AAJ @ 30

You already know the story. Back in 1990, in some quaint American backwater called Philadelphia somewhere in the Quaker-infested wilds of Pennsylvania, young Michael Ricci dreamt of combining art and technology to create a uniquely American art form and transmit it electronically to every corner of the world except those places where they eat rotting shark meat because dude, seriously.

After five years of constant experimentation, at one point even involving a banjo and a KitchenAid mixer connected to a HAM radio, Ricci came to the conclusion that the answer was contained in evolution rather than innovation. Jazz and the Internet had already been invented and were just awaiting the inevitable, like that time when I wanted to invent a hand-held self-contained pizza except they already had Hot Pockets.

All About Jazz was born (birth weight 9 MB 6 KB) in 1995, the same year the Atlanta Braves won the World Series for the first time since 1957, and the expansion Carolina Panthers entered the NFL. This will become important later, so set a timer for 2001 in case I forget. Ricci assembled some of the most learned and respected voices in Jazz and posed to them the challenge of helping him find a bunch of geeks willing to be damned by the faint praise of Internet fame and would work for leftover Halloween candy.

So then.

In 1995, the Internet was still mostly a communal fountain of 1's and 0's located on the village green where individuals drew bucketfuls of data packets and assembled them into content at home as a family activity. It was a simpler time. The idea of creating an immersive multimedia experience in that environment was a daunting mission, but Commodore Ricci (he was commissioned as a Commodore in the Italian Navy by benefit of the fact that everything you read on the Internet is now absolutely true and if you disagree you are literally Hitler. Godwin v. Poe, 2020) felt equal to the task. The early years were spent convincing the average netizen that Jazz was somehow more valuable than dancing hamsters and AOL chat rooms (A/S/L in comments below, please). Still, Ricci persevered, bringing on such stalwarts as C. Michael Bailey (after exhausting the initial A. and B. Michael Bailey options) and Canada's answer to John Kelman, John Kelman.

As for me, Your Own Personal Genius happened upon the scene in 2001 (cue "Thus Spoke Zarathustra," or Louis Armstrong's "Struttin' With Some Barbecue" as the case may be). Ricci was looking for "the Dave Barry of Jazz," but instead happened upon the Ring Lardner/Robert Benchley/Will Cuppy/George Ade/S.J. Perelman of Jazz (with dashes of Salvador Dalí and Glenn Baxter). An eccentric, reclusive humorist from Virginia who shared Ricci's love of both Jazz and baseball, I came to AAJ on a mission to prevent it from committing the deadly sin of taking itself too seriously.

I could go through the history of AAJ ad nauseum (Latin for "to the point of ordering out for Taco Bell"), but I won't, owing to both the terms of the restraining order and the fact that other, more adept writers than I have already tackled the task (bringing up a 3rd and 2 from the 30-yard line). Jazz is too important a thing to be left in the hands of librarians and historians, those who sort and catalog but do not contribute to the furtherance of the art. AAJ has always been a living entity, a dynamic place where Our Music exists in its current state no matter how much I believe that Bix Beiderbecke could take Dave Douglas in a fair fight.

While my own contributions to AAJ have dwindled to a trickle over the years due to personal setbacks and my own glacial writing pace (three words a day, like clockwork), I am in constant awe of what this chunk of webspace has become, its place in the Jazziverse, and the 10% discount AAJ contributors receive at participating Hardee's/Carl's Jr. locations.

Thus.

In all likelihood, I will not be here for AAJ's 60th anniversary. I'm a 58-year-old hillbilly, working two jobs in order to afford my extravagant love of both food and shelter (and tickets to professional sporting events and my inexplicable collection of condiments such as hot sauces, BBQ sauces, salad dressings, and fancy mustards). It is almost a certainty that AAJ will be here in 30 years. Jazz will continue, the communal sharing of information over the prevailing technological medium will continue, Life—and Jazz is certainly an integral part of everyday life—will continue. What Monsignor Ricci has created will likely outlive him, a legacy which is the goal of any 60-ish native Pennsylvanian Ohio State grad (also known as "jawns").

I wish AAJ at least as good a next 30 years as they have had the last three decades, and I wish you the same, dear reader. As for me, I will continue to listen to Jazz and construct my own peculiar brand of nonsense as I've a mind to do. And I will be forever grateful to Michael Ricci and AAJ for giving me a platform. Till next time, exit to your right and enjoy the rest of AAJ.

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