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By Jazz Fans, For Jazz Fans: How All About Jazz Works

by Michael Ricci
September 21, 2026

When All About Jazz launched in 1995, one of our earliest taglines was simple: “By jazz fans, for jazz fans." At the time, those six words pretty much said it all. We were people who loved jazz, writing about jazz for other people who loved jazz. There wasn't much need to explain the organizational philosophy behind it because there wasn't much of an organization yet. More than thirty years later, All About Jazz has ...

Thirty Years Later, the Vision Remains

by Michael Ricci
August 13, 2026

When people ask me how All About Jazz began, they often assume it started with a website. It didn't. The idea predates AAJ by two years. Before All About Jazz launched in August 1995, I was fascinated by the possibilities of organizing album information in ways that made it more useful, more connected and more enjoyable to explore. At the time, I was working on a CD-ROM project devoted to jazz discographies, inspired in ...

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Giving Thanks & Spreading the Jazz Joy

by Michael Ricci
November 27, 2025

As always, we're celebrating Thanksgiving by recognizing two special groups of people: our benefactors, who helped make much of the 2025 website improvements possible, and our staff, who contribute and edit articles throughout the year. Both contributions are immeasurable, and we thank you all for your generosity, passion, creativity, and friendship. The good people who support this website are as cool--and as essential--as the music itself. With deep appreciation, thank you again! A daily commitment since 1995 At ...

Onward to 30!

by Michael Ricci
August 25, 2024

For our members who do not subscribe to our weekly newsletter, this past week's was of particular importance so we pulled sections from it and published it as an article. You can join over 89,000 members and subscribe to our free weekly newsletter. When you do, we'll keep you current on website happenings plus include a local jazz events calendar. Learn more here. Last week we toasted All About Jazz's 29th birthday. We also launched the Jazz ...

Raising the Bar in Year 28

by Michael Ricci
August 3, 2023

The above Mingus quote really struck a chord as All About Jazz is a work of passion and creativity in a continuous search to present the rich universe of jazz in the most accessible way possible. Musician profiles, jazz clubs, show dates, festivals, album reviews, photos, polls, contests, news, free music, etc., over 100 years of jazz history--past, present, and in-the-making--packed into one friendly platform. At times, the depth and breadth of All About Jazz can seem overwhelming, but ...

Silver Linings: AAJ @ 25

by Michael Ricci
October 2, 2020

All About Jazz recently celebrated its 25th year online. Crazy as it sounds, “AAJ," as it has come to be known, was originally a sandbox to help me learn the ins-and-outs of the infant World Wide Web. Fast forward five years and the double whammy of Y2K and 9/11 sunk my software business (another story). But AAJ was built of sterner stuff. We navigated through such disruptive forces as malicious hackers and the revenue-draining vampire that is social media, and ...

Scheduling a livestream event? Upload it to Jazz Near You and we'll help you promote it.

by Michael Ricci
March 20, 2020

COVID-19 and its impact represents an extraordinary and unprecedented time for us all. It has affected every person and every organization in jazz, disrupted our livelihoods, and we're all greatly concerned about the health and well-being of our community. Personally, I'm accustomed to working from home and have been doing so since 1995--but our network and touchpoints extend far beyond AAJ HQ. As a central source for all things jazz, we are in constant communication with individuals representing ...

All About Jazz Website Tips: 2017

by Michael Ricci
April 26, 2017

I think it's safe to say that All About Jazz (which includes Jazz Near You) far exceeds any reader's expectations when they first visit the website. We regularly introduce new sections, new features, and we keep our design fresh with the goal of constantly raising the bar we set 22 years ago. As a result, we have much to offer our fund drive supporters, our members, our advertisers, and our readers. As we scale our platform to offer more features ...

All About Jazz: The Innovation Game

by Michael Ricci
April 15, 2016

2015 marked All About Jazz's 20th year online. From the humble beginnings as a simple link site to the largest database in jazz media, AAJ has continually improved over the years and through some inspired stretches, has made significant advancements for jazz online. For me personally, operating All About Jazz since its inception has been a rewarding and life changing experience. And though it hasn't been without its dramatic moments, we have always navigated through the rough patches and improved ...

All About Jazz: Upgrades Continue... Move pending

by Michael Ricci
February 19, 2016

If you visited All About Jazz between mid-December and the first week of February, then there was a good chance that our website was either slow or (worse) timed out. We apologize for the inconvenience but we were dealing with two very serious technical issues that have since been resolved. Now that we're back on track, we're excited to roll up our sleeves and get back to doing what we do best: innovate. But first, we'll ...