November/December 2017

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Contents NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2017

features
BASIC TRAINING: ‘RUDOLPH THE
RED-NOSED REINDEER’ AND –
CONFIRMATION – EAR TRAINING
FOR THE JAZZ MUSICIAN 12
Miles Donahue offers some (holi-
day-themed) tips for jazz musicians who
want to work on ear-training

FOCUS SESSION: EXPLORING

HARMOLODICS 14
JAZZed presents an excerpt from the
recently-released book Free Jazz, Harmo-
lodics and Ornette Coleman by Stephen
Rush

UPCLOSE: STEWART COPELAND: ‘STICKING IT TO

CONVENTION’ 18 18
Drummer Stewart Copeland dishes on jazz, his musical
roots, and new musical project Gizmodrome
Just to make my predicament
THE END OF JAZZ? A RESPONSE even worse with the jazz world is that I
TO BENJAMIN SCHWARTZ’S actually like white big band jazz – Stan
ARTICLE IN THE ATLANTIC ON Kenton, Woody Herman, and Buddy
THE FUTURE OF JAZZ 22
Lee Evans explains why jazz will be with
Rich, of course.
us for decades and centuries to come in
departments

this guest editorial column

Editor’s Note ........................................... 2
LESSONS LEARNED: TEACHING Noteworthy ............................................. 3
JAZZ THROUGH THE BIG BAND 27 What’s on Your Playlist? ....................... 10
Why the big band is one of the best op-
portunities to introduce students to the Jazz Festivals Worldwide...................... 24
great traditions and present of jazz Hot Wax ................................................ 28
Gearcheck ............................................. 31
OUTLIERS BLUES: GRADY TATE:
STYLE BEYOND STYLE 30 Classifieds ............................................ 35
Steve Futterman offers some thoughts Ad Index ................................................ 35
on the musical legacy of the late Grady
Tate Backbeat ............................................... 36

JAZZed® Volume 12, Number 6, November/December 2017, is published six times annually by Timeless Communications Corp., 6000 South Eastern Ave., Suite 14-J, Las Vegas, NV 89119, (702) 479-1879, publisher of Musical Merchandise Review, School
Band & Orchestra and Choral Director. Standard Mail Postage Paid at Las Vegas, NV and additional mailing offices. Subscriptions to JAZZed are available through our website, www.jazzedmagazine.com/subscribe. JAZZed is distributed to the music trade
by Hal Leonard Corporation. POSTMASTER: Send all UAA to CFS. NON-POSTAL AND MILITARY FACILITIES: send address corrections to JAZZed, PO Box 16655, North Hollywood, CA 91615-6655. The publishers of this magazine do not accept responsibility
for statements made by their advertisers in business competition. No portion of this issue may be reproduced without the written permission of the publisher. Copyright ©2017 by Timeless Communications Corp., all rights reserved. Printed in USA.

November/December 2017 • JAZZed 1

editor’sletter CHRISTIAN WISSMULLER

Go After Your Piece November/December 2017

Volume 12, Number 6

“I
n 2017, an independent label devoted to the music of
New Orleans… should not exist, much less be thriving,”
PRESIDENT Terry Lowe
reads a portion of an article about Basin Street Records tlowe@timelesscom.com
that appeared in the November 14th issue of Billboard.
GROUP PUBLISHER Greg Gallardo
The feature details the origins and evolution of the label and
gregg@timelesscom.com
explores key factors behind its continued – and, in fact, increas-
ing – success (Basin Street’s most release by noted trumpeters Editorial
Kermit Ruffins and Irvin Mayfield, A Beautiful World, debuted at EXECUTIVE EDITOR Christian Wissmuller
number 1 on Billboard’s Jazz Album Chart). That success, and the cwissmuller@timelesscom.com

paths that could lead to similar results, are topics of great importance for any jazz artist, ASSOCIATE EDITOR Victoria Wasylak
scholar, or aficionado. For a genre that long struggled to achieve notable sales even back victoria@timelesscom.com
when overall album sales were strong, making the most of every opportunity now that the
ASSOCIATE EDITOR Mike Lawson
recorded music industry is a ghost of what it once was is a vital pursuit. mlawson@timelesscom.com

Art
Within that shrinking ‘commerce pie,’ jazz is
ART DIRECTOR Garret Petrov
represented by an extremely tiny slice. gpetrov@timelesscom.com

PRODUCTION MANAGER Mike Street

That overall music sales are down is undeniable and well documented. Within that mstreet@timelesscom.com
shrinking “commerce pie,” jazz is represented by an extremely tiny slice. According to the
GRAPHIC DESIGNER Angela Marlett
Nielsen Music Year-End Report for 2016, of total music consumption in the United States amarlett@timelesscom.com
during that year, jazz recordings accounted for just one percent. Within just over 200 mil-
lion total album units moved (CD, cassette, vinyl, and digital) cited in that same Nielsen Advertising
summary, aggregate sales of only 2 million were split amongst all jazz recording artists in ACCOUNT MANAGER Matt King
the entire year. Factor in that the top selling jazz albums in 2016 were from, in order, Frank mking@timelesscom.com
Sinatra, Norah Jones, Tony Bennett, Willie Nelson, and india.arie & Joe Sample and you
ACCOUNT MANAGER Dave Jeans
have an even smaller fragment of that pie for younger and lesser-known acts to fight over. djeans@timelesscom.com
Passionate champions of jazz music and culture with a formula for success in today’s
market, such as Basin Street Records founder Mark Samuels, do exist out there – and for ACCOUNT MANAGER Matt Huber
mh@timelesscom.com
those musicians lucky enough to be embraced by such partners, congrats! But what about
everyone else? Basin Street is doing really well, but with 14 artists, total, on its roster and a GREATER CHINA
very narrow focus – New Orleans jazz – it’s not as if the label’s success represents a direct Judy Wang
Worldwide Focus Media
pipeline to financial comfort and widespread audience exposure for all. Basin Street Re- C: 0086-13810325171
cords in 2017 is not Columbia Records in the ‘70s. E: judy@timelesscom.com
When I’ve chatted with jazzers currently trying to break or build upon some already
Business
achieved level of exposure, I often hear disillusionment, a sort of “Why bother…” attitude
VICE PRESIDENT William Hamilton Vanyo
when I bring up things like audio streaming services, digital distribution houses, social
wvanyo@timelesscom.com
media campaigns, et cetera. The wording changes, depending on the source, but I often
get some variation of, “That may work for hip-hop or punk, but it doesn’t really work when CIRCULATION MANAGER Naomi Crews
ncrews@timelesscom.com
you’re trying to reach jazz fans.”
For his part, Samuels understands that mindset – but not the defeatism. “You can get
your music up on all these platforms just like we can,” he agrees. “The problem is, every-
body else can also get their music up on all those platforms just like we can… [but] It’s
the other things that people are spending their time doing that’s our competition. Our
competition is trying to get a person off their couch.” 6000 South Eastern Ave., #14-J
All you can do is exploit every opportunity out there, even those that you feel “don’t Las Vegas, NV 89119
work” in the world of jazz. 702-479-1879
Fax: 702-554-5340
That slice of pie is shrinking – make sure you get your bite.

RPMDA
Christian Wissmuller JAZZ EDUCATION NETWORK

cwissmuller@timelesscom.com

2 JAZZed • November/December 2017

 noteworthy
JEN to Host 9th Annual Conference in Dallas
The Jazz Education Net-
work (JEN) will present its
9th Annual Conference
in Dallas, Texas on Janu-
ary 3 through 6, 2018. The
four-day event will feature
world-class performers and
presenters, as well as GRAM-
MY Award-winning bassist/
composer/producer Marcus
Miller as guest speaker.
“We are excited about our 2018 Con-
ference’s wide range of activities, work-
shops, day and evening performances,
and special fund-raising events,” says JEN
president Caleb Chapman. “There will be
something engaging and enjoyable for
everyone, whether you’re a live jazz fan,
an educator looking to share research
with peers, a student looking to grow as a
musician, or a company with great prod-
ucts and educational materials to exhibit.”
This year’s Conference will also mark
Wadada Leo Smith to Present CREATE
Festival West in December
Composer and trumpeter Wadada Leo
Smith will present CREATE Festival West,
a two-day celebration and exploration
of his inventive and unclassifiable music,
on Friday December 15 and Saturday, De-
cember 16, 2017 at The Lab in San Fran-
cisco.
The festival will include performanc-
es by seven separate ensembles over
two evenings. In addition, Smith will
host a workshop, open only to musi-
cians, on his Ankhrasmation Symbolic
Language Scores. Tickets are $35 per
the Second Annual JEN
Scholarship Concert: JEN-
erosity For the Future, on
Friday, January 5, 2018.
The exclusive fundraising
event, which will feature
guest speaker Marcus Miller
and a performance by the
University of North Texas
One O’Clock Lab Band and
Friends.
The conference will host four days of
live performances by professional, stu-
dent, and community groups; educational
clinics; research presentations; jazz indus-
try/music business sessions, an industry
exhibition, and networking and outreach
opportunities. Conference badges are
available for immediate purchase online,
with an online discount offered through
December 15, 2017. To see a full confer-
ence lineup or register, visit Conference
Central at www.JazzEdNet.org.
concert; $60 for both concerts. The
workshop is $50, and more informa-
tion can be found at www.thelab.org.
Both evenings will culminate with a
performance of music from “America’s
National Parks,” a six-movement suite
inspired by the scenic splendor, historic
legacy, and political controversies of the
country’s public landscapes, performed
by Smith’s newly-expanded Golden Quin-
tet: Smith, pianist Davis, bassist John
Lindberg, drummer akLaff, and cellist Wal-
ters along with video artist Jesse Gilbert.
In the end, Smith hopes that audienc-
es who attend the festival will come away
“with a deeper understanding of how I
make my art. I expect that they’ll be more
informed about what my music is and
therefore they can create a deeper level
of appreciation for what I do. Ultimately,
I wish to create a dialogue about issues of
liberty, democracy, art and the connec-
tion between human beings.”
Sunnyside Jazz Festival
Welcomes Pianist-
Composer Sarabski
The Sunnyside Jazz Festival in Reims
celebrated its third edition this past fall.
Produced by Jazzus Productions, the
festival was established with the “desire
to open the public to various original
forms of music” and to prove that “jazz
is a living music.”
The festival welcomed 450 jazz afi-
cionados on November 5 to see Azer-
baijani pianist–composer Isfar Sarabski.
Sarabski is winner of the 2009 Solo
Piano Prize at the Montreux Jazz Festi-
val, and his appearance was made pos-
sible by the Paris office of The European
Azerbaijan Society (TEAS).
“For the third successive year –
thanks to TEAS – we are being given
chance to discover a new internation-
al-standard artist from Azerbaijan,” said
Gilles Gautier, co-director of Jazzus Pro-
ductions and co-founder of the Sunny-
side Festiva.
Sarabski has performed in some of
the world’s leading concert halls and
jazz venues, including the Royal Albert
Hall and Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Club in Lon-
don, the Asphalt Jazz Club in Berlin and
Le Duc des Lombards in Paris.
The following concert by Israeli bass-
ist/singer/composer Avishaï Cohen saw
him perform with pianist Omri Mora
and drummer Noam David, which took
him draw in a multiplicity of musical
genres, including Arabic-Andalusian
and Latin music, ending with three en-
cores.
Isfar Sarabski
November/December 2017 • JAZZed 3
noteworthy
The GRAMMY Music Education Coalition Launches to
Support Music Education
The GRAMMY Music Educa-
tion Coalition (GMEC), a non-
profit collective, was announced
today with the goal of increasing
the number of youth actively
participating in music making in
U.S. public schools.
GMEC consists of more than
30 music education organiza-
tions, including the National
Association for Music Education
(NAfME), the NAMM Foundation (Nation-
al Association of Music Merchants), VH1
Save The Music Foundation, and Lang
Lang Foundation International Music
Foundation, among others.
“The GRAMMY Music Education Co-
alition has one mission - to increase the
number of students actively making mu-
sic across the country with particular em-
phasis on underserved communities,” said
Recording Academy president and CEO
Neil Portnow. “The partnerships we are
creating with school districts, teachers,
parents and youth are designed to drive
systemic change across geographies and
communities nationwide.”
The first proposed beneficiaries of the
program in Metropolitan Nashville Public
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Schools Music Makes Us, (Nashville), New
York City Department of Education (New
York City), and The School District of Phil-
adelphia (Philadelphia) will receive cus-
tomized funding and strategic services
based on school system needs assess-
ments. The investments aim to provide
program enhancements that drive active
music making among students in public
schools.
GMEC will aim to work with participat-
ing school districts to lay the groundwork
and implement robust music programs
that will be independently sustainable.
To date, more than $2,500,000 has been
raised thanks to The Walker Family Foun-
dation, ELMA Philanthropies and the
GMEC board. The GMEC plans to expand
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its partnerships to include art-
ists, additional school districts,
corporations, non-profit organi-
zations and foundations.
Currently, children in majority
low-income schools - more than
1.5 million elementary students,
and 1 million secondary stu-
dents - are disproportionately
without access to music educa-
tion.
“We know that the benefits of music
education extend far beyond the class-
room,” said Dr. Lee Whitmore, executive
director of the GMEC. “By increasing the
number of students actively making mu-
sic, we are fostering the development of
essential cognitive and social skills that
better prepare them for success as well
as beginning a lifelong appreciation of
music.”
GMEC has teamed up with Disney•Pix-
ar’s “Coco” to bring best-in-class music
from the film and learning content to
teachers and youth. With support from
The Walt Disney Studios and inspired by
the film’s themes, GMEC is working with
Berklee College of Music to provide new
educational materials within Berklee
PULSE, an online music education re-
source for students and educators.
“‘Coco’ is rooted in music,” said Adrian
Molina, co-director, screenwriter and a
songwriter for the film. “The film features
traditional Mexican music and original
songs – ‘Remember Me’ [written by Acad-
emy Award-winning songwriters Kristen
Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez] and
‘Un Poco Loco’ [written by Molina and
Germaine Franco] will be featured in the
program, along with Mexican folk songs.
We believe in GMEC and its mission and
are honored to work with this organiza-
tion.”
To inspire students to follow their mu-
sical dreams, Disney•Pixar’s “Coco” team
will donate 300 Cordoba guitars to GMEC
partners and Guitar Center, the world’s
largest retailer of musical instruments
and various musician-based in-house
services, including lessons, will donate an
additional 300 Cordoba guitars with all
600 slated for delivery before the end of
the year.
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noteworthy
Applications for the 2018 Yamaha Young Performing Artists Now Open
Yamaha has announced that the ap-
plication process for the 2018 Yamaha
Young Performing Artists (YYPA) com-
petition is now open.
Between now and January 8, 2018,
American musicians between the ages
of 18 and 22 are invited to apply to the
prestigious program, which has been
recognizing outstanding young musi-
cians from the worlds of classical, jazz
and contemporary music for three de-
cades.
Winners of the 2018 competition will
be invited to attend an all-expense-paid
trip to the YYPA Celebration Weekend at
the Music for All Summer Symposium.
During the weekend, they will have
the opportunity to perform in front of
thousands of students and music ed-
ucators, participate in workshops de-
signed to launch a professional music
career, and receive national press cover-
age along with a recording and photos
of the live performance. Winners will
also enjoy services and communication
with Yamaha Artist Relations.
“The YYPA Program is one music
competition where the prizes can last a
lifetime,” said John Wittmann, director,
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6 JAZZed • November/December 2017
artist relations and
education, Yamaha
Artist Services Indi-
anapolis. “Since the
program began in
1988, Yamaha has set young artists on
track toward long, successful careers as
both performers and educators.”
“I absolutely loved my time as a 2008
YYPA winner,” added Conrad Jones, a
principal trumpet of the Indianapolis
Symphony. “Soloing for such a large and
enthusiastic audience really helped me
develop a sense of what it takes to han-
dle the ‘hot seat.’ I’m also very grateful
for my relationship with Yamaha. I still
rely on my Yamaha instruments on a
weekly basis with the ISO!”
“The YYPA weekend was truly, and
unexpectedly, the most inspiring three
days I’ve ever had,” said Patrick Bartley, a
Grammy-nominated saxophonist, com-
poser, and bandleader who won YYPA’s
saxophone category in 2015. “Coming
into it, you think it’s just going to be an-
other ‘camp’-like experience with some
good players. But then you immedi-
ately realize just how serious everyone
at Yamaha is about wanting to see you
SAXOPHONIST/COMPOSER
“AN AWESOME TEACHER. BILL HAS
A REAL GIFT AT KNOWING HOW
TO CONNECT WITH STUDENTS.”
- NOE MARMALEJO
(U OF H -MOORES SCHOOL OF MUSIC)
My goal is to inspire and develop talent with positive
input, energy and humor!! I have established a
proven method of teaching jazz and improvisation.
BRIEF BIO:
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• 2 videos for Truefire “The Language of Improvisation“
• Masterclasses in Improvisation, Small Group and Big Band
• Charts available from my live CD “ Vans Joint“
recorded with the renown WDR Big Band
grow and flourish. They’re like family. By
the end of the weekend, I felt mentally
prepared to build my career. People like
John Wittmann and Jeff Coffin really
helped me harness and internalize tools
for being clear, confident and motivat-
ed while moving through this whole
process!”
Applications will be considered for
piccolo, flute, oboe, bassoon, clarinet,
saxophone, trumpet, french horn, trom-
bone, euphonium, tuba, mallet or con-
cert percussion, drums, violin, viola, cel-
lo, upright bass, and piano.
“We want as many students as pos-
sible to get involved,” Wittmann added.
“Of course, it’s always hard to choose
just 10 winners from so many gifted ap-
plicants, but we’ve seen that even the
act of preparing their applications helps
young musicians focus on their talent
and their careers. For all who enter, the
YYPA competition can be a step toward
a promising musical future.”
Sacramento Traditional
Jazz Society Celebrates
Young Jazz Musicians
The Sacramento Traditional Jazz So-
ciety (STJS) celebrated young jazz musi-
cians on Sunday, November 12th, at their
monthly Jazz Concert at the Sacramento
Elks Lodge. Regional youth jazz band, Sax
By Popular Demand from Davis, California
and The New Traditionalists (TNT) high
school honor jazz band performed on
the main stage. Hot City Jazz Band also
performed.
The STJS also presented its annual Mu-
sic Lessons Award winners for 2017-18.
25 students from elementary through
10th grade received $300 each for private
music lessons.
The lively jam session room, called the
Tailgate, was open to any and all young
musicians who want to practice tunes
with other jazz musicians.
D’Addario Awards $480,000 to Music Programs Nationwide
The D’Addario Foundation is steadfast “Nurturing many of these organiza-
in its commitment to supporting inde- tions for a number of years now, we are
pendent not-for-profits that are bringing seeing incredible outcomes for the chil-
back access to music in schools and com- dren participating such as improved ac-
munities where it does not exist. ademic performance and achievements,
“We know firsthand that long-lasting, higher graduation rates, and students ap-
immersive, communal music education is plying to and attending college, many of
a radical way to combat social-emotional whom live in neighborhoods where grad-
issues and help children in difficult cir- uation rates hover at 50 percent,” Suzanne
cumstances, who are already at a deficit, D’Addario Brouder explains.
to really rise up and overcome,” Suzanne
D’Addario Brouder says, director of the
D’Addario Foundation.
The D’Addario Foundation just com-
pleted their rigorous grant application Fr
review process for the second time this Weill Music Institute ee
year, having received a record number of
proposals. Of the total applications, 116
organizations received very exciting news
– D’Addario committed over $237,000 in
monetary and product support to pro-
grams in 35 out of the 50 United States,
bringing the total for the year to over
$480,000 for 2017.
Focused on providing assistance to
organizations in the early stages of de- INAUGURAL
velopment, a grant from the D’Addario
Foundation brings a level of credibility to SEASON
these community-based programs and
gives them critical leverage to acquire
other forms of support. The D’Addario
Foundation chooses organizations they
feel best exemplify the virtues of produc- Extraordinary Opportunity
for America’s Best Young
ing quality, immersive, sustainable music
education programs. Many programs at-
tribute their success to obtaining a grant
from the D’Addario Foundation in their
early years. Jazz Musicians
Some of the programs the D’Add-
ario Foundation has awarded a grant to
for the first time include; A Child’s Song In the summer of 2018, gifted young
(Colorado), Dual Language Academy jazz musicians (ages 16–19) from
of the Monterey Peninsula (California), across the country come together
Eastman School of Music RocMusic (New to study with and learn from
York), Lone Star Youth Orchestra (Texas), world-class jazz musicians, Sean Jones
Jimmy Katz

Love, Light and Melody (International), perform at Carnegie Hall, and

and Price Hill Will – MYCincinnati (Ohio). tour Europe as NYO Jazz. Trumpet
Continued support was awarded to many player Sean Jones will be the soloist
programs, including those which the and bandleader for the ensemble’s
D’Addario Foundation consider their pre- inaugural season.
mier partners; Education through Music Application Deadline: February 1, 2018
(New York), the People’s Music School
(Chicago), OrchKids (Baltimore), Austin
Classical Guitar (Texas), Bloomingdale
School of Music (New York), and Sound-
Apply Today! | carnegiehall.org/NYOJazz | 212-424-2024
scapes (Virginia).

November/December 2017 • JAZZed 7

171001_Jazzed Magazine_NYO Jazz Recruitment_FINAL_PRINT_171002.indd 1 10/2/17 1:11 PM
noteworthy

Yamaha Adds Szekely, Block, and Sabatino to Artist Family

Yamaha Artist Services has announced that cellists Ja-
cob Szekely and Mike Block, as well as bassist Charley Sa-
batino, have been welcomed to the Yamaha Artist family.
All three musicians currently use Yamaha electric string
instruments.
Both Szekely and Block play the Yamaha SVC-210sk
Silent Cello, while Sabatino performs on the SLB-200LTD
Limited Edition Silent Bass.
“It’s the closest thing to an upright bass in sound and
feel, it’s just wonderful,” said Sabatino of the SLB-200LTD.
“It feels like an acoustic instrument, which is really the
exciting thing. Even when a cellist is playing electric mu-
sic, we’re still often evoking the acoustic sound of a cello,”
Block said of the SVC-210sk.
“Yamaha has done its homework,” Szekely added.
“They’ve created an instrument that a classically-trained
musician—which is what 98 percent of string players
are—can sit down and just feel comfortable with, instant-
ly. No company in the world supports their artists like Ya-
maha. I don’t think that’s controversial or debatable.”
All three musicians are involved with music education;
Szekely runs String Project Los Angeles, a school dedicat-
ed to creative string playing, Block is a professor at Berklee
College of Music and runs The Mike Block String Camp, and
Sabatino has been teaching bass for over 30 years. Because
of this, all three artists can recognize and appreciate the
dedication to music education that Yamaha has shown.
“Yamaha is actively involved on the ground level of pro-
moting music education in its many forms,” Block said. “I’m
grateful for this opportunity to collaborate with them.”
“It would be hard for me to understate their commit-
ment to music education,” Szekely added. “I have a unique
perspective, because I’m not only an artist and a teacher,
but I’m also a school owner. Yamaha is unlike any other
company on earth.”
Looking forward, Szekely will be promoting and play-
ing at the 6th annual L.A. Creative String Festival and re-
cording a new album with his trio. Block will be recording
a new solo album that’s due out in 2018, and Sabatino will
be appearing at the Uncool Festival in Switzerland and
the Stockholm Jazz Festival with his free-improvised jazz
group, The Velocity Duo.

The Keys to Jazz Are In Good Hands

OSCAR PETERSON oscarwithlove.com

“...this recording, which easily ranks among the best of the year,
“...a tribute album for the ages…” – All About Jazz overflows with such indelible tracks.” – The Los Angeles Times

To honor her late husband, Kelly Peterson assembled some of the most celebrated jazz artists in the world to perform and
record on the luminary’s prized personal Bösendorfer Imperial piano, then released the recordings as a deluxe collector’s
edition, featuring an extensive commemorative book, and as a standard 3-CD digipak package. Oscar, With Love
showcases Oscar Peterson as a composer and includes the world premiere of several pieces he wrote but
never recorded; the compositions were retrieved from Peterson’s library for the project.

joeydefrancesco.com JOEY DeFRANCESCO

“...Joey has embraced the ‘heart and soul’ aspects of his instrumental “One of the true attractions of the B3, is that
prowess. There is no organist who is regarded by his when it’s in the right hands...No one alive
peers and critics to such a degree.” does it better than Joey DeFrancesco…”
– Audiophile Audition – JazzWeekly.com

BILLY CHILDS billychilds.com

“Child’s piano stylings have a “It’s punctilious and unpredictably

lusciousness that are all his own.” powerful all at once.”
– Huffington Post – All About Jazz

christiansandsjazz.com CHRISTIAN SANDS

“Sands is skilled, soulful and melodic throughout, “...pianist Christian Sands plays with a restrained touch
his energy and spirit altering with each tune.” and a rolling command across the entire keyboard.”
mackavenue.com – Vice Noisey – The New York Times

8 JAZZed • November/December 2017


KRISIEY SALSA
The D’Addario Foundation Presents Grants to Music Not-For-Profits
The D’Addario Foundation held three
grant presentation events in October at Ted
Brown Music in Tacoma, Washington, Bea-
cock Music in Vancouver, Washington, and
Menchey Music in Timonium, Maryland.
The not-for-profits that were awarded
grants include Seattle JazzED, Metropolitan
Youth Symphony, and Baltimore Symphony
Orchestra.
“Handing out grants to not-for-profit ini-
tiatives like these is really the best part of our
job,” said Suzanne D’Addario Brouder, exec-
utive director of the D’Addario Foundation.
“The D’Addario Foundation has pioneered a
process of supporting grassroots efforts to
bring quality, immersive music education
Spring Semester: January–May
Ages: 13-18
Instrumental and vocal students learn from the best in the industry in NJPAC’s exciting
training programs.
Sign up today! Visit njpac.org/register
Questions? Call 973-353-7058
STANLEY MORRIS
back into underserved communities. Our
purpose is to not only provide financial sup-
port to organizations like these, but also to
recognize and raise visibility for the tireless,
incredibly impactful and innovative work
being done using music as a powerful tool
for positive social and academic develop-
ment.”
So far this year, $46,000 in grants has
been formally handed out at check pre-
sentations, and The D’Addario Foundation
has awarded over $517,000 in year-to-date
monetary and product donations to 242
music education not-for-profits.
“OrchKids’ partnership with the D’Add-
ario Foundation over the last three years
saturday
jazz training
programs
chick corea
& béla fleck
Sat, May 19 @ 8PM
GRAMMY®-winning artists Chick Corea and
Béla Fleck bring a night of jazz, pop standards
and more.
GREG DOHLER
has been crucial to the success of delivering
a high quality after-school music program
to the more than 1,200 Baltimore City stu-
dents we serve,” said Raquel Whiting Gilmer,
executive director of Baltimore Symphony
Orchestra’s OrchKids. “We are so grateful to
have partners that are willing to invest in
our students with multi-year support – this
level of commitment enables OrchKids to
reach more students and have a greater im-
pact in our community.”
The D’Addario Foundation held anoth-
er grant presentation event recognizing
not-for-profits in southern California at the
D’Addario & Co. Woodwinds Facility in Sun
Valley on November 14.
For full schedule visit
njpac.org • 1.888.GO.NJPAC
November/December 2017 • JAZZed 9
playlist TOM MARKO

WHAT’S ON YOUR PLAYLIST?

BY CHRISTIAN WISSMULLER
The current director of Jazz
Studies at Illinois State Universi-
ty, Tom Marko is also an accom-
plished drummer, composer, and
recording artist. Maintaining a
busy schedule in central Illinois
and the Midwest as a performer
and adjudicator, Marko can often
be heard with popular groups and
artists such as Kevin Hart and the
Vibe Tribe, The Brazilionaires, The
Todd Kelly Quintet, David Hoff-
man, The Travis Wesley Trio, and
his own project: Tom Marko and
the Inner Light.
His impressive first album as a leader – Inner Light (Summit
Records) – featuring special guest Scott Wendholt on trumpet,
was released in the fall of 2016 to enthusiastic critical praise
and a receptive radio audience.

1. Pat Metheny – Unity Band
This recording featuring Chris Potter,
Ben Williams, and Antonio Sanchez has
a stunning sound and mix. I love every
track, but if I had to pick my favorites,
I would have to put “New Year” and
“Roofdogs” at the top of my list. The
compositions seem to bring out the
best in an already incredible group of players. They all sound
superb, both individually and especially as an interactive unit.
I suppose “Unity Band” really is the most appropriate title for
the project.
2. John Cowherd – Mercy
John Patitucci, Brian Blade, and Bill
Frisell join forces here on a collection
of John’s beautiful compositions. Much
of it is introspective, mood-wise, with
plenty of space, dynamics, and of course
emotion. My favorite tracks are “Mercy
Suite: Part 1” and “Postlude.” This album
has impeccable sound. Listen through nice headphones or a
high-end system to enjoy the full depth!
3. Burlap to Cashmere – Burlap to
Cashmere
A great set of compelling songs in
a pop/rock/folk genre. I love the lyrics,
live feel, grooves, and time signatures inspired by Greek music.
I don’t know how those guys sing and play at the same time!
4. Jerry Gonzalez and the Fort Apache Band – Crossroads
I love this record: great original com-
positions, arrangements, Afro-Cuban
grooves, and solos all delivered with
passion and clarity. The whole package
continues to appeal to me since one of
my teachers, David Hardman, played it
for me more than twenty years ago.
5. John Coltrane – Coltrane’s Sound
When I hear the band launch into
“The Night has a Thousand Eyes,” I get
chills. McCoy Tyner, Steve Davis, and El-
vin Jones are at their best here. I may
never tire of this album.
6. Michael Brecker – Tales from the Hudson
This is another all-time favorite of
mine. The tunes are melodic and intri-
cate, the recording quality is beautiful,
and the band supports each other in
the most musical ways. I can’t pick a fa-
vorite on this album, I love the whole
thing.

10 JAZZed • November/December 2017

7. John Abercrombie, Peter Erskine, 10. Kenny Garrett – Pursuance: The list of Coltrane tunes. “Lonnie’s Lament”
Bob Mintzer, John Patitucci – Music of John Coltrane and “Liberia” stand out most to me, but
The Hudson Project This is my the whole album is full of passion and
I read a re- favorite tribute technical mastery combined. I’ll be
view of this al- to one of my enjoying this one for another twenty
bum that used favorite artists. years.
the word “un- Kenny Garrett, Tom Marko and the Inner Light’s debut
spectacular.” I Pat Metheny, release, Inner Light, dropped on October
must say, I think Rodney Whitak- 7, 2016. www.summitrecords.com
it’s completely er, and Brian Blade really do justice to a
the opposite. I first found this live set of
originals on video. I can watch and listen
to these tunes over and over. The guys
do a masterful job breathing life into
some great modern and varied compo- Get the Most from Your Tenor Sax
sitions while always maintaining great
sympathy for each other. The DVD also
includes an informative Q&A session
in which each of the members of the
group offers some meaningful insights
on several topics.

8. Jeff Lorber Fusion – Galaxy

© bruce langton
If you like
grooves and
fusion influ-
enced by funk,
techno, R & B,
and Brazilian
styles, you
should check this out. Perfectly mixed
and mastered, this album is full of great
arrangements, solos, drumming, and
programming. and more. My favorite
tracks are “Live Wire,” “Galaxy,” and “The
Underground.”

9. Brian Blade Fellowship – Perceptual

This is one
of my favorite
groups. Brian,
Jon, and the Make the music your own
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November/December 2017 • JAZZed 11

basic training
‘Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer’
and – Confirmation – Ear Training for the Jazz Musician
BY MILES DONAHUE

T
he intuitive side of music is the natural ability we are born
with that enables us to remember what we hear and accu-
mulate vocabulary without benefit of intellectual study. Van
Cliburn, who in 1958 and was the winner of the Tchaikovsky piano
competition in Moscow, was only three years old when he was
able to play the music his mother had just taught a student of hers
mere moments after she would leave the room. As an adult, the
first thing he did when learning a new piece of music was to sing
the melody of the piece before beginning to actually play it at the
piano. The jazz pianist Art Tatum had perfect pitch and learned
to play the piano at age three by listening to the radio and his
mother’s piano rolls. Neither Van Cliburn nor Tatum had taken an
ear-training course to develop this ability.
Singing is the only way to improve your ear if you are not lucky
enough to be born with this natural ability. Relative pitch is the
ability to identify or recreate a musical note by comparing it to a
reference note and to identify the interval between the two notes.
Jazz musicians need this skill to create an improvised solo.
Using a keyboard, I have developed a method for improving
this necessary skill:
• Play the melody note and
hold it down while you sing
the next note of the song and un-
derstand/hear what the interval is.
• Play the note you sang and check yourself for or
accuracy.
• Sing the whole song and check to see that you have
not changed keys. It is necessary to start with simple dia-
tonic melodies such as Christmas songs, thus the title of this
article: “Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer.” If you sing a melody
and you lose the key, that means you sang a wrong interval
somewhere in the song and went off track. It will be neces-
sary to go thru the song note by note and discover which
interval you sang incorrectly.
The difficult news is that learning intervals is a mathematical
skill that involves thinking – i.e. a minor 6th is E up to C (8- ½ steps)
and a major 6th is G up to E (9- ½ steps). By singing intervals cor-
rectly, over time you will have confidence in your hearing ability,
and this translates into being a better musician no matter what
the music is that you are performing.

In a career spanning 50 years, New

England–based bandleader, sax play-

CELEBRATE! er, and jazz educator Miles Donahue

DIVA
has performed and recorded 14 al-
bums, many of which are available on
The iTunes. His site, www.jazzworkbook.
com, offers an effective course for
Jazz Orchestra’s new players to learn jazz improvisa-
tion and for seasoned players to learn
25th Anniversary Project fresh approaches to soloing.

on
To become part of DIVA Jazz History go to this link “Relative pitch is the ability to identify or
http://www.artistshare.com/news/?pt=4722
recreate a musical note by comparing it to
Join the project and get immediate access to exclusive videos,
composer sketches, artist's blogs, photos, opportunites to
participate in unique DIVA experiences and MORE!
a reference note and to identify the interval
between the two notes. Jazz musicians need
this skill to create an improvised solo. ”

Featured Composers & Performers include:

Alexa Tarantino, Mercedes Beckman, Janelle Reichman, Erica von Kleist, Leigh Pilzer,
Liesl Whitaker, Jami Dauber, Rachel Therrien, Barbara Laronga, Jennifer Krupa,
Sara Jacovino, Leslie Havens, Tomoko Ohno, Noriko Ueda & Sherrie Maricle

12 JAZZed • November/December 2017

1 play the note and then sing the interval-2 hear the sound of the interval 3 CHECK FOR ACCURACY

RUDOLPH THE RED NOSE RAINDEER

play sing down minor 3rd

V 44 Ï Ï ä Ï
sing up a minor 6th
Ï Ï
down minor 3rd play sing up a 4th
VÏ ˙. Ï Ï Ï Ï Ï Ï
2
down a 1/2 step down a flat 5(tri tone) sing maj 6th
Vw Ï Ï ä Ï Ï
Ï
4
sing up a 5th END DOWN A STEP TO THE TONIC

VÏ ˙. Ï Ï Ï Ï Ï Ï w
6
CONFIRMATION CHECK OUT SOME OF THE SAME INTERVALS IN THIS COMPLEX SONG

V ∑ ∑ ∑
9
PLAY SING DOWN A 4TH
VÏ Ï ä
3
Ï Ï Ï Ï #Ï
12
Ï
SING UP A 5TH SING DOWN A MINOR 6TH
Ï
SING UP A TRI TONE
VÏ Ï Ï Ï ä Ï
13 #Ï

Vä j Î Î ä j
CHECK THE TONIC NOTE PLAY

Ï Ï
14

ä jSING UP A1/2 STEP

SING UP A 4TH
VÏ Ï Ï Ï Ï
15
Ï

V #Ï nÏ bÏ Ï Ï Ï Ï
16

November/December 2017 • JAZZed 13

focussession EXPLORING HARMOLODICS

An Excerpt from the Recently Released

BY STEPHEN RUSH
A Definition of Harmolodics: The Shape of Jazz to Come
Harmolodics is about race. It is about human equality. Equality of
tones is about race. Consider this exchange from page 128:
Stephen: This constraint on civilization and the constraint on mu-
sic is going to cause an end to jazz?
Ornette: I know you’re right…. I know you’re right. And the reason
why it is … sex, money, and race. In that order.
(major or minor), with phrases ending
on C# in m. 4, G# in m. 6, C# again in m. 8, and G#
in m. 10 (see below). However, the coda (mm. 11–14) ends the
composition with a phrase in G, then in Gb!
I could envision this scenario in a jazz improvisation or theory
class:
Teacher: In what key is “Peace Warriors” by Ornette Coleman?

H
armolodics is an approach that attempts to value each el- Student: C# and Gb, I think! But maybe A, G, or G#.
ement and each participant equally. Melody is the “source Teacher: That is precisely correct. But isn’t the key of the com-
of the music,” as Ornette told me years ago in an interview position established by the opening phrase of the composition,
that predates this material. From melody all other elements are and supported by the last phrase?
implied: groove, intervallic content, harmony. If one were to trace Student: Yes, but the opening phrase ends in A, and the last
Gary Peacock or Charlie Haden’s bass notes accompanying Or- phrase ends in G#, and the body of the composition is clearly in
nette Coleman over the years, it would prove difficult, even fruit- C#. In other words, the composition is in at least three keys, before
less, to attempt to codify the harmony for any given composition. any improvisation occurs at all.
Each repetition of the form, if there is a repetition, uses a consis- Teacher: Correct! You get an A. Or a Bb, or a ... (class laughter
tent harmony. The bass line, seeming to contain the harmony, is ensues).
actually a result of the melody: in the same
way, the bass line of a Bach Two-Part Inven-
tion seems to contain the harmony, but is
actually a result of the melodic material that
generates both treble and bass lines. The
melody is the source code of all the other
musical events, harmonic or contrapuntal.
It is simply bizarre that music schools still
teach the bass line as being the generator
of the melody (figured bass instruction is
endemic to all classical Western European
music education). Ornette’s approach is
much more straightforward: “top down” in-
stead of “bottom up.”
Notice in “Peace Warriors,” from In All
Languages (Coleman 1987), Charlie Haden’s
ability to follow and sometimes subvert
Ornette’s tonal and rhythmic phraseology.
The composition itself is tonally ambigu-
ous, and deliberately so. The first phrase is
almost a throwaway tonally—ending in A—
but generates the groove. It does end on a
G#, making the G# seem like either I or V. The
first portion of the head is certainly in C#

14 JAZZed • November/December 2017

 “Peace Warriors” is a Harmolodic composition. It is in many keys,
and shows traditional sequences of I–V, surely, and transpositions
(e.g. the coda) down by a step. These are not new compositional
approaches, but they are newer consequences of traditional ap-
proaches.
A close look at the improvisation (above) shows that starting in
m. 18, Ornette begins by transposing the shape and rhythm of the
opening phrase – eight times. The ending notes of each of those
phrases – ostensibly the tonal centers for those transpositions –
are Bb, Ab, Fb, D, B, Bb, Ab, Db. To attempt to provide some rationale
for those choices would be to miss the point – this phrase is about
the shape and the rhythm of the motive rather than an attempt to
reveal some larger architectonic scheme. But it is a key element of
how motivic generation works in Harmolodics, with absolutely no
respect for the traditional hierarchy of tonality.
Such rapid change of tonality, however, could soon turn into
a difficult, didactic exercise in both listening and performance,
so Ornette sinks deep into a key in order to balance stasis with
non-stasis. Starting at m. 38, he begins with a clear phrase in G.
Charlie Haden hears and supports this wonderfully. In order to
seat the improvisation in the key of C, Ornette inserts the Wizard
of Oz quote “I am the King of the Forest” in m. 45. It is interesting
to note that the time feel flexes away from 4/4. My notation is not
meant to imply, by the way, that m. 44 is in 2/4 time, or m. 47 is
in 5/4, but it is meant to show that the “6 feeling” of the quote is
You’re going to want more than one.
Never before available to the public, this collection was developed
collaboratively with drummers on the cutting edge of “America’s
Original Art Form,” including Jeff Ballard, Greg Hutchinson,
Joe McCarthy and Lewis Nash.
For full specs, go to VicFirth.com/MJC
superimposed on the 4/4 time of most of the improvisation. This,
too, is Harmolodic improvisation. The domination of 4/4 time on
Jazz improvisation is just as much an issue here as the dominance
of “playing with the changes.” Free Jazz means freedom from 4/4
as well as freedom from playing over prescribed harmony.
A bit more about folk music in Ornette Coleman’s “style” of im-
provisation. Measure 63 begins a very pleasant folk-like melody,
with almost the feel and lilt of a children’s song. The first phrase
is out-of-time but clearly in C. Measures 63–66 are a phrase going
from I to V in G, then mm. 66–69 go from G to C. What complicates
this, though, is that Charlie Haden accompanies the V chord (G
major) in m. 66 with an A (going to a D!), and the cadence back to
a I chord (C major in m. 69) with a Bb! Surely Haden heard the refer-
ence to C major in Coleman’s improvisation, and just as surely, he
chose to not play the obvious or appropriate tonal solutions. One
could say that if he were to play the “right notes” (as in the roots
of the chord) it would have been the wrong thing to play because
this is Free Jazz.
Just to round out this improvisation, note that Ornette ends
with a long note, slightly sharp – a trademark of his. The note he
uses ends up being “C” – ironically, the putative key center in the
middle of the solo. In this way, he helps the listener along, using
a mix of tonal and atonal languages. He grounds the listener’s ear,
centering on focal points – in this case C major – while exercising
extreme liberty.
VICFIRTH.COM ©2016 Vic Firth Company
focussession

Works Cited
Audio Recordings
Coleman, Ornette. 1987a. In All Languages.
With Don Cherry, Charlie Haden, and Billy Hig-
gins. Caravan of Dreams Records, Caravan of
Dreams CDP 85008, vinyl recording.

Coleman, Ornette. 1959a. The Shape of Jazz

to Come. With Don Cherry, Charlie Haden, and
Billy Higgins. Atlantic, Atlantic LP 1317, vinyl
recording.

Stephen Rush is a pro-

fessor of music at the
University of Michigan,
and is the author of
Free Jazz, Harmolod-
This technique of referencing vital keys could be related to the ics and Ornette Cole-
“folk-music influence” so often cited in discourses about Ornette’s man (Routledge, 2106)
style. Ben Ratliff describes it brilliantly in his obituary of Ornette in which includes an ex-
the New York Times (June 11, 2015): “[his music] embodied a new tensive interview with Coleman and many transcriptions, analyses
type of highly informed folk song: deceptively simple melodies of Harmolodic compositions performed by Coleman, Keith Jarrett,
for small groups with an intuitive, collective musical language Branford Marsalis, Pat Metheny, and others. Rush has performed and
and a strategy for playing without preconceived chord sequenc- recorded with Roscoe Mitchell, Steve Swell, et al. His classical work
es.” Of course this technique goes back to the early days of Bebop. is also widely known, with performances by Warsaw and Detroit
Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie often inserted (usually comical) Symphonies, members of the New York Philharmonic and Cleveland
quotes of everything from folk tunes, cartoon theme songs, and Symphony. He has also recorded over 35 records and CDs. www.ste-
even Ferdi Grofé’s “Grand Canyon Suite” into complex improvisa- phenjrushmusic.com, srush@umich.edu
tions. Later, Albert Ayler was to take this a step further with his
extremely connotative compositions that sounded like hymns
(“Prophecy”), popular calypso music (“Ghosts”), or New Orleans
dirges (“Spirits”). This is clearly a strong part of the jazz tradition.

“Free Jazz means freedom from 4/4 as well as

freedom from playing over prescribed harmony.”

16 JAZZed • November/December 2017

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upclose
S
tewart Copeland declares jazz to be, “the last refuge of the
talentless.” That’s not exactly the most auspicious comment
to launch this cover story profile with, but it’s appropriate
considering the iconic drummer has never been one to play by
the rules. Whether agitating his old Police bandmate Sting, impro-
vising with orchestras, or secretly roping together a band, Cope-
land follows his own beat for sure. Which is funny, because many
people might declare that that is exactly what many jazz players
do, particularly in the face of repetitive pop music or heavily struc-
tured orchestral music.
The drummer believes that jazz, more than any other form
of music, has the highest fluff ratio. “The 10 percent at the top
is amazing, of course,” he concedes. “But I’ve been a musician
for 60 years now and you can’t fool me – those guys are just
wiggling their fingers.” He places less of the blame on jazz
drummers and more on the soloists, guitarists in particular.
“One of my favorite ways to enliven an otherwise somber din-
ner party is to make a statement like, ‘The problem with jazz
18 JAZZed • November/December 2017
Stewart
Copeland
‘Sticking it to
Convention’
BY BRYAN REESMAN
musicians is that they all suck.’ Okay, now we’ve got a party,
now we’re talking.”
After all of his years in the business, Copeland still exudes a
youthful energy and a desire to push himself. His latest project,
Gizmodrome, is an eclectic rock band that will tour the U.S. in ear-
ly 2018. When I meet him for our interview at the Empire Hotel in
Manhattan, Copeland is easy to spot. While he’s obviously older
than the figure I first recall seeing during MTV’s glory days (and
hey, so am I), he still retains the same tall, wiry frame and abun-
dantly light colored hair. He’s an animated subject who loves to
debate and discuss music and enjoys being contentious when the
occasion arises.
Despite his overt disdain for jazz, Copeland is not completely
harsh on the genre. Having a spent a life in pop and rock, musical
areas where he says drums are there as a supporting instrument
to make the singer look good and where everybody knows their
place, he remarks that jazz fans “do not want you to know your
place. They want to hear everything you’ve got all the time right
now. You go out there completely indulgent. I did the jazz festivals
in Europe with Stanley [Clarke]. Jazz music is more fun to play than
it is to listen to.”
Jazz fans I adore. I will play
for jazz fans every day of the
week.
That being said, he remarks that jazz fans pay good money to
hear musicians let it all hang out. He actually loves those “very ad-
venturous ears. Jazz fans I adore. I will play for jazz fans every day
of the week.” But he calls bull on people like Miles and Coltrane.
“I’ve tried to listen to those guys. I know what drugs those guys
are on, and you can’t fool me. Jazz has the highest quotient of the
king’s new clothes. That doesn’t mean that Stanley Clarke isn’t a
genius, and that on some of those cuts Miles Davis wasn’t burn-
ing. That’s what music is all about. But it is a world where you can
get up there and put a vaguely petulant expression on your face,
wiggle your fingers, and get away with it.”
Throughout the course of his musical career, Copeland has
relished usurping expectations, and he has challenged himself
to step outside of his comfort zone. While mainstream listeners
know his work with The Police, his personal canon extends far be-
yond that. I have come to think of him as a percussionist disguised
as a rock drummer, and the trajectory of his career offers great
lessons for aspiring musicians.
Copeland does not teach students or give master lessons, save
the occasional drum lesson that gets auctioned off at his kids’
schools. But when asked about basic mistakes that he sees begin-
ners make when they start, he replies, “The main one is trying too
hard, which manifests as gripping the sticks [too hard]. My over-
arching advice is if you relax you get more power. I think the mys-
tery of John Bonham’s huge sound is that it’s because he’s really
relaxed and on it. He’s got plenty in reserve. When he really wants
to hit big, he’s got it ready to go.”
No one can doubt that Copeland is in command of his kit. His
musical roots and training run deep. He began playing trombone
at the age of seven. His
father was a jazz mu-
sician who had played
trumpet in the Glenn
Miller Band and who en-
couraged all four of his
children to play music,
but they did not take to
it. (Although his brother
Ian played drums for a
short time and later be-
came a music promot-
er and booking agent,
while his brother Miles
went on to found pio-
neering music label IRS
Records and also man-
age The Police, among
others.)
“He [my father] filled Gizmodrome (from left): Mark King, Vittorio Cosmo, Stewart Copeland, and Adrian Belew
the house with instru-
ments hoping that one of his kids would play and they all didn’t
until the last kid comes along,” recalls Copeland. “The instruments
are lying around, and I immediately grab them and break them.
He spotted that telltale sign. He would say to my siblings, ‘Isn’t it
time for your piano practice?’ That’s not a musician. But when it
comes to the kid to whom you have to say, ‘Will you please stop for
a minute?’ That is the sign of a musician in the family.”
Although he tried other instruments outside of trombone,
drums were the instrument that grabbed him around the age of
eight or nine. They were the most empowering for the late de-
veloper. “When the rest of my friends were getting chest hair and
facial hair I was way behind, and the drums turned this skinny lit-
tle runt into a silverback,” says Copeland. His father immediately
enrolled him in lessons so he could learn proper grip and proper
rudiments.
During his childhood, Copeland moved around because his
father Miles worked as an agent for the CIA. Stewart was born in
Virginia in 1952 but spent his young years in various Middle East-
ern countries and was exposed to a variety of musical rhythms.
“Maybe I wasn’t even listening to it that closely – I was looking
for American music – but I was surrounded by Arabic music,” rec-
ollects Copeland. “When it came time to playing reggae, I under-
stood the fundamental building blocks of the drop beat on the
third beat of the bar because the baladi rhythms, the country
music of Arabic music, have that dropkick on the three and the
absence of one.”
When his family moved to London during his later teen years,
he studied under Max Abrams, “who was a venerable figure,” con-
tinues Copeland. “I learned how to read and was basically there
playing big band jazz charts. Some of my best friends are jazz mu-
sicians, and when I’m rattling their cage about jazz in general they
say, ‘But dude, you were raised on wrong jazz. White big band jazz
is wrong jazz.’ Just to make my predicament even worse with the
jazz world is that I actually like white big band jazz – Stan Kenton,
Woody Herman, and Buddy Rich, of course.”
The burgeoning rocker spent years taking lessons and explor-
ing jazz, but then a revolutionary figure emerged who perma-
nently altered his musi-
cal inclinations. “I loved
bonding with my father
over music and every-
thing, but then when
Jimi Hendrix came along
that was it for trombones
and trumpets,” says Co-
peland. “It was all about
guitar.” Funnily enough,
as he notes, Hendrix
drummer Mitch Mitchell
came from the school of
jazz. Despite his musical
conversion, Copeland
continued with lessons
to develop his technique.
After attending col-
lege at the University of
California at Berkeley,
Copeland returned to
England, where he tour managed and soon played drums for and
recorded with reunited prog band Curved Air between late 1974
and late 1976. After that breakup, Copeland, Sting, and guitarist
Henry Padovani formed the punk-inflected trio The Police. By late
summer 1977, Andy Summers took the latter’s place, and within
a few years, the reggae-influenced group blossomed into the big-
gest rock band on the planet, culminating in the multi-platinum,
Grammy-winning Synchronicity album and successful world tour.
Creative and interpersonal tension lead to solo outings by 1985
and the break-up of the acclaimed band in 1986. By that time,
Copeland had already dived into the soundtrack world for both
film and TV (he received a Golden Globe nomination for scoring
Francis Ford Coppolla’s 1983 movie “Rumble Fish”), and his 1985
film and album The Rhythmatist found him exploring new musical
vistas in Africa. Over the subsequent three decades, Copeland has
expanded his musical vision into many areas: funky pop and rock
(the trios Animal Logic and Oysterhed), films (such as “Wall Street”
and “Highlander II: The Quickening”), television (“The Equalizer”),
opera (Holy Blood and Crescent Moon and The Tell-Tale Heart), bal-
let (King Lear), and video games (Spyro the Dragon). His discog-
November/December 2017 • JAZZed 19
upclose
raphy and filmography is extensive, and he always seems to be
cooking up something at his home studio, The Sacred Grove. Just
look on YouTube.
His latest project Gizmodrome is considered to be a super-
group of sorts, comprised of himself, King Crimson guitarist Adri-
an Belew, Level 42 bassist Mark King, and keyboardist Vittorio Cos-
ma. Copeland actually delivers the quirky singing heard on most
of the album, and Belew and King provide some harmonic vocal
accompaniment. Reportedly called “punk prog” by at least one
journalist, the quartet manages to siphon a prog vibe without the
overindulgence often associated with the genre.
For their live shows, the drummer plans to play rhythm guitar
and sing, while most of the kit duties will be handled by Level 42
drummer Pete Ray Biggin. Switching up instruments is nothing
new to Copeland. Back in 1980, during The Police’s earlier years,
the drummer released an album as his musical alter ego Klark
Kent, playing everything himself including the kazoo.
Gizmodrome’s debut album is both familiar and alien – rock
and pop tunes turned upside down with funk inflections, exotic
rhythms, and off-kilter phrasing. “Any art form has to be a combi-
nation of familiar and unfamiliar, the tension and release,” muses
Copeland. “The tension comes from the unfamiliar and the release
is the familiar. The cadence is familiar.”
The songs were recorded in two sessions a year apart in Milan,
Italy. Even then, the album feels very organic and like something
that gelled in the studio. Copeland admits that the creation of this
musical collective came from a “nefarious scheme, which was I
can’t afford these guys,” he quips. The drummer knew he want-
ed to get them to play together, so he assembled them together
under the ruse of a solo project. “Like Adrian will tell you, he came
20 JAZZed • November/December 2017
expecting to play two or three tracks on Stewart’s album, and af-
ter a day or two he realized it’s not Stewart’s album anymore, it’s
his album. It’s Mark’s album. It’s Vittorio’s album.”
Through this surreptitious recruitment scheme, Copeland be-
came more of a puppet master than bandleader by allowing them
to be the way he has been with other musicians rather than polic-
ing their output. “The real creative juices flow when you give them
free rein,” says Copeland. “I don’t think you can make a rock album
by hiring session players and telling them what to do. Those songs
that I wrote are pristine in my mind. In my mind it’s perfection,
it’s ‘Stairway To Heaven’. But I’ve learned in this long life that Mr.
Belew is probably going to come up with a better idea. If you give
the rest of the band free rein and approval and encouragement,
that’s when they start to really produce the stuff that Adrian is
known for. To really get full-on Adrian Belew, give him free rein.
And wow, did that pay off.”
One example that Copeland offers in terms of their songwrit-
ing genesis is “Amaka Pipa.” “We have a perfectly good song, and
at the end he [Adrian] is playing a solo and out of nowhere comes
this riff that is smoking,” recalls the drummer. “So we put it in the
beginning, we put it in the middle, and now that song is all about
that riff. I had a great idea, but just letting Adrian be Adrian lifted it
way up. On ‘The Man In The Mountain,’ out of nowhere Mark says,
‘How about this?’ He starts singing a lyric, ‘I’ve got the keys to your
horse.’ I don’t know even what that means, but that’s brilliant, let’s
do that. If they had come in and I told them what to do, I wouldn’t
have gotten that cool stuff. The benefit is that I get everything that
these guys have in their cookie jar and repertoire, and I get to play
with that.”
One of my favorite ways
to enliven an otherwise som-
ber dinner party is to make a
statement like, ‘The problem
with jazz musicians is that
they all suck.’
Copeland’s cookie jar is sizable. The rule-breaking drummer
has a unique composing style that combines woodwinds and
percussion in interesting ways in his soundtrack work. Much
in the way that Danny Elfman frequently serves up a rambunc-
tious storm of strings and horns, Copeland favors a playful blend
of woodwinds and mallet instruments, a sound that I first heard
on his soundtrack to the ‘80s TV crime drama “The Equalizer” and
which has surfaced on later works such as the 2004’s Grammy
Award nominated live album Orchestralli.
There are certainly textural and sonic qualities that woodwinds
and mallet instruments share. “Sometimes a figure that works
well on an oboe works well on a xylophone,” notes Copeland. “I
learned about the use of xylophone from my almost namesake,
Uncle Aaron [Copland], who I adopted as an honorary uncle even
though he misspelled his name. I probably got percussion with
woodwinds from him.” The drummer adds that he loves oboe and
bassoon, and he discovered that the basses in orchestra do not re-
ally provide the bass in that setting. “The bass lines are put on the
celli, that’s where it works, and then you use the bass to add a lit-
tle heft to the celli,” he explains. “The
other main bass instruments are the
bassoon and the contrabassoon.”
On a tangent thought, Copeland
veers into another personal discov-
ery connected to his instrument.
“Another weird thing about orches-
tra is that the percussionists are not
the rhythm section,” he says. “Orches-
tral percussion does not do rhythm.
What they do is punctuation.” He
acknowledges that some orchestras
have problems with certain rhythms
that he writes into his compositions.
He might see a percussionist reading
a cowbell part while following the
conductor, and then he will stress to that player that he should be
leading the rhythm.
“And he looks at me with a look of fear because he’s used to fol-
lowing the conductor,” says Copeland. “I realize that for one thing
these are players of the eye not the ear, which is a whole other topic
of conversation. They connect with the music with their eye. The vi-
sual cue of the baton is the guiding light. The notes that they read
with their eyes on the page is their guide. Their connection to music
is all visual, and their bodies and their ears take care of themselves.
So those percussionists don’t lead, they are led by the conductor and
that’s their thing. They don’t do rhythm. Once again, the celli and the
strings are where you hear the rhythm.”
Even while acknowledging such differences, Copeland under-
stands that classical and rock players approach things in different
ways and that there is value to both. He notes that in an orchestral
piece “with rubato or very hard to discern rhythm or shifting tempo,”
classical percussionists can land on the same place with dozens of
other orchestra players simultaneously, whereas he feels that rock
drummers could not do that. “They would need to hear a click track,
so they have a whole completely different set of skills. Just because
they’re banging on inanimate objects doesn’t necessarily mean that
they’re drummers. Fun fact.”
In his post-Police years, Copeland has delved into composing for
films, ballet, and the opera, areas that he was not trained in. He says
part of his education came in writing his scores, but the rest came
from reading scores by the likes of Ravel, Stravinsky, and Copland. “I
learned the reading as a kid, and I did take tuition in orchestration,
not composing, just to learn the language of the page,” he explains.
“But [for] what to do with that language, I studied Rites Of Spring, Ro-
deo, and Billy the Kid, just looking to see how they do it.”
He enthuses about John Williams and one of his most famous cin-
ematic fanfares. “The first page of ‘Star Wars’ is an education in mu-
sic,” declares Copeland. “He’s got this harp gliss combined with other
things – that’s how that sound arrives. Ravel sounds like this sweep-
ing wave that is all one thing, but you look at the chart and there’s all
kind of agitation within it. You learn this by studying those scores.”
It is interesting to compare and contrast the structured scores
that Copeland composes for other artistic ventures with playing in a
group like Gizmodrome. There is an obviously greater improvisatory
nature to his rock work. It seems that he is more focused when need-
ing to generate a score or soundtrack, but his own performances al-
low him to let loose.
“The cool thing about playing in a
band is that I just haven’t got the dis-
cipline,” he says. “One of the problems
in The Police was that Sting has a very
pristine, clear picture of how it should
be, and he’s usually right. He’s a really
good arranger, particularly in how you
use a drum set. There are ten way differ-
ent ways to hit a snare drum, and he is
completely conversant in all of them, so
when he turns around to me and sug-
gests something he’s not wrong at all.
In fact, that’s a great idea, but get out of
my face. The conflict is not because he’s
wrong, it’s because when I sit behind
the drums I’m an animal. It’s visceral. I
don’t think about what I’m doing. I’m listening to music. My body does
what it does. That drives him crazy.”
When Copeland plays with an orchestra, a similar dynamic occurs
but in a different way. “Their whole ethos is faithfully reproducing
what it says on the page, and that is their mission,” he says. “Their
self-esteem derives from how closely they obey the page. When I go
out to play with an orchestra I’m all over the place, but I know I have
the freedom to be all over the place because those guys are locked.
I know the music. I can play what my body feels like at the moment,
but the music that they’re playing is locked and that takes us back to
the dichotomy of The Police. When Sting is trying to do the song, it’s
not locked. Over his left shoulder is this cacophony. We both have
great empathy for each other, and I did my best to give him a solid
platform. He did his best to somehow ride that horse. That’s where
the creative tension was.”
It is interesting to note how Copeland, to quote his earlier observa-
tion, often steps out of place. That is a big part of what has made his
rock drumming so exciting, the fact that he tries not to repeat himself
throughout a song and attempts to fill certain sections with unexpect-
ed trills and fills of his own devising. If he unintentionally absorbed
Arabic music during his young years, he likely did the same with jazz
when he was consciously studying it. Indeed it could be said that jazz
informs his playing. When offered that thought, he replies slyly: “Some
have said.”
What has always appealed to me about Stewart Copeland is
his way of using the drum kit as an extension of his personality
and not just the standard backbeat or pulse of rock and roll. It
sounds like that approach does not lend itself to playing a lot of
straight grooves. “No, I’ll play a backbeat,” he counters. “Some-
times it’s got to be a backbeat. I always check every other idea
first and a lot of times end up with a backbeat because it works.”
Of course, it is more fun when he embellishes that backbeat
with other flourishes. In preparing for this story, I found a You-
Tube video of Copeland, his former Police bandmate Andy Sum-
mers, and ELO frontman Jeff Lynne jamming on some 12-bar
blues. While rocking out the jam, Copeland strayed from a tight
groove and gave his performance a little extra punch; perhaps
too much so in that moment. “I’ve got to f**k it up somehow,” he ad-
mits.
Musical insurgency has not been bad for Copeland. He’s proven
that one can break the rules, and thrive doing so. But only after learning
what the rules are.
November/December 2017 • JAZZed 21
guesteditorial
The End of Jazz?
A response to Benjamin Schwartz’s article
in The Atlantic on the future of jazz
BY LEE EVANS
F
or the November 2012 issue of The Atlantic, writer Benjamin
Schwartz provided a provocative column – with whose ba-
sic argument I strongly disagree – entitled, “The End Of Jazz:
How America’s Most Vibrant Music Became A Relic.” His screed is
based upon Ted Gioia’s useful new book, The Jazz Standards: A
Guide To The Repertoire (Oxford University Press.)
Essential Jazz Repertoire
Gioia’s volume consists of a listing and analysis of 250 piec-
es that, in his opinion, form the most significant, as well as the
most requested and most often performed, jazz repertoire of
the current working jazz musician, including such songs as Bil-
ly Strayhorn’s “Lush Life,” Duke Ellington’s “Sophisticated Lady,”
and others that constitute what is often referred to as “The Great
American Songbook.” In Gioia’s words, “my choices...the corner-
stones of the jazz repertoire as it exists today... reflect the jazz
idiom as a vibrant, present-day endeavor.”
Functional-Harmony Logic
What I believe jazz musicians find particularly appealing
“ Schwartz maintains that without the writing of new song material
appropriate for jazz performance, the jazz idiom is a dying art form, an
assertion with which I strongly disagree.”
22 JAZZed • November/December 2017
about most of the songs that constitute The Great American
Songbook, apart from their memorable melodic lines, is the in-
ternal functional-harmony logic of each, such as circle-of-fifths
(ii7 – V7 and ii7 – V7 – I) chord movement. (Think of “All The
Things You Are” and “Gone With The Wind” as two such exam-
ples.) This harmonic-progression feature makes it easier for jazz
improvisers to remember such chord patterns by feel. In fact, it
was this aspect of many popular songs that made them excel-
lent candidates for re-composition. (Think, for example, of Char-
lie Parker’s “Ornithology,” based on the chord structure of “How
High The Moon,” and Lester Young’s “Lester Leaps In,” based on
the chord structure of “I Got Rhythm”; plus a great many other
examples.)
Omissions
An interesting sidelight in Schwartz’s The Atlantic article
deals with his complaint that Gioia in his Jazz Standards volume
has omitted four of Schwartz’s favorite songs: Rodgers and
Hart’s “Where Or When”; and three by Cole Porter: “I’ve Got You
Under My Skin,” “In The Still Of The Night,” and “Begin The Be-
guine.” While all four are gems, I would
hardly call the latter two essential jazz
repertoire, due both to their unusu-
al length and because the somewhat
untraditional chord structure of those
two songs make them less conducive
to facile improvisatory treatment. For
example, “Begin The Beguine” contains
108 measures, and “In The Still Of The
Night” almost 80, instead of the usual
32 bars and AABA form that character-
ize many of the songs of the big-band
swing-era period from which Gioia’s es-
sential jazz repertoire is drawn. (In this
connection, while “Lush Life” is indeed a
uniquely beautiful song, it too features
a somewhat untraditional length and
chord pattern that make jazz improvisa-
tion based upon it more of a challenge.
Moreover, it is always played with both
verse and chorus, while most Amer-
ican Songbook songs are ordinarily
performed by jazz players with chorus
alone, without the verse if one exists.)
A Paucity of New Jazz Song
Material
Writer Schwartz bemoans the drying
up of “the crucial wellspring of jazz” –
The American Songbook. He believes
that without replenishing this essential
Songbook repertoire, jazz is doomed to
disappear as “a living and evolving art
form.” And he furthermore maintains that
“jazz is a relic.” Both Schwartz and Gioia
are troubled by the paucity of recent jazz
compositions suitable for employment
in a jazz context. Schwartz, in fact, views
this as a contradiction to Gioia’s belief
that jazz continues to be a vibrant idi-
om. Schwartz maintains that without the
writing of new song material appropriate
for jazz performance, the jazz idiom is a
dying art form, an assertion with which I
strongly disagree.
A similar argument has been made in
the realm of classical music. For example,
there are those who maintain that much
of 20th and 21st century classical music
– say music composed after Debussy,
Ravel, and early Stravinsky – has been re-
jected by most concert-goers. There may
be some truth to that, but the enormous
existing canon of Renaissance, Baroque,
Classical, Romantic, Impressionist, and
early modernist music such as the music
of Richard Strauss and Gustave Mahler
“ I’m secure in the belief that new jazz genres
will evolve in time, along with new and appropri-
ate repertoire for each.”
continues to form the guts of today’s
classical-music concert and recording
repertoire; just as the songs of Gershwin,
Porter, Berlin, Rodgers, Arlen, and many
others of their ilk, not to mention the
songs of such preeminent pure-jazz com-
posers as Parker, Gillespie, Monk, Shorter,
and Mingus, constitute the ground-floor
repertoire of today’s educated jazz musi-
cian – and will, I predict with confidence,
continue to do so far into the future.
End Notes
In conclusion, I believe that Schwartz’s
prediction of doom for jazz is completely
off base. The early combo jazz and hard
bop eras featured non-Songbook orig-
inal repertoire that formed the basis of
those two vibrant jazz periods. I’m secure
in the belief that new jazz genres will
evolve in time, along with new and ap-
propriate repertoire for each. It already
occurred to a degree with the advent
of bossa nova and its repertoire’s incor-
poration into the canon of standard jazz
repertoire.
A N TO N I O C A R LO S J O B I M
ella
LEGACY
APRIL 27-29 2018
WAS HING TO N, DC
2nd Annual
ELLA FITZGERALD
JAZZ VOCAL COMPETITION
LEARN MORE AT:
ellafitzgeraldcompetition.org
LD
ERA
ZG
T
FI
ELLA
C H A R I T A B L E
Milton’s Paradise Lost and Homer’s Ili-
ad and Odyssey are still with us. The mu-
sic of Bach, Beethoven, and Mozart is still
with us. The music of Gershwin, Porter,
Rodgers, and Monk is still with us. One
may similarly rest assured that jazz will
still be with us in the decades and cen-
turies to come.
Lee Evans, Ed.D., is
a professor of music at
NYC’s Pace University.
His most recent books
include Starter Classics
(Stipes Publishing), a
collection of 32 essential solo piano clas-
sical repertoire at the late beginner to ear-
ly-to-late intermediate levels, compiled,
edited and/or arranged by Dr. Evans; the
solo-piano books Opera With A Touch Of
Jazz (Hal Leonard) and Classics With A
Touch Of Jazz (Hal Leonard), and the ac-
claimed foundation performance/theory
workbook Crash Course In Chords (Hal
Leonard). For additional information, visit
www.leeevansjazz.com.
Photo cour
tesy of Sh
aron B. M
cGuire
FF OO UU NN DD AA TT II OO NN
Smithsonian Institution
November/December 2017 • JAZZed 23
jazzfestivalsworldwide
The Django Reinhardt NY Festival Celebrates
18th Year
The Django Reinhardt NY Festival, presented by AIR FRANCE,
took place this year from November 7 to 12 at Birdland Jazz
Club. 2017 marked the 18th edition of the festival, which fea-
tured The Schmitt Family, Grace Kelly, Ken Peploski, and Chris
Smith. The Festival was co-founded by Maestro Ettore Stratta
and was produced by Pat Philips Stratta.
The Django Reinhardt NY Festival launched in 2000, produc-
ing top players like The Django Festival Allstars, who tour two
times a year and always spend a week at their home in the Unit-
ed States – Birdland. On the road, they play top venues like the
Hollywood Bowl, San Francisco Jazz Festival, Kennedy Center,
Montreal Jazz Festival, and much more.
The Schmitt Family, featuring family members Dorado, Sam-
son, and Amati, performed together on the Birdland stage for
the first time this year. The family was joined by virtuoso accor-
dionist Ludovic Beier, Grappelli protégé Pierre Blanchard on vi-
olin, Francko Mehrstein on rhythm guitar, and Gino Roman on
bass.
Additional special guests included saxist Grace Kelly, who
performed on November 7, 8, and 11, and top swinging clar-
inetist Ken Peploski, who performed on November 9 and 10.
Newcomer Chris Smith performed on drums on November 12.
The music harkened back to the 30s and 40s in France to the
Hot Club Quintette of Django and Grappelli, romantic days in
Paris with swing music in the dance halls and streets.
Healdsburg Jazz Hosts Jazz Jam Benefit
Concert
Healdsburg Jazz produced a special Jazz Jam Benefit Con-
cert, a fundraiser in support of those affected by the recent
devastating fires in Sonoma County. The event took place on
Sunday, November 12, from 4 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. at the Paul Mah-
der Gallery, 222 Healdsburg Ave., Healdsburg.
With a minimum donation of $30, 100% of funds raised were
donated to support the Corazon Healdsburg Fire Relief and Re-
covery Fund and the Community Foundation Resilience Fund.
24 JAZZed • November/December 2017
Musicians who per-
formed at the Jazz Jam
Benefit Concert included:
jazzfestivalsworldwide.com
Bennett Friedman Group with Randy Vincent and Robb Fisher;
Alan Hall Trio with Ken Cook, Jeff Denson and guest Paul Han-
son Brazilian Jazz with Ami Molinelli; Carlos Henrique Pereira,
Ruth Ahlers, Christian Foley-Beining, Jim Passarell and guest
Lorca Hart; Sarah Wilson Quintet with Rob Sudduth, John
Schott, Dan Seamans and John Hanes; Greg Hester Group with
Gary Johnson, Ken Plourde, Michael MacKenzie and guest Shea
Breaux Wells; John Simon Trio with Rob Wright and guest Janie
Roberts; Blue 7 with John Mihalik, Preston Bailey, Dave Webster,
Claus Brigmann, Ron Masi and guest Bob Johns Gypsy Trio with
Ian Scherer and Steve Froberg.
Community partners for the event included Campo Fina and
Healdsburg Center for the Arts.
The New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Foundation
Announces Grant Recipients
The New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Foundation - the non-profit
that owns the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival presented
by Shell - has announced the recipients of its 2017-2018 Com-
munity Partnership Grants.
Of the 325 applications received in four grant categories, 285
(or 88 percent) were awarded funding.
The total amount awarded was $800,980, up from $709,474
awarded last year and from $601,264 awarded in 2016. Checks
for grant awards in the two education categories were distribut-
ed on October 26 in a ceremony at the George and Joyce Wein
Jazz & Heritage Center. A second ceremony was held on October
27 to distribute the remaining grant awards.
“It’s an honor and a privilege to be able to support the great
work that is being done by so many people in our community,”
said Donna Santiago, president of the board of directors of the
New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Foundation. “These are truly your
Jazz Fest dollars at work.”
Since 1979, the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Foundation has
reinvested the proceeds from Jazz Fest directly into the commu-
nity — in the form of grants to arts and educational organiza-
tions — to support projects that reflect the Foundation’s mission.
 The Foundation has donated more than $5 million to non-
profit event presenters, educational programs, dance troupes,
theater workshops, gallery showings, film productions, per-
forming artists, visual artists, and many more.
By investing so much into the community, and making a
concerted effort to nurture local artists and organizations, the
Foundation is creating an environment in which arts and edu-
cation projects can succeed over the long term.
For the 2017-2018 grant cycle, grants were awarded in
four categories: one for Louisiana-based non-profit arts or-
ganizations that present festivals and other cultural events
and hire local performers (77 of 96 applications received
funding; one for artists and others who create new artistic
works or otherwise document the local culture (66 of 81 ap-
plications received funding); one for schools providing music
and art classes as part of the school day (all 52 of the applica-
tions received were awarded funding); and one for non-prof-
its that present after-school and summer educational pro-
grams in the arts (90 of 96 applications received funding).
The applications were reviewed and scored by committees
made up of members of the Jazz & Heritage Foundation’s Board
of Directors and Advisory Council. The applications are then
ranked by score. Those with the highest scores are awarded the
largest percentage of the amount they requested.
The largest grants given this year were $5,000 - the maxi-
mum that may be requested. The smallest was $900. The aver-
age grant award was $2,810, up from $2,793 last year. All grant
awards must be matched by an equal amount of funds the ap-
plicants raise from other sources.
The number of applications received this was 325, up from
286 last year. The number funded this year was 285, up from
254 last year.
The total budget for Community Partnership Grants in-
creased this year to $800,000 from $700,000 last year and
$600,000 the year before. The budget for the program has
increased steadily each year since 2012-2013, when it was
$313,000.
“Every year we wrestle with the question of whether to give
fewer grants in larger amounts, or to give the largest number of
grants possible even if it means the individual grant sizes may
be small,” said Don Marshall, executive director of the New Orle-
ans Jazz & Heritage Foundation. “We have found over the years
that even though some of the grants may be small, they still
have a big impact on the grass-roots organizations receiving
them.”
The New Orleans Jazz & Heritage & Heritage Foundation is
the non-profit that owns the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festi-
val presented by Shell. The Foundation uses the proceeds from
Jazz Fest - and other raised funds - for year-round programs in
education, economic development and cultural enrichment.
Monterey Jazz Festival Announces 48th Annual
Next Generation Jazz Festival
Monterey Jazz Festival has announced the 48th Annual
Next Generation Jazz Festival, featuring the nation’s most
talented middle school, high school, conglomerate, and
college instrumental
and vocal jazz en-
sembles and soloists.
The Festival will take
place at the newly-renovated Monterey Conference Center
in March 2018.
An evolution from Monterey Jazz Festival’s California High
School Jazz Competition, which began in 1971, applications
are now being accepted from middle school big bands; high
school big bands, combos, vocal jazz ensembles, vocal so-
loists and composers; high school conglomerate big bands
and combos; and college big bands, combos and vocal jazz
ensembles through January 14, 2018.
Application instructions are on the Monterey Jazz Festi-
val’s website, www.montereyjazzfestival.org/NGJF.
Next Generation Jazz Festival finalists are selected
through recorded auditions reviewed and ranked by a panel
of nationally-renowned jazz educators. Finalists will include
12 big bands, six combos, eight vocal jazz ensembles and
six vocal soloists in the high school division. Six college big
bands, six college combos, and six college vocal jazz ensem-
bles will also be selected, in addition to six high school con-
glomerate big bands, six high school conglomerate combos,
and six middle school big bands.
In addition, special invited groups will also perform. In
2017, 93 groups from across the United States attended the
Next Generation Jazz Festival.
The high school, conglomerate, and college divisions of
the Next Generation Jazz Festival are open to superior rat-
ed big bands, combos, and vocal ensembles. The top groups
will win cash awards and be invited to perform at the 61st
Annual Monterey Jazz Festival, September 21-23, 2018.
Online auditions for Monterey Jazz Festival’s Next Gen-
eration Jazz Orchestra will also be held through March 25,
2018. As Monterey Jazz Festival’s premier touring student
ensemble, this group performs at jazz venues and festivals,
both domestically and internationally, and will be featured
in a Sunday Arena performance at the 61st Annual Monterey
Jazz Festival.
The Next Generation Jazz Festival Presented by Monterey
Jazz Festival also includes a big band composition competi-
tion, open to high school composers. Judged by college facul-
ty from leading music schools across the country, the winning
composer will receive the Gerald Wilson Award and a cash
prize, with the winning composition to be performed by the
Next Generation Jazz Orchestra on the final day of the 61st
Annual Monterey Jazz Festival.
All Next Generation Jazz Festival events and activities,
from Friday night’s Kick-Off Concert, featuring the Next Gen-
eration Jazz Festival Adjudicators, through Saturday and
Sunday’s High School Jazz Competition, are free of charge
and open to the public. The Festival will also conduct clinics,
workshops, jam sessions, and auditions in the heart of his-
toric Monterey, with music to be performed at the Monterey
Conference Center, as well as on spotlight stages in down-
town Monterey.
November/December 2017 • JAZZed 25
jazzfestivalsworldwide
Interested schools and students should visit www.monte-
reyjazzfestival.org/NGJF for instructions on how to apply to
the Next Generation Jazz Festival.
Monterey Jazz Festival Announces Artists in
Residence
Tia Fuller
Monterey Jazz Festival has announced that saxophonist
Tia Fuller and trumpeter Ingrid Jensen have been select-
ed as joint artists-in-residence for the 61st Monterey Jazz
Festival, September 21-23, 2018, and will work year-round
with young musicians in performances and clinics at the
2018 Next Generation Jazz Festival, Summer Jazz Camp,
and at the Monterey Jazz Festival.
Over the Festival’s 60-year history, artists have had an
informal role in the production and artistic selection of the
festival, including John Lewis, Clark Terry, Dizzy Gillespie,
and many others. In 2004, the Artist-In-Residence program
was revamped to include educational visits to the Next
Generation Jazz Festival and Summer Jazz Camp, outside
the festival weekend.
“I am very excited and pleased to be working with both
Ingrid and Tia for 2018,” said MJF artistic director Tim Jack-
son. “They are master musicians, outstanding educators
and engaging communicators. It is the perfect recipe for
success and our students are in for a meaningful experi-
ence and a whole lot of fun!”
Mack Avenue recording artist Tia Fuller is a touring art-
ist and full-time professor at the Berklee School of Music.
Beyoncé selected Tia as part of several world tours in the
United States, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Australia.
Tia can also be seen touring regularly with a number of
bands. She has acted as the assistant musical director for
tours by Esperanza Spalding and Dianne Reeves, and has
performed with the Ralph Peterson, Rufus Reid, Geri Allen,
the Nancy Wilson Jazz Orchestra, Wycliff Gordon, Jon Fad-
dis Jazz Orchestra, Chaka Kahn, Ledisi, Kelly Rowland, Jay-Z,
Jill Scott, Pattie Labelle, Nona Hendryx, Sheila E, Valerie
Simpson, Dionne Warwick, Janelle Monáe, Patrice Rushen,
Erykah Badu, and Aretha Franklin.
Tia has recorded four CDs with her quartet. In addi-
tion, she presents lectures, residencies and masterclasses
at some of the most respected institutions in the country
including Duke University, University of Colorado at Den-
ver, Spelman College, University of Idaho’s Lionel Hampton
Jazz Festival, New Mexico State University, the University
of Massachusetts at Amherst, and Rimon School of Music
in Israel.
26 JAZZed • November/December 2017
Ingrid Jensen has been hailed as one of the most gift-
ed trumpeters of her generation. Born and raised in British
Columbia, after graduating from Berklee College of Music
in 1989 and winning the Carmine Caruso Trumpet Com-
petition in 1991, she recorded three highly-acclaimed CDs
for the ENJA record label, soon becoming one of the most
in-demand trumpet players. After a teaching stint as the
youngest professor in the history of the Bruckner Conser-
vatory in Linz, Austria, Ingrid settled in New York City where
she joined the innovative jazz orchestras of Maria Schnei-
der and Darcy James Argue.
She is regularly invited to trumpet festivals around the
world, including a prestigious invitation in 2011 to work
with classical trumpet maestro Håkan Hardenberger and
the Swedish Wind Orchestra. Ingrid’s most recent release,
an electric project with keyboardist Jason Miles, has gar-
nered rave reviews globally and has led to recent collabo-
rations with Joe Lovano and Lionel Loueke.
Crescent City Blues & BBQ Festival Hosts 12th
Annual Weekend of Music and Food
The 12th annual edi-
tion of Crescent City
Blues & BBQ Festival
took place from Friday,
October 13, to Sunday,
October 14, in New Or-
leans, with performanc-
es by Deavon John’s
Jump Blues and Luther
Kent and Trick Bag.
The free event,
brought to guests by
the New Orleans Jazz
& Heritage Foundation,
took place in New Or-
leans’ Lafayette Square
Park.
Grammy-winners
Robert Cray
Robert Cray and Bobby
Rush were the headline performers at this year’s Blues &
BBQ. Other performers included Como Mamas from Como,
Mississippi, Louis “Gearshifter” Youngblood from Jackson,
Mississippi, and north Louisiana’s Robert Finley.
Fans chomped on brisket, ribs, sausage, pulled pork and,
Cochon de Lait and took part in an official barbeque com-
petition on social media during the festival.
The festival also featured an arts market with 22 craft
vendors, live painting from artist John Bukaty, and a silent
online auction to benefit the Heritage School of Music.
Community radio station, WWOZ, broadcasted the fes-
tival from the St. Charles Avenue Stage both on the radio
and in live streaming video throughout the festival. Robert
Cray, Bobby Rush, Robert Finley, Samantha Fish, the Como
Mamas, John Mooney, Guitar Lightning Lee and Andrew
Duhon all were broadcasted on air.

Teaching Jazz Through the Big Band
BY ANDREW J. ALLEN
T “
o some, the title of this article may appear redundant. What is
being taught through school big bands if not jazz? All too of-
ten, unfortunately, a very myopic version of our great art form
is communicated to students through their interactions with “jazz
band.” An accidental focus on a few genres or a gravitation towards
complex orchestrations can often subvert many of the key princi-
pals that most of us would wish to share with our students. As the
big band constitutes the entire jazz curriculum of many middle- and
secondary schools (and even some small colleges), a conscious effort
must be made to teach the art form holistically through this format.
Improv
It would be easy to argue that the unifying factor in all eras and
styles of jazz is the act of spontaneous musical creation, or improvisa-
tion. From New Orleans to the most forward-thinking free jazz inno-
vators, this direct expression has been key. However, due to looming
performances and a false belief that “you either have it or you don’t,”
or a well-meaning misunderstanding that a student has to have the
technical facility of Coltrane to say something meaningful as an im-
proviser, improvisation takes a backseat in many academic programs.
Quite simply, if our students are to know anything of the jazz tra-
dition, they must have some comfort and ability to improvise. In ad-
dition, improvisation holds some of the greatest potential for future
vocational music making for many of our students. Whether playing
in bands or simply performing for their own enjoyment, spontaneous
creativity can create a lifetime of happiness once students leave the
classroom.
While the act of teaching improvisation can seem daunting, we all
know that it is as easy as teaching students how to play a blues and
offering all students (without exception) the opportunity to solo. This
need not be in performance. Rather, much good can be achieved
through ten-minute “jam sessions” at the ends of rehearsals, where
students have the freedom to explore ideas with their friends. Once
students are comfortable with the blues scale, pentatonic scales can
be introduced, et cetera. Eventually, “jam sessions” can be structured
around simple ii/V progressions and simplified standards. With the
conscious goal of creating comfortable improvisers, much can be
achieved.
Style and Literature
Another major area of concern for the conscientious director
should be the exposure of students to the full breadth and scope of
jazz history and literature. All too often, the academic big band focus-
es on a rather narrow stylistic milieu, ranging from Ellington to Basie
to more contemporary big band styles. Sometimes the “jazz band”
is merely an ensemble that plays pop arrangements. While there is
nothing wrong in engaging students with popular music, this should
be done sparingly if the end goal is, indeed, educating students.
Today there exist many incredible arrangements for groups of ev-
ery skill level encompassing the entire history of jazz from New Or-
leans style to contemporary hip hop-fusion. Systematically, directors
should rehearse and perform pieces from all time periods. Students
should be familiar with important composers, performers, and stylis-
lessonslearned
Quite simply, if our students
are to know anything of
the jazz tradition, they must
have some comfort and ability
to improvise. ”
tic hallmarks of New Orleans, swing, bebop, hard bop, cool jazz, free
jazz, fusion, and everything in-between.
Avoiding “performanceitis” is of the utmost importance. While
public performances are always important and can serve an excel-
lent educational and public relations purpose, they are not the entire
point. Rather, performance can serve as a means to an end: Creating
technically and musically proficient young players with the intellec-
tual understanding to create meaning for themselves to one extent
or another.
Pieces should be chosen for their artistic merit and for the ability
to introduce wider concepts and principals to students. If performing
a New Orleans style arrangement or a Basie-type swing chart, stu-
dents should be introduced to the historical background, important
figures, and stylistic hallmarks of the genre. Above all, listening to
great examples is of the highest value.
Conclusion
The big band is more than just a performing ensemble: It is one of
the best opportunities to introduce students to the great traditions
and present of jazz. Young musicians can see this great art form for
all of its past glories and its future potential. Even more importantly,
if approached in the right spirit, it create the next generation of jazz
messengers, eager to sing the praises of America’s great contribution
to the culture of the world, and, perhaps, to create the next group of
great jazz artists.
Andrew J. Allen  is an assistant professor of
music at Midwestern State University in Wichita
Falls, Texas. Dr. Allen has premiered nearly
twenty works for saxophone and has performed
and lectured at the World Saxophone Congress,
the International Saxophone Symposium,
the National Association of College Wind and
Percussion Instructors Conference, and national
and regional gatherings of the North American Saxophone Alliance
and the College Music Society. He currently performs with the Wichita
Falls Symphony Orchestra, the Lone Star Wind Orchestra, SAGA Quar-
tet, Rogue Two, and the Allen Duo. His debut album with saxophone/
percussion duo, Rogue Two, is forthcoming on Equilibrium Records.
Dr. Allen currently serves as editor of  The NACWPI Journal  and is a
member of the editorial board of  The Saxophone Symposium. He is a
Conn-Selmer Artist-Clinician and performs exclusively on Selmer Paris
saxophones and Vandoren mouthpieces, ligatures, and reeds. Learn
more at www.allensax.com
November/December 2017 • JAZZed 27
 hotwax albumreviews
Bill Evans
Another Time: The Hilversum
Concert (Resonance)
Bill Evans – piano
Eddie Gomez – upright bass
Jack DeJohnette – drums
It’s as if the
jazz gods de-
cided it was
time to give
the faithful
something
special, as sud-
denly appears
a surprise recording dating to 1968 by
pianist/composer Bill Evans, one of the
greatest, most distinctive artists in jazz
history.
This gift originated at a live perfor-
mance at Netherlands Radio Union
(NRU) in Hilversum, Netherlands on
June 22, ’68, before a politely appre-
ciative audience (near perfect crisply
unison applause, no yelps and whoops
– not to Bill Evans’ deep, sophisticated,
beautiful music).
Evans and trio – considered by many
the finest piano trio at the time – had
released a recording not long before
this concert, so apparently there was
no thought to do another album so
soon. So this music was stuck in a
drawer or someplace where it wasn’t
noticed.
How and by whom it eventually was
discovered, the multiple people who
took immediate interest in making an
album and how it eventually got to
Resonance and to you is an exciting,
feel-good tale too involved to tell here.
So let’s talk about the music instead.
Bill Evans emerged in a big way
in the ‘60s playing quite differently
from the majority of musicians of the
era who were still devotees of Parker,
Gillespie, Monk, et al and exciting lis-
teners with breakneck tempos, wild-
eyed improvisations lengthy, adventur-
ous and virtuosic solos, et al.
That’s when some folks started call-
ing America’s contribution to the arts
“noise.”
In the midst of this roiling scene
came Bill Evans, a light on the keys
player, albeit not feeble. A composer
and superb interpreter of lovely, spell-
28 JAZZed • November/December 2017
binding melodies, Evans could swing,
but in a quieter, almost polite way,
sometimes described as impression-
ism. He was easy on the keys.
Not his greatest recording (he won
seven Grammies and was nominated
33 times!), Another Time is a fine rep-
resentation of his, Gomez’s, and De-
Johnette’s artistry.
By the way this is the third and final
recording by this near unanimously es-
teemed trio. Why the end?
Oh, some guy named Davis – Miles
to most people – scooped up himself
a super rhythm section. Yes, he hired
them all simultaneously.
Jazz piano trios often are predict-
able, each playing the same role on
nearly every tune.
Evans is probably the exceptional
exception. He plays thoughtfully and
spontaneously, thus surprisingly. al-
tering the generally accepted chord
progressions, meter, tempo, and other
components of bebop.
The trio often seems to play as one.
Gomez and DeJohnette don’t back
Evans (i.e. keep time) as much as play
with him.
You only have to hear Evans once to
know he was a romantic, and that qual-
ity is on display here.
The nine songs here include two
of his best-known ballads and a third
original.
“Very Early” begins as a lullaby, but
all three pick up the pace and the tune
sparkles. Gomez’s full-bodied tone
does acoustic bass proud.
Evans’ “Turn Out the Stars” finds
him at his most lyrical in the intro,
then modestly swinging, with Gomez’s
“walking” bass.
Apparently not afraid of being “com-
mercial,” the trio tackles two hugely
popular songs of the day.
Every singer with a decently sized
fan base recorded Burt Bacharach and
Hal David’s “Alfie,” Evans plays the mel-
ody straight and tenderly to begin,
then brightens it just enough to make
it sound delightful. The sparse ap-
plause is hard not to notice. Perhaps it
was hardcore jazz fans, unhappy in the
choice of a pop tune by a jazz icon.
Standards include “Who Can I Turn
To” and “Embraceable You,” both of
which are given the sensitive readings
you would expect. “Embrace” is the
Gomez show, as he solos beautifully
throughout with Evans and DeJohnette
occasionally inserting brief statements.
The other pop tune is “Emily,” a mov-
ie theme (“The Americanization of Em-
ily”) that receives a lovely intro from
Evans, as well as decorative comments
in the upper register. Gomez offers a
super solo, and you’re left wanting to
hear more.
The one jazz tune is an excellent
choice – Miles Davis’s catchy “Nardis.”
The trio plays the heck out of it with ex-
tended, inventive, high-energy solos,
especially the great DeJohnette, who
gets his overdue solo.
Summing up, here is a special addi-
tion to your jazz collection, thanks to
some people from two continents who
felt obligated to get it to you. Enjoy.
(Bob Protzman)
Alan Ferber Big
Band
Jigsaw (Sunnyside Records)
John O’Gallagher – alto saxophone
Rob Wilkerson – alto saxophone,
soprano saxophone, flute
John Ellis – tenor saxophone, bass
clarinet
Jason Rigby – tenor saxophone
Chris Cheek – baritone saxophone
Tony Kadleck – trumpet, flugelhorn
Scott Wendholt – trumpet, flugel-
horn
Alex Norris – trumpet, flugelhorn
Clay Jenkins – trumpet, flugelhorn
Alan Ferber – trombone
John Fedchock – trombone
Jacob Garchik – trombone
Jennifer Wharton – bass trombone
Anthony Wilson – guitar
David Cook – piano, keyboards
Matt Pavolka – acoustic bass,
electric bass
Mark Ferber – drums, percussion
Rogerio Boccato – percussion (1, 6)
A jigsaw is an
instrument of
doing and un-
doing, a tool of
cutting expres-
sion, and a refer-
ence to puzzles
formed of interlocking designs. In short,

it’s wholly representative of all that’s
right and good with trombonist Alan Fer-
ber’s writing. His work is a master study
in piecing together and pulling apart,
slicing right through to an idea, and
thinking big without overlooking how
small details come to shape full pictures.
Whether working collaboratively in the
paint with saxophonist David Binney, ex-
panding notions of what a nonet is ca-
pable of creating, occupying a trombone
chair in any number of forward-looking
large ensembles, or leading his own
big band, as on the Grammy-nominat-
ed March Sublime (Sunnyside Records,
2013) and this arresting date, Ferber
manages to make his presence felt. His
playing, his arrangements, and his com-
positions all have a way of taking root
as permanent memories for those on
the receiving end, and with Jigsaw he
gives us seven views into his conscious
mind and subconscious impulses. There
are opportunities to hear this beast of
a band in full roar, soak up the conver-
sation that comes with the gathering of
breakaway bunches, and stare sui ge-
neris soloists in the face. And through it
all, Ferber’s pen remains fresh as can be.
Layered expressions usher in “Impul-
so,” an album opener with a Latin-influ-
enced undercarriage that shifts focus
from Ferber’s centered horn over to John
O’Gallagher’s bright and eager alto and
Alex Norris’ bold trumpet. Then this en-
semble thoroughly fleshes out guitar-
ist Anthony Wilson’s intoxicating “She
Won’t Look Back,” bringing a heightened
sense of passion to the fore without
overplaying its hand. It’s a performance
that’s as well-paced as they come.
By the time the title track takes shape,
when a loose encounter between O’Gal-
lagher and drummer Mark Ferber co-
alesces into a tight and punchy thrill ride,
it’s crystal clear that no single sound or
style will ever come to define this band.
The four tracks that follow further high-
light that fact. “North Rampart” is pure
plaintive beauty, with Wilson and saxo-
phonist John Ellis tugging at the heart-
strings; “Get Sassy” opens on a raunchy
and woozy trombone section meeting,
setting the scene for a bluesy stroll with
plenty of personality; Ferber’s take on
Paul McCandless’ “Lost In The Hours”
plays like a modernist’s slant on Brazilian
music, giving cause and pause to admire
albumreviews
the handiwork of trombonist John Fed-
chock and saxophonist Rob Wilkerson;
and Clay Jenkins’ “Late Bloomer” is a
patchwork of artfully paranoid thoughts,
given to focused written exposition by
the leader and thorough exploration by
the ensemble. Divergent ideals carry the
day and prove triumphant on Jigsaw,
maintaining interest and highlighting
some of the many facets of Alan Ferber’s
wide-ranging artistry. (Dan Bilawsky)
Good Things Happen
Slowly: A Life In and
Out of Jazz
by Fred Hersch with David Hajdu
Acknowl-
edged as one
of the most ac-
complished pia-
nists in jazz, Fred
Hersch may now
be as equally
recognized for his gay rights activism as
well as the horrific bouts of illness that
he has endured. Thus, his riveting mem-
oir is both a keen look back on the mak-
ings of a distinguished career now in its
fifth decade, and the unsparing tale of a
grateful survivor.
The professional and the personal con-
verge right from the start as Hersch finds
his way as an aspiring jazz musician and,
simultaneously, as a gay man. Candidly
observing both these essential aspects
of his life, Hersch offers up a dual por-
trait of an ambitious fledgling artist and
a young man hungry for experience after
relocating from Cincinnati to New York
City in the 1970s. With admirable hones-
ty, Hersch recounts his own fondness for
drugs (one that he shared, literally, with
name jazz artists of the time) and sexual
encounters, recognizing his own uneasy
balance of blinders-on ego and troubled
insecurity. His remembrances of hanging
out at the legendary nightspot Bradley’s
soaking up the informal lessons impart-
ed by a host of genius pianists, and his
important sideman work with the likes of
Joe Henderson, Sam Jones and Stan Getz
have a gripping immediacy. So much so
that dedicated jazz fans may find them-
selves disappointed that more time isn’t
spent in detailed discussion of Hersch’s
hotwax
experiences with these giants as well as
Art Farmer, Toots Thielemans and other
luminaries.
By the 1980s Hersch uncovers his pi-
anistic and compositional voice, fosters
his talents as a bandleader, and finds
his footing as an out-of-the-closet man,
but the tragedy of AIDS is also clouding
the New York sky. Hersch’s own ghastly
dealings with debilitating HIV is present-
ed with clarity, free of self-pity. Further
hardship hits later in the form of non
AIDS-related pneumonia that leads to
a months-long comma–a shattering ex-
perience that leaves him unable to play
his instrument. That Hersch not only
survives, fully recovers his ability to play,
and ultimately revives a career that has
since flourished immeasurably (and even
transforms his physical and emotional
nightmare into substantial art: his mu-
sical theater work with Herschel Garfe
in, My Comma Dreams) is a personal tri-
umph, yet one that Hersch is quick to
acknowledge the restorative role played
by friends, the jazz community, and his
partner Scott Morgan.
In his committed role as a gay rights
advocate, Hersch has cast light on cru-
cial lifestyle issues that were still taboo in
jazz circles until the close of the last cen-
tury. His smart and illuminating memoir
reveals the makings of a superb musician
and a fearless man. (Steve Futterman)
CHECK OUT GET
THE LATEST
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November/December 2017 • JAZZed 29
outlier’sblues
Grady Tate: Style Beyond Style
BY STEVE FUTTERMAN

I
n an obituary published in the New York Times, Loren Schoen- exquisite taste and
berg, founding director of the National Jazz Museum in unerring judgement
Harlem, was quoted as saying this about Grady Tate, the in- about what to add
dispensable drummer who died at age eighty five this past Oc- and what not to, but
tober: ”He was there to serve the music without the imposition to my ears, Tate didn’t
of a defined personality or style.” Schoenberg was specifically possess an instantly
referring to Tate’s contributions on Quincy Jones’s recording of recognizable style,
“Killer Joe,” but he could have been referencing any number of compared to such
the multitudes of sparkling Tate performances. illustrious peers as,
say, Elvin Jones, Tony

“
Williams or Jack De-
Tate may have provided Johnette. There must
be those that can
just what the music called for hear Tate mannerisms
that distinguish him
again and again, but I’d be hard from all others, but
pressed to identify him in a to me he sounds like

”
blindfold listening.
In fact, truer words couldn’t have been spoken about a play-
er who in the course of a seven-decade career was able to fit
into any musical situation he was asked to, ranging from jazz
to pop to R&B to cabaret, and plenty of other byways along the
twisting road. He enhanced performances by Jimmy Smith and
Bette Midler, Wes Montgomery and Paul Simon, Peggy Lee and
Bill Evans, among scores of other artists; he played in the New
York orchestra of “The Tonight Show” and was heard on the
soundtrack of both the original incarnation and 2017 edition
of “Twin Peaks.” (and by the last few decades of his life, in an
increasingly committed role, became a much-praised vocalist).
Utterly dependable in any setting because he was so fright-
eningly consistent, Tate could be counted on to sound great
no matter what he was asked to do, and until someone points
out a less than excellent performance from him to me, I believe
he may never have let any employer down. Yet, in his role as a
jazz musician Tate presents us with an interesting dilemma, one
which leads us back to Schoenberg’s comment. Indeed, Tate
always served the music brilliantly without imposing a discern-
ible identity. But isn’t jazz a music that prizes individuality, one
that puts a high premium on establishing a musical voice of
one’s own? Tate may have provided just what the music called
for again and again, but I’d be hard pressed to identify him in
a blindfold listening. He had technique to spare coupled with
an immensely gifted,
superbly supportive,
and sensitively at-
tuned percussionist
– albeit one who re-
mains hidden in plain
sight.
Yet I wouldn’t
trade Tate’s work on such masterpieces as Jimmy Smith’s Organ
Grinder Swing, Pee Wee Russell’s Spirit of ’67, and Zoot Sims’s
Zoot Plays Soprano (to name a mere disparate few) for that of
anyone else. A special favorite remains Sweet Rain, a landmark
recording by Stan Getz. A 1967 quartet date stocked with heavy
hitters including bassist Ron Carter and pianist Chick Corea
(shortly before he was hired by Miles Davis) Sweet Rain is a gor-
geous album that features supremely lyrical playing by Getz,
faultless support by Carter and Corea (whose compositions “Li-
tha” and “Windows” are highlights) and owes more than a bit
of its luster to Tate who navigates the sophisticated rhythmic
turns with panache. He’s superb throughout, yet compare Tate
with the work of Roy Haynes or Elvin Jones on Getz recordings
during the sixties and Tate, for all his excellence, can come off
as relatively anonymous. Proof, perhaps, that craftsmanship of
the highest quality, given the right circumstances, can outma-
neuver personality. Elvin or Roy or whomever drum giant of the
time might well have done an impressive and distinctive job on
Sweet Rain; still, Tate, in all his accommodating glory, is spot on.
He was the right man for the job – as usual.

“ Utterly dependable in any setting because he was so

frighteningly consistent, Tate could be counted on to sound great
no matter what he was asked to do.”

30 JAZZed • November/December 2017


ACCESSORIES
GHS Strings Pedal Steel String Sets
The new Pedal Steel string sets from GHS
Strings include revised gauging and updat-
ed packaging. The design team revisited
their pedal steel string sets, updating them
to reflect this updated tuning. Now the E9
Tuning sets include a 012 string (previously
013) and the C6 Tuning sets feature a 015
string (previously 012).
The revised string sets are supplied in
GHS’ Nitro-Pack airtight packaging, which carries the anti-corro-
sion guarantee. The GHS Pedal Steel string sets retain all the same
great tone and longevity across the range, now combined with
more modern tuning.
www.ghsstrings.com
Accessory Packs from Alvarez Guitars
These two new accessory packs from Alva-
rez Guitars - The Artist Accessory Pack and the
Masterworks Accessory Pack - feature a spec-
trum of tools that will aide any player in their
day-to-day guitar needs.
The Artist Accessory pack comes complete
with an Alvarez branded tuner, capo, and
polishing cloth and retails at $40. The Master-
works Accessory Pack also features an Alva-
rez branded aluminum folding stand, tuner,
capo, and polishing cloth and retails at $70 MSRP.
www.alvarezguitars.com
The Foundations Bass Strings from S.I.T. Strings
The Foundations line of electric bass
strings are built with a newer, stronger
core material to create a string that very
bright and flexible. The Foundations
were designed to be a lower tension
string and are therefore very respon-
sive to the touch. These strings will not
replace the current lineup of S.I.T. bass
strings, but rather complement the line. In addition, the strings
inside the Foundations bass sets are also sealed in an airtight VCI
corrosion resistant pouch to keep the strings fresh. The Founda-
tions are available in both nickel and stainless in the following
gauges: 40-100, 45-105, 40-120 (5-String) and 45- 125 (5 String).
6-string sets and additional gauges will be available early 2018.
www.sitstrings.com
Railhammer Reeves Gabrels Pickups
Each Railhammer Reeves Gabrels pick-
up features an alnico 5 magne that gives
it a warm and lightly compressed sound.
The bridge pickup has an overwound
coil for extra sustain, massive tone, and
a slight “cocked wah pedal” feel. The neck
pickup has a broad tonal palette that complements the bridge
pickup, with a warm and open tone like an intensified vintage PAF.
Either one can easily be paired with any Railhammer in the line.
Rails under the wound strings, and poles under the plain strings
for tighter lows, fatter highs, and perfect tonal balance.
www.railhammer.com
gearcheck
D’Addario Reserve EH Clarinet Reeds
Designed to emulate the stability and
playing characteristics of a BH clarinet
reed, D’Addario Woodwinds now offers a
solution for EH clarinet players without the
need to cut or modify a larger reed to fit
their instruments. Featuring a traditional
blank, this filed reed offers a longer vamp
for security of feel, thick heart for tonal
depth and pitch stability, and a flexible tip with squared corners
for ease of response and exceptional articulation quality. Like all
reeds in the D’Addario Reserve line, the EH clarinet reed is craft-
ed using D’Addario Woodwinds’ groundbreaking digital vamping
process for ultimate quality control, precision, and reed-to-reed
consistency, making it the ideal choice for the advancing student
and professionals alike.
These reeds are offered in half strengths from 2.0 to 4.5 with a
special 3.5+ strength. MSRP: $45.
www.daddario.com
WCB100 Wood Cajon Brushes from On-Stage
The WCB100 Wood Cajon Brushes set features extend-
ed-length, 8.5” all-maple
wooden handles for su-
perior control and better
feel. In addition, rubber
rings adjust spacing be-
tween the 6” straight
nylon bristles for precise dynamic modulation -- from snare-like
attack to open brushing. The On-Stage WCB100s connect musi-
cians to their instrument with an innovative, yet traditional take
on a classically authentic sound.
www.on-stage.com
PIANO & KEYBOARD
The Kross2 from Korg
The Kross2 is a pro-level performance keyboard that features
upgrades such as more PCM, more sounds (1075 programs), more
polyphony (120), user sampling, audio recording, audio and MIDI
over USB, and 16 sample trigger pads.
The synthesizer comes embedded with Korg’s Enhanced Defi-
nition Synthesis-integrated sound engine, found in many of the
brands popular synthesizers. EDS-i allows for the use of five insert
and two master effects to be used simultaneously. Extensive sam-
pling and sample editing has also been added, along with a new
bank of 16 illuminated trigger pads, allowing users to play back
samples as well as audio tracks. The Kross2 carries a U.S. street
price of $1049.99.
www.korg.com
November/December 2017• JAZZed 31
gearcheck
CASES & STANDS
Band and
Orchestra
Cases from
Kaces
The new se-
ries of instrument
cases from Kaces offers advanced instrument
protection for beginners and advanced stu-
dents alike, and includes models for trum-
pet, clarinet, saxophone, flute and trombone.
Crafted from high density reinforced hard EPS
foam, these cases are strong, yet lightweight.
Exteriors are covered in a rugged 600D poly-
ester material, with luggage grade #10 zippers
and heavy duty pull tabs designed to last. All
cases feature conveniently placed handles,
with removable straps for easy transport. Pad-
ded interior compartments, large exterior stor-
age pockets, and interior organizers provide
plenty of room for accessories. Backed by a 6
year warranty, Kaces B&O cases are available in
5 different colors, and are the perfect solution
for “back-to-school” season and beyond.
www.kaces.com
New Lightweight Woodshell Cases
from ProRockGear
The new Armourguard Wood Series of
lightweight cases from ProRockGear and AP
International offer the weight of a gigbag
and the durability of a hardshell case.
The Armourguard Wood Series features a
sturdy form-fit wood shell covered with rug-
ged 600D nylon, utilizes heavy-duty zippers,
and has added rubber bumpers on the bot-
tom to prevent shock while standing. Incred-
ibly soft interior foam and padded neck rest
ensure your instrument will be safe while
travelling, and the sturdy nylon handle and
detachable shoulder straps give you the op-
tion of carrying or wearing. The added large
outer storage pocket comfortably fits your
picks, straps, and cables, so you can show up
to the gig ready to go with one convenient
lightweight and trusty package. The new se-
ries comes in five different sizes to fit most
popular guitars and basses: rectangular
electric guitar, Les Paul, dreadnought acous-
tic, classical acoustic, and rectangular bass.
www.prorockgear.com
32 JAZZed • November/December 2017
BAND & ORCHESTRA
The Venova from Yamaha
The Venova from Yamaha is a casual wind instru-
ment that’s compact and lightweight. Created with
innovative Yamaha technology, the Venova features a
unique branched-pipe structure that gives it a bright
and rich timbre with plenty of volume. Its ABS resin body is smaller, lighter and more
durable than conventional wind instruments.
Like a saxophone or clarinet, the Venova is a single-reed instrument that produc-
es different sound nuances depending on how you blow it. It’s capable of playing ev-
erything from powerful passages to beautiful soft, expressive melodies. Easy, record-
er-style fingering makes it ideal for beginners and novices, while more experienced
players will appreciate the musical possibilities provided by its fully chromatic two-oc-
tave range. The Venova comes with a mouthpiece, a synthetic reed, a mouthpiece cap,
and a durable carrying case with a strap.
www.yamaha.com
The Curve Soprano Saxophone from PJLA Music
The Curve Soprano has all the features of straight mod-
els while adding the sonorous sound quality typical of curve
saxophones. Rich overtones and harmonics are added to
this outstanding model as a result of bell/bow configura-
tion designed to deliver solid/focused tonal projection. Its size
makes it the most versatile performance saxophone in our line.
The saxophone is available only in Bright Silver plate with 18K Gold
Trim and retails for $2,775.
www.pjlamusic.com
FRETTED
The Prestige Troubadour RS Guitar
The Prestige Troubadour RS is a single cutaway solid body guitar,
boasting a combo of solid ¾” carved Canadian Maple top and solid
mahogany body and neck. The guitar is finished with a satin/matte
black top, with satin/matte stained mahogany sides, back and neck
with cream 3 ply binding surrounding the body, and a cream bound
neck and headstock. The guitar features an ebony fingerboard with
clean, understated, offset mother of pearl dot inlays. The Troubadour
RS will be loaded with your option of either the Seymour Duncan
Pegasus Bridge pickup, or a Seymour Duncan Custom Shop ’78 Cus-
tom bridge pickup. Pickup will be direct mounted and exposed coil
in Zebra (Cream/Black). Controls will include single nickel knurled
volume and tone knobs with push pull coil split, and on-off toggle
switch. Hardware is rounded out with all-nickel TonePros intonatable
wraparound bridge and 18:1 Grover Sta-Tite open geared Tuners. The
Troubadour RS will be priced at $999 MAP, with the ’78 custom version
at $1199 MAP.
www.prestigeguitars.com
The Cort Gold A6 Guitar
The Cort Gold A6 with a Grand Auditorium body from Cort Guitars
delivers a full-bodied, well-balanced tone that suits virtually any mu-
sical style and taste. It features a 45mm genuine bone nut and saddle,
ideal for fingerstyle playing. Cort’s premium materials are showcased
in softer melodies. The only way to electronically compliment the
high-quality craftmanship of the guitar was to integrate the Fishman
Flex Blend System. This system combines an under-saddle pickup
with a condenser mic to provide even the most demanding acoustic
players the tones they desire.
www.cortguitars.com

FRETTED
Platinum Series e-volution DBS from Elrick Guitars
The Daric Bennett Signature bass features a unique combination of options; single-cut thru-neck
construction, 3-piece quarter-sawn maple neck, birdseye maple fretboard with glow-in-the-dark
side and top position markers, burled walnut top, alder body with soft maple center-block, Bartolini
3-band pre-amp, and dual coil pickups, 35” scale, and 18mm string spacing.
All Elrick basses are available directly from Elrick Bass Guitars, Ltd., as well as select Elrick dealers
worldwide.
DRUMS & PERCUSSION
Remo Classic Fit Drumheads
Remo has developed
the Classic Fit Drumhead for
oversized drums made prior
to the mid 60s. The Classic
Fit batter drumheads have a
slightly narrower flesh hoop
and step design yet main-
tains a standard outside diameter that does not interfere with the
counter hoop. Available with Ambassador Coated, Clear or Fiber-
skyn film in sizes 12”, 13”, 14”, 16”, and 18”. Also available in a Snare
Side Ambassador Hazy, sizes 13” and 14”.
www.remo.com
MalletSTATION Adjustable Range Electronic Mallet
Controller from Pearl
The MalletSTATION Adjustable Range Electronic Mallet Con-
troller is a full sized 3.0 octave adjustable range electronic mallet
controller designed for all players in any genre, from the begin-
ning student through the gigging professional. The adjustable
low note range function allows you to set the fundamental dia-
tonic note of the instrument to what you need. The malletSTATION
is powered exclusively by Mac, PC, iPad, iPhone, and Android de-
vices through USB Bus Power, allowing performance almost any-
where with minimal set-up and equipment.
MalletSTATION’s tech-forward design features KMI’s Smart Fab-
ric Sensor technology allowing the silicone bar material to have
an extremely sensitive, natural response, including mallet damp-
ening and aftertouch control, and all can be easily tailored to your
individual playing style.
The EM1 features a master control section, with 3 programma-
ble faders, 4 programmable buttons, and the fixed function low
note and octave shift buttons. In addition, three assignable pedal
inputs allow for flexibility in performance such as sustain, expres-
sion, or any MIDI parameter of your choice. These controls are fully
programmable through a software editor so changing your con-
figuration is as easy as clicking a mouse.
The ultrathin, lightweight chassis allows for easy portability,
and the flexible mounting options provide many different ways of
using your instrument. MAP: $ 999
www.pearldrum.com
gearcheck
www.elrick.com
Roland SPD::ONE series
The Roland SPD::ONE series is a line of
compact electronic percussion pads that
can be played with drumsticks, hands, or
feet. Offering features like built-in sounds,
user sample import, intuitive operation,
and more, the SPD::ONE series enables any
musician to enhance their performances
and expand their creativity with Roland’s leading digital percussion
technology. The four models in the SPD::ONE series run on batter-
ies or AC power and offer feature sets tailored for different musical
needs. Common features include a versatile, highly responsive pad
surface that can be played like a drum, hand percussion instrument,
or foot-triggered stomp box. A simple knob-based interface provides
quick access to sound selection, volume level, and other parameters,
while side-mounted controls offer easy adjustment of the playing
response. Each model also includes separate main and headphones
outputs.
Each SPD::ONE model can be used on a tabletop or floor, or
clamped to a drum or mic stand using the included mounting hard-
ware. USB-MIDI is also supported, allowing musicians to use an SP-
D::ONE pad to input MIDI data and trigger sounds in music software.
www.roland.com
Tollspire Chimes
from SABIAN
The Tollspire Chimes
are a set of 5 conical-
ly-shaped micro-splash-
es, sized in quarter-inch increments from 4.75” to 5.75.” Crafted
from SABIAN B20 Bronze, they are rolled and tempered from
splashthickness blanks, then formed into a cupless, conical shape.
SABIAN Tollspire Chimes include a mini-tree mount with uni-
versal multi-clamp to fit most common cymbal and percussion
stands.
www.sabian.com
Wuhan Flat Chau Gongs
Wuhan Flat Chau Gongs are the new-
est addition to Wuhan’s gong assort-
ment.
These gongs are a new hybrid version
that looks like are a new version of Wu-
han’s Wind Gongs. The sound is darker
than a traditional wind gong with con-
trolled overtones and a quicker decay.
www.wuhancymbalsandgongs.com
November/December 2017• JAZZed 33
 gearcheck
PRINT & DIGITAL
Piano Styles for Beginners from Mark Harrison New Releases from Hal Leonard
Piano Styles for Beginners, a new in- Hal Leonard now offers the So There
struction book by Mark Harrison, teaches songbook, which breaks down the
beginning pianists to play and improvise eight chamber pop songs and a 21 min-
in today’s popular keyboard styles. Pia- ute piano concerto by Ben Folds.
nists have the chance to study a variety The book serves as a perfect com-
of styles with an educator whose stu- panion to the album and offers new in-
dents include GRAMMY Award winners, sight into Folds’ creative process. It also
members of the Boston Pops, and first- includes six brand-new studio record-
call touring musicians. ings featuring Folds going solo in the
Piano Styles for Beginners is a perfect studio. The audio tracks can be accessed
introduction to playing in blues, boo- online using the unique code inside
gie-woogie, gospel, funk, and pop ballad styles. You will start play- each book and can be streamed or downloaded. The audio files
ing authentic chordal patterns and rhythmic grooves right away, include PLAYBACK+, a multi-functional audio player that allows
enhanced by the downloadable play-along audio tracks. Each you to slow down audio without changing pitch, set loop points,
track features a piano demo (performed by Mark himself ) and a change keys, and pan left or right.
rhythm section recorded on separate channels so that you can So There retails for $19.99.
play along with the band. The tracks, in combination with Mark’s Easy Improvisation was designed as
easy to follow instruction, give the player a great foundation for a simple, non-intimidating introduc-
improvising in each style. tion to improvisation for any student in
www.harrisonmusic.com a band. It can be used by an individual
player using the included PLAYBACK+
audio files, a small group of players with
or without the audio, or a large ensem-
ble with or without the audio. Students
Get jazzed about magazine... play along with great-sounding demo
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JAZZed is the PREMIER MAGAZINE about jazz and
exercises for each musical style with helpful tips and suggested
jazz education that you do not want to be without. notes to be used while improvising and even four sample solos
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Easy Improvisation is available for flute, oboe, bassoon, clari-
net, alto sax, tenor sax, trumpet, horn, trombone, tuba, and key-
board percussion.
The audio tracks include demonstration of the music on each
page plus separate tracks with just the background rhythms and
chords. The audio is accessed online using the unique code in-
side each book and can be streamed or downloaded. The audio
files include PLAYBACK+, a multi-functional audio player that al-
lows you to slow down audio without changing pitch, set loop
points, change keys, and pan left or right.
Easy Improvisation retails for $9.99.
Hal Leonard is also distributing
Artiphon’s INSTRUMENT 1 digital in-
strument to U.S. and Canadian mu-
sic stores. The INSTRUMENT 1 is a
patented multi-instrument that lets
Each Month, JAZZed brings you the latest Industry News, you strum like a guitar, bow like a vi-
Education, Performance, Music & Much More! olin, and tap like a keyboard or drum
pad. It plugs into iPhone, iPad, Mac,
or PC and connects with hundreds
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LESSONS LEARNED • WHAT’S ON YOUR PLAYLIST? • JAZZ FESTIVAL PREVIEWS & CALENDARS
This ultra-expressive, next-generation digital instrument allows
UP & COMING • GEAR CHECK • NOTEWORTHY musicians of all abilities to explore a variety of instrument styles
and techniques. Designed for pros and casual players alike, the
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34 JAZZed • November/December 2017
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November/December 2017 • JAZZed 35
 Backbeat
Andy McGhee 1927-2017
A
ndy McGhee, former longtime Berklee College of Music
faculty member, passed away on October 12 in Atlanta.
He would have been 90 years old on November 3. Berklee
shared the news of his passing on Tuesday, October 24.
Born in 1927, McGhee moved to Boston from North Carolina in
1945 to study at New England Conservatory of Music. After gradu-
ating, he served in the Armed Forces, serving in the Army in Korea
and at Fort Dix, New Jersey, where he played in an Army band and
gave lessons to other musicians.
Afterwards, he worked in Lionel Hampton’s band and toured
the United States, Europe, and Asia from 1957 to 1963, and went
on to work with Woody Herman from 1963 to 1966.
McGhee’s time at Berklee started in 1966, the beginning of his
47 years teaching at the school. Following 31 years as a full-time
faculty member, he “retired” in 1997, but continued to teach as a
professor emeritus and part-time faculty member for 16 additional
years, his actual year of retirement being 2013.
During his tenure at Berklee, McGhee taught private lessons
and ensembles, and his many students included established sax-
ophonists like Woodwind Department Chair Bill Pierce, and Javon
Jackson, Donald Harrison, Walter Beasley, Antonio Hart, Richie
coming next issue
Don’t miss the January 2018 issue of
The January 2018 issue of JAZZed
eb,
will feature a conversation with David Lo
ies
director of UNLV’s acclaimed Jazz Stud
36
program.
JAZZed • November/December 2017
Cole, Greg Osby, Jaleel
Shaw, and Ralph Moore.
Outside of his teach-
ing career, McGhee par-
ticipated in the Golden
Men of Jazz tour with
Hampton, Harry “Sweets” Edison, Clark Terry, Benny Bailey, Al Grey,
and Benny Golson in the early 1990s. The tour included concerts
in Europe and the Unites States, featuring a show for President
George H. W. Bush in Washington, D.C.
In May 2006, Andy was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Mu-
sic from Berklee, and in commemoration of service to the college
and the impact he has had on his students through the years, the
school has also established the Andy McGhee Endowed Scholar-
ship in his honor.
“With Andy’s passing, Berklee lost one of the seminal figures in
its development,” a statement from Berklee School of Music and Vice
President for Academic Affairs / Vice Provost Jay Kennedy reads.
Kennedy has invited Berklee community members and mem-
bers of the jazz community to share their stores and memories of
McGhee on a special In Memoriam blog.
t
D AV I D LOE B
Maesta
& Holly Hofmann

Two Amazing Voices

in Modern Jazz.

Holly Hofmann has spent her

career bringing the flute to the
front-line spotlight in jazz.
Classically trained and one of the
world’s premiere jazz flutists and
promoters, Holly has earned respect
from Birdland to the Horton Grand
Hotel, from The Village Vanguard,
and around the globe.
Holly and Maesta, two classic
performers who know how to swing!