Hah! I love that stuff. And, I love the clips. I roomed with a trombone player in college and he played that record almost nonstop. But, that’s not the only thing I love about the post. I refer to how interesting it is that sometimes support for our particular point of view comes from unexpected sources. Dick Katz, who studied at the Peabody Conservatory, Manhattan School of Music AND Juilliard; and was a Jazz educator. Considering all the silly derision levied here upon the idea of scholarship and Jazz, an unexpected source indeed.
This is interesting for yet another reason re unexpected sources. You may find this story interesting. This past August I was performing with the Philadelphia Orchestra at SPAC and on the same program was Wynton’s JLCO performing Wynton’s “Swing Symphony”. I am friends with a couple of the members of Wynton’s band and after the rehearsal one morning we went to lunch at a nearby restaurant. During the meal, after much talk about the music the conversation turned to, of all things, audio. One of the guys was interested in buying a sound system. I mentioned Audiogon as a place to get acquainted with what is out there and the forums being a good place to learn about putting together a system. Conversation about the forums led to....you guessed it, this thread. One of the topics that came up was the idea of....you guessed it, traditional vs. “new” Jazz. I mentioned some of the ongoing disagreements here on the subject. To a man, the view was that the feeling that only old Jazz is of any value or that many of the younger players today are not on the same level as players from the past is absurd. That not only is it absurd, but that the belief is one of the things that hurts Jazz’ viability today the most. Then the punchline: Wynton feels the same way! Wynton is a big supporter of the new generation of players and not just the players playing traditional Jazz. He also likes some of the non-traditional “new” Jazz very much. His views have changed over the years and he, for “political” reasons, needs to maintain and cultivate his public persona of the unwavering traditionalist.
I couldn’t stop laughing! Well, when I was alone.
I was going to bring this up here back then, but I had the good sense to not “stir the pot” unnecessarily. BTW, my invitation from a couple of years ago (!) stands. If you’re ever in NYC I would be glad to introduce you to some of these guys and probably Wynton as well.
The music:
https://youtu.be/JrypkiPgPxc
