From: wjh@cbnewsl.cb.att.com (william.j.hery)
Subject: Re: Where is Jazz?
Organization: AT&T
Distribution: na
Date: Tue, 15 Sep 1992 03:24:22 GMT

>> In article <1992Sep8.212435.14550@seada.com>, Sue Raul writes:
>> What's happening with jazz in the world?
[ looking for Pullen, Chico Freeman, Murray, Geri Allen, Cedar Walton,
Ibrahim, etc. ]
>> Where should I be living? [Sandeep, I know what you're going to say!] ;-)

In spite of Sandeep's posting, I think that what you think he would say
is still true. Sandeep, Marc Weiner and I caught Freeman with Mal Waldron's
group (Ricky Ford, Reggie Workman, Pete LaRoca) the night before I saw
your posting. I've personnally seen Pullen, Murray (several times), and
Allen in the NY area within the past year. Walton is playing Sweet Basil
for 2 weeks right now. Ibrahim used to have 2-3 two week gigs at Basil
each year, but he has moved back to South Africa to tryto get a jazz scene
going there, so I don't know how much he will be here in the near future.

>> sik@grosz.esd.sgi.com (Seth Katz) writes:
>> ...and he'd be right.  The question I'd then ask Sandeep is, how
>> much longer will New York stay the jazz center if jazz gets
>> attendance like the Brotzmann/Crispell/ Drake show we attended?

smehta@nynexst.com writes:
>And you'd be right in asking! In fact, I've been speculating how
>valid the title "jazz capital of the world" is for NYC? I do not
>think that claim holds a lot of water anymore... The downtown scene is shaky at
>best. The New Music Cafe has fizzled out after a year of various
>problems -- largely exacerbated by the owner. The KnitFact's last 2
>schedules seem watered down....

I'll agree that the downtown improv scene isn't what it was, but if you
look at the list of musicians Sue asked about, most show up at the Vanguard
or Sweet Basil pretty often.

>Lincoln Center's "Classical Jazz" series is a cruel joke.

Can't argue with that, although perhaps the veribage is a bit strong :-)

>.... JVC Jazz is another joke.

JVC (was Kool, was Big Apple, was Newport in NY, was Newport) has always
been known for being more concerned with filling big concert halls than
bringing in cutting edge music. You might debate the logic in that,
and I'd probably agree with you, but it was never any better in 
the past than it is now (Wein had Frank Sinatra in the 50s, Dylan in
the 60s at the Newport JAZZ festivals.) In fact, one could argue that
it is actually getting better: this year we (yes Sandeep, including you)
saw David Murry/Bobby Bradford, Liberation Music Orchestra, Roots (Pullen,
C Freeman, Blythe, Sam Rivers, Nathan Davis), Oliver Lake at JVC.

>I'd say if you lived in the north-east US and could travel easily to
>Vancouver, Toronto and Victoriaville you'd cover the jazz scene
>fairly well.

I don't know what has been going on in Toronto, but there are certainly
interesting things at the Vancouver and Victoriaville festivals. But
more than in NY??? Yes, Victoriaville has more of the downtown improv
stuff than has been here in the last few months, and Vancouver had some
very interesting locals and a few west coasters who don't travel east
too much. But these are once a year festivals. How about posting your
list of gigs you attended in the last 12 months and comparing it to
the Victoriaville and Vancouver lineups (and toss in what you know about
Toronto). Then add to the NY gig list the ones you skipped because you
were out of town, or too busy (like Butch Morris, Andrew Hill), or
considered too expensive (Cecil at $35/head, which I agree was too
expensive, but you can probably blame Cecil for that).

And don't forget that in NY the scene is usually a lot worse in the
summer than the rest of the year because so many of the musicians are
all over the place at other festivals (which are almost always in the
summer).

Maybe you're just looking at this month's listing and comparing it
to a years worht elsewhere, or maybe your tastes are narrowing to
only the downtown improv type stuff, or maybe your getting a bit jaded,
but I think you overstated your case. I know you've been complaining
that you've only been going to a gig an average of every 2 weeks this
year instead of every week last year, but I suspect that most of the
netters would glad trade their "gigs attende" list for the past year
for yours.

As an aside, there has always been an ebb and flow of easy to find
cutting edge venues in NY, and we do seem to be in a bit of an ebb
lately, but a new flow seems to show in some other part of town when 
that happens. In the 40s the cutting edge was up at Minton's and
a few other Harlem clubs, but that ebbed as bop got popular
and moved down to 42nd St. Then some interesting things started
happening in Greenwich Village in the 50s (the "cool jazz" coffee
houses, then the Five Spot and Half Note, finally the Vanguard)
with Ornette, Mingus, Coltrane. The Five Spot and Half Note
closed and the Vanguard (and Village Gate) started getting more
popular, more expensive, less experimental by the late 60s
(a real nadir for jazz), and some things started happening at out
of the way places like Slugs (in the East Village), where Sun Ra
used to play, and Lee Morgan was shot by "his woman" while he was on
stage. Then that faded away, and the "loft jazz" scene quietly
started in the early 70s in what is now the expensive SoHo didstrict
(but was inexpensive, unused commercial space at the time), with
musicians (including Ornette and Sam Rivers) running small "performance
spaces" for cutting edge jazz. That faded in the eraly 80s (as yuppies
moved in and rents went up, no doubt), with places like the Knitting
Factory eventually becoming the home for a new generation of cutting
edge musicians, again in relatively low rent space. If this downtown
improve scene is dispersing, the question is not whether everyone should
move to Victoriaville, but where in NY things will start opening up
for cutting edge musicians. Maybe it will be in NJ (wishful thinking :-):
David Murray, Olver Lake, Tony Reedus (and probably a few more) already
live in Montclair NJ (and Marcel said he was moving there for the school
system).

So Sandeep, don't despair--just keep looking for small ads in the voice
and posters on the street corners to see where some new, obscure place
is going to open :-)

Bill Hery
AT&T Bell Labs
201-386-2362
hery@att.COM