lessee if I can find a link: Jackie McLean Re: the cabaret laws, there's a whole book on the subject, written by the lawyer who helped bring about their end. The book's at my office, and I can't remember the guy's name... but Peter Pullman will be exploring this subject as well in his Bud Powell bio.

One for Lazaro indeed! Long may you rule the airwaves to the north.

Thanks for the heads-up--I'll try to tune in for that. Really enjoyed the several hours I heard Sunday night and the sets I caught here & there throughout the rest of the memorial.