Jazz News

Music Empowerment Program for La Paz, Bolivia

Source: All About Jazz
June 15, 2008

David Haney Presents a Two Week Workshop in Improvisation for Orphaned Boys Ages 14-18 in la Paz, Bolivia

THE PROGRAM In conjunction with Creative Corners of London, England, David Haney, a Seattle based pianist, improviser, and composer will teach a two week residency at the State Orphanage in La Paz, Bolivia. During the two week period, boys ranging in ages from 14 to 18 will learn the basics of improvisation and musical dialogue. Using specific rhythms from around the world ...

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Playboy Jazz Festival Day One

Source: All About Jazz
June 14, 2008

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Young Jazz Stars Get a Chance to Shine

Source: All About Jazz
June 14, 2008

Live from Salt Lake City, it's Friday Night! Saturday Night Live musical director Lenny Pickett will join American Fork's Crescent Super Band tonight for a benefit concert that will help fund the 2008-09 SLC Jazz concert season. The Crescent Super Band, a jazz ensemble of 21 high-school students, isn't your average high-school band. The band based out of American Fork's The Music School is considered one of the best high-school-age jazz ensembles in the nation, judging from its Best of ...

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American Idol Sued over Musicians' Royalties

Source: All About Jazz
June 14, 2008

Even in the off-season, American Idol Manages to Stir Up Controversy Musicians' Union Files a Lawsuit against the show, claiming the musicians in the American Idol band were underpaid. The American Federation of Musicians says the hit Fox show violated a collective bargaining agreement by failing to pay musicians royalties for rebroadcasts of episodes. In 2007, the show started using musicians to re-record new music for season highlights, a move that the union was also not informed of. A rep ...

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Thelonious Monk Institute New Home

Source: Michael Ricci
June 14, 2008

Inside the Thelonious Monk Institute Last September the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Performance, a postgraduate training program headed by the trumpeter Terence Blanchard, relocated to Loyola University New Orleans after a dozen years at the University of Southern California. The move was partly a practical matter, but also a symbolic gesture, announced as the signal gesture of a “Commitment to New Orleans" initiative. It may have been one of the happiest cultural developments in this city over the past ...

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For 3 Days, 2 Jazz Festivals Will Go Head-to-Head

Source: Michael Ricci
June 14, 2008

FOR 14 years, the jazz acts at the Caramoor International Music Festival in Katonah have been presented on two consecutive Saturdays at the end of July and the beginning of August. This year, they will be presented on three straight days, Aug. 1 to 3. That coincides precisely with the schedule of the Litchfield Jazz Festival, in Goshen, Conn., setting up the first head-to-head three-day competition between two major events on the jazz calendar. Both festivals draw heavily from an ...

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Jazz Fest New Orleans Finale

Source: Michael Ricci
June 14, 2008

Something Odd Happens Over a Full Weekend of Jazzfest. Between performances and parades, and the geography of where stages are situated, it's virtually impossible not to run into a brass band, Mardi Gras Indians or both. I assume that's by design; those traditions infuse all sorts of other New Orleans music and they are the main heritage in “Jazz and Heritage." To see so many groups maintaining their street-level music after Katrina is heartening, and their tunes are incorrigibly upbeat. ...

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Bill Cosby to Get in Some Licks on Drums at Jazz Festival

Source: All About Jazz
June 14, 2008

Bill Cosby had to opt for comedy over being jazz drummer, but loves role at Playboy jazz fest (NEW YORK) Bill Cosby quips that he gave up his dreams of becoming a professional jazz drummer and turned to comedy after seeing how easily the pioneer bebop drummer Max Roach handled rhythmically complex tunes that he struggled to get through. “I finally went to see Max play and he played a song 'Parisian Thoroughfare' that Bud Powell wrote," said Cosby. “Max ...

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