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Out and About: The Super Fans
You've seen them around. They're at all the gigs, their attention focused deeply on the bandstand, as much a part of their local jazz scenes as the musicians and venues. They know and love the music, and musicians love them back. These passionate music-goers are The Super Fans, and they are an essential part of the concert experience. "Listening is a magnetic and strange thing, a creative force... When we are listened to, it creates us, makes us unfold and expand." (Karl A. Menninger) Each month, AAJ focuses the attention back on one of The Super Fans to find out what it is they love about live jazz. By Tessa Souter and Andrea Wolper.
Meet Martin McFie
Super Fan Martin McFie is so into live music he doesn't even have a record collection. These days, McFie, British by birth, calls both South Carolina and Nice, France, home. The frequent-traveling “jazz detective" has made it his business to seek out jazz of all kinds in some of the most unlikely places, especially when he's tooling around the Continent in his vintage London taxi. Tell us a bit about yourself. I was born in London ...
read moreMeet Mark Weber
Almost every aspect of Mark Weber's life ends up intersecting with jazz; he just might be the original Renaissance jazz fan. A former wedding photographer, he found himself photographing nearly every jazz musician to pass through Los Angeles and Albuquerque in the past several decades and, without planning to, ended up writing for CODA, deejaying a jazz radio show, and even performing his poetry with improvising musicians. Plus, he's got all the stories, and shares an awfully good one with ...
read moreMeet Sarah V.
One of our youngest Super Fans yet, Sarah V might also be our most dedicated, attending over 200 concerts a year, and even moving to New York City to immerse herself more completely in the music scene. Like Super Fan “Jazz Judy" Balos, she likes to sit way up front--which, as you'll find out when you read on, comes with some degree of risk! Tell us a bit about yourself. I spent most of my ...
read moreMeet Maurice Edwards
We think every Super Fan column is special, but this one has a couple of firsts: a flat out refusal to answer a question, and some strong language. We love it! Maurice Edwards caught the jazz bug at an age when he was too young to fully understand it, yet he was so determined to “crack the code" that he took on jazz like a course of study. It's no surprise that someone with that level of commitment has some ...
read moreMeet David Richardson
Wherever he goes, David Richardson makes it his business to seek out the best in jazz. From Siberia, Moscow, and St. Petersburg to Costa Rica, Europe to the U.S., you'll find him meeting up with fellow jazz-loving Facebook friends, following his favorite musicians, and finding new places to listen. But his obsession with jazz doesn't end with being a consumer: he started a company called The Real Jazz Ambassadors to make documentaries about beloved musicians, one of whom is the ...
read moreCelebrating the 2017 Super Fans
You've seen them around. They're at all the gigs, their attention focused deeply on the bandstand, as much a part of their local jazz scenes as the musicians and venues. They know and love the music, and musicians love them back. These passionate music-goers are The Super Fans, and they are an essential part of the concert experience. “Listening is a magnetic and strange thing, a creative force... When we are listened to, it creates us, makes us unfold and ...
read moreMeet Geri St. Clair
Welcome to KC Super Fans, part ll! Tom and Geri (no, not Tom and Jerry!) aren't the first spousal Super Fan team we've featured (that distinction goes to Roberta DeNicola and Richard Berger), but they're our first jny: Kansas City super fans, and we love them for it. Geri St. Clair and her partner in life, love, and jazz, October Super Fan Tom Wells, make it absolutely clear--should anyone have doubts--that their city has great musical offerings and a powerful ...
read moreMeet Tom Wells
Born and raised in that other “capital of jazz"--jny: Kansas City, birthplace of Charlie Parker--Super Fan Tom Wells, along with long-time jazz date, his wife, Geri St. Clair (a future Super Fan--stay tuned!), is a huge supporter of the local scene. How huge? Well, Tom and Geri once followed the University of Missouri Kansas City's Jazz Orchestra all the way to jny: Paris, jny: Switzerland and jny: Holland for the “jazz experience of a lifetime." Tell us a ...
read moreMeet H. Alonzo Jennings
H. Alonzo Jennings, artist, photographer, poet, and jazz aficionado, has been photographing jazz musicians since 1976 and going out to support live jazz music for even longer. His photographs include images of jazz legends such as Billy Eckstine, Miles Davis, Sarah Vaughan and Cassandra Wilson. “My objective as an artist/photographer is to provide a visual record of these sublime moments of transcendence, reflecting the purity and honest spirituality of the artist's souls." Music is no less than an entryway to ...
read moreMeet Abby London Crawford
Abby London Crawford is just the sort of Super Fan this column was created for. A jazz hero, she can be seen all over New York city at live music events, radiating love and positivity. But being a listener alone has never been enough for Abby, who's found numerous ways to nurture and support the music and the people she holds so dear. Never one to draw attention to herself, she exemplifies the old adage, “still waters run deep"; if ...
read moreShowcase
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Sebastiana by Ricardo Bacelar
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Dreaming Spirits by Mark Egan
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Still Dreaming by Joshua Redman
Story of the Day
I have loved jazz since I was a little girl watching old movies, and seeing some of the greatest performers. My family did not listen to it on the radio or the car. It was something that I had to go out of my way for. I have met many jazz, swing, blues, and rock musicians
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By Michele Peraino
Member since: 2015
