O Meally even refers to his anthology as a museum without walls, comparing the process of grouping and juxtaposing recorded selections to the way museum curators hang exhibits. Even so, it s instructive when anyone poses challenges to conventional wisdom and refreshing to find a critic more interested in dissolving borders around jazz than in policing them. Straight Out of Church, Let s Have a Party, Swinging the Songbook, After Hours, Jazz Compositions, Scat and Vocalese, Novelties and Take-offs. The categories are porous and overlapping, with some artists reappearing in several throughout the set. Well, I won t do it.
Surprising choices abound.
It s a powerful reminder that the voice has always been central to jazz expression from trumpeter Buddy Bolden calling his children home to pianist Keith Jarrett reinforcing his solo lines in an eerie falsetto. Instructive and entertaining, The Jazz Singers attests to the Smithsonian s able leadership in curating this nation s musical heritage. Now the institution needs to reinstate and rebuild a recordings program that will continue to play a vital role in its overarching cultural mission. No, these aren t unissued outtakes from his album Interstellar Space . Sweetheart, it turns out, was his father s favorite song, while the other was a tune Coltrane liked to sing in the car on his way to gigs.