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AFRO-AMERICAN MUSIC INSTITUTE CELEBRATES 36 YEARS

BOYS CHOIR AFRICA SHIRTS
 
 
http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/building-today-for-tomorrow/x/267428

 Pain Relief Beyond Belief

                         http://www.komehsaessentials.com/                              

 

PITTSBURGH JAZZ

 

From Blakey to Brown, Como to Costa, Eckstine to Eldridge, Galbraith to Garner, Harris to Hines, Horne to Hyman, Jamal to Jefferson, Kelly to Klook; Mancini to Marmarosa, May to Mitchell, Negri to Nestico, Parlan to Ponder, Reed to Ruther, Strayhorn to Sullivan, Turk to Turrentine, Wade to Williams… the forthcoming publication Treasury of Pittsburgh Jazz Connections by Dr. Nelson Harrison and Dr. Ralph Proctor, Jr. will document the legacy of one of the world’s greatest jazz capitals.

 

Do you want to know who Dizzy Gillespie  idolized? Did you ever wonder who inspired Kenny Clarke and Art Blakey? Who was the pianist that mentored Monk, Bud Powell, Tad Dameron, Elmo Hope, Sarah Vaughan and Mel Torme? Who was Art Tatum’s idol and Nat Cole’s mentor? What musical quartet pioneered the concept adopted later by the Modern Jazz Quartet? Were you ever curious to know who taught saxophone to Stanley Turrentine or who taught piano to Ahmad Jamal? What community music school trained Robert McFerrin, Sr. for his history-making debut with the Metropolitan Opera? What virtually unknown pianist was a significant influence on young John Coltrane, Shirley Scott, McCoy Tyner, Bobby Timmons and Ray Bryant when he moved to Philadelphia from Pittsburgh in the 1940s?  Would you be surprised to know that Erroll Garner attended classes at the Julliard School of Music in New York and was at the top of his class in writing and arranging proficiency?

 

Some answers  can be gleaned from the postings on the Pittsburgh Jazz Network.

 

For almost 100 years the Pittsburgh region has been a metacenter of jazz originality that is second to no other in the history of jazz.  One of the best kept secrets in jazz folklore, the Pittsburgh Jazz Legacy has heretofore remained mythical.  We have dubbed it “the greatest story never told” since it has not been represented in writing before now in such a way as to be accessible to anyone seeking to know more about it.  When it was happening, little did we know how priceless the memories would become when the times were gone.

 

Today jazz is still king in Pittsburgh, with events, performances and activities happening all the time. The Pittsburgh Jazz Network is dedicated to celebrating and showcasing the places, artists and fans that carry on the legacy of Pittsburgh's jazz heritage.

 

WELCOME!

 

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Duke Ellington is first African-American and the first musician to solo on U.S. circulating coin

    MARY LOU WILLIAMS     

            INTERVIEW

       In Her Own Words

THE COMMERCIAL STATE OF JAZZ IN THE NEW MILLENIUM

There is a discussion on The Washington DC Network re: returning jazz back to commercially advertising radio stations. The discussion was initiated by my close friend and native Pittsburgher, Mickey Bass, an extraordinarily talented and venerated bassist. After reading the developing thread there I left a short comment but have decided to start another thread on this network that perhaps will move in another direction. Please join in both discussions if you like. It's all good.
================================================================================
Sometimes we have to look in the mirror and discern what it is we can do to promote our own interests. Expecting third parties to do it is pretty much over in today's world if it, in fact, were ever a good way to do things. The world of the "establishment" is crumbling at light speed before our eyes. If we continue to try to use the establishment models, we will be lost in the shuffle. It has already been pointed out and is easily clear to see that commercial radio stations always existed and depended entirely upon advertising dollars based on the market slice of listeners that paid attention to the station. Jazz has hardly had that kind of patronage since the 40s.

You can always tell the mission of the advertisers by the type of ads that are being run on the commercial stations. The black stations are promoting slavery and ignorance. Not directly from the music so much as from what they sell in between the music. For example, you will learn where the pawnshops are, how to rent furniture, how to get a good bail bondsman, loan shark, etc. on the hip hop/soul stations. Don't take my word for it... listen and hear for yourself. When I talk to my 6th - 12th grade and college students, they report that they listen to nothing else because the other stations don't play "our" music. I remind them what they will never hear in between "their" music on those stations, i.e., the Dow Jones Industrial Average, how to save or invest money, how to get a mortgage, scholarship, health information, learning systems, etc. All they would have to do is turn the dial to get that information but they are so indoctrinated they they won't do it... because the other types of music (classical, pop, adult contemporary and jazz) repel their sensibilities.

In addition to that let's not forget that music has been largely relegated to insignificance in the public schools so the youth are listening to machines and don't even have a clue that human beings can make their own music. The private school students who learn music are learning European classical and Broadway style and don't have a clue what improvisation or live spontaneous jazz is either. If anyone would try to operate a commercial radio station exclusively for jazz, especially the straight-ahead mainstream variety, they would soon go out of business before they attracted a sponsor. The few public stations that have jazz on their playlists have to beg 2-3 times per year to get enough public support to even stay on the air. You cannot solve a problem with the same models that created the problem.

So here we are having a discussion online (where all the fences have come down, and the middle-man has no role to play at all) discussing going back to the days of payola, agents and middleman carpetbaggers who prevented our music from being played, who created the hit parade mentality and who target the 11-12 year old tabula rasa minds with as much crap as they can steal. Does it make sense going back to those models? Wake up people! It's a new world that will never go back to the old world. Years ago the major advertisers (like the largest, Proctor & Gamble), reduced their advertising budgets 60-70% on network radio and television. Super Bowl half-time has trouble getting money from them. Where has their money gone? Right here on the internet.

Advertising money is spent on our attention. A brand means nothing unless someone looks at it for more than a couple seconds. We look at YouTube videos for 51-20 minutes at a time. There are millions of us on MySpace providing all the content and value and attention needed for Rupert Murdoch, et al to make close to $100 million/month in commercial advertising and share none of it with us. Wake up people!!!

We can have our own MySpace for almost nothing. We can have our own radio podcast or videocast for almost nothing and load it up with our own content. It will attract the attention of end users that want to experience our offerings and their are many valuable sequelae that flow from that. The techological revolution is decimating the old models and creating new opportunities for us that are at our fingertips.

The athletes figured it out... now they make millions individually. I remember when they used to follow the jazz musicians around the club circuit. We still hide our magic under a bushel, don't talk about it to our audience even when we have a microphone in our hands, and ignore the non-musician patrons who DO come to the clubs while we hover in the corner talking to each other about our sad state of affairs. I see it every week. Tell me I'm wrong. Turn on the network media and see if you can find a panel of jazz musicians talking about our craft in intricate detail the way the athletes and ex-athletes talk about their sport. I have seen the "immaculate reception" over 1000 times in the past 35 years. Wouldn't it be nice to hear a Sonny Rollins or Art Tatum solo passage that often? It would take a different world to do that. So why don't we wake up and make a different world and quit wasting our time lamenting why the carpetbaggers have abandoned us? They were never our allies in the first place if you want the truth. Can you say Blue Note Records?

"Without vision the people perish." - Proverbs 29:18 If the vision isn't correct, it isn't vision but myopia or perhaps even blindness. When the blind lead the blind, they both fall off the cliff. Can you say Alan Greenspan?

The entire future of intellectual property is in flux (as is everything else in the world) and will probably wind up in a different configuration than we are accustomed to seeing.

I don't know about you, but I don't care anymore about commercially advertising radio than I do black and white television or silent movies. I'm too busy promoting my brand across cyberspace and I suggest it would behoove us all to do likewise to the extend that we can look ahead and not backward.

Please add your opinions to this discussion and see what happens.

Swing on,

Nelson
==================================================================================
LAZY BIRD, ARISE!
Re: Blue Note CDP 7-85177-2
Can be recited or sung to "Lazy Bird" by John Coltrane, Jowcol Music - BMI
Lyrics by Nelson E. Harrison, Timeslice Music/Mayah Publishing - ASCAP

Time for you to wake up,
Lazy bird, there's a sun on the rise…
There's a cause to take up,
Lazy bird, keep your eye on the prize…

(Bridge)
The early bird catches the worms…
The lazy bird fetches the germs…

Wasted time you'll make up,
Lazy bird, if you wing to the skies…

***
You were born to be free,
Lazy bird, time to rise off the fence…
Raise your sights and you'll see
What your claim on the skies represents…

(Bridge)
Don't settle for less than you are…
There is no lid on the jar…

When you're flying carefree
Open skies are your true residence…
Accomplishments… will commence…
When… you… get… up… and… fly.

Author Copyright © 1998 - 2009 by Nelson E. Harrison, ASCAP PAu 2-413-092
All rights Reserved without Prejudice
Article 1 Constitution of the United States and 1-207 U.C.C.

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Comment by Ed Skirtich on February 22, 2009 at 3:44am
Hi Nelson,

I really dig what you wrote.

I'm really blessed though that you can share your musical abilities and knowledge to the Jazz Workshop, Inc. Outreach Programs and Family Night Concerts.

Musically,
Ed Skirtich
Artistic Director/Jazz Workshop, Inc.
ejskirtich@comcast.net
(412) 422-4149 (H)
(412) 841-8046 (C)
Comment by Stephen Shannon on February 22, 2009 at 3:43am
I think Mr. Easley has a point about pleasing the crowd, and I also agree that musician should talk more about the making of their music in public instead of shrouding it in mystery. I'm young, I'm stupid, and maybe I'm wrong about this, but keeping a mentality that people are supposed to stumble upon Miles album or whatever and figure out that you're supposed to learn them by ear to play jazz doesn't really attract people to this music. Most people need a nudge in that direction, in the same way people don't play soccer or become writers without that nudge, and one illustration of this that comes to mind is the fact that out of all the musicians I know that are roughly my age (which is maybe 10? probably less), perhaps a couple of them don't have musician parents, myself included. Is this really meant to be something solely passed down from parent to son? Miles Davis' dad was a dentist. Again, this is probably the ramblings of a young fool, but that's my two cents.
Comment by Marva Josie on February 22, 2009 at 1:08am
Dear Nelson - Its been a long time coming and finally it has arrived. That is exactly how I choose to imagine and think of it. We must - and I will continue to plan and accomplish all that the Good Lord allows during the months and years ahead - i.e. the promotion and embracing of our illustrious and truly historical profession, to which I and so many others have dedicated their lives. I have been so fortunate to have experienced the grand days of the period of which you speak and I can testify that we, as a whole, have allowed much of what you addressed, to slowly slip away. I look forward to the days when education and dedication will once again rise and give opportunity for young people to gain the knowledge of who a Earl 'Fatha' Hines, Harry James, Benny Goodman, John Coltrane, Sarah Vaughan, Count Basie and so many other greats were and just how they came to be noted in history books. Until an appreciation is nurtured into these young minds, the giants of today and their music will not be noticed, respected or applauded. If we choose not to take up the task and promote our beloved music (past and the present) we may, as a group, deprive the future of our illustrious and truly historical profession. You can't know what you don't hear or see. Marva Josie
Comment by Bill Easley on February 22, 2009 at 12:20am
I am in agreement with much of what has been posted. Just wanted to add that we often leave things behind that made us what we are. We use to play for the people. It was our job to make them happy and if we didn't they would surely come up and let us know that they didn't like what we were doing. People walked in and challenged us; "Make me feel good right now!!" They had a need to feel good. They had worked hard all day and all week. They didn't have toys at home to make them feel good. As of late I see young musicians on the bandstand trying to figure out what they are going to play next. What key is that in? What is the first chord in the bridge? Hum the melody to me? Let's play some math problems that we like but really can't play. The people would have run them out of the joints "back in the day" And I don't mean last June.
Very little thought goes to, what would move these people right now? I really believe that if you touch people you can take them wherever you want. Without the initial connection, they don't listen, they don't have a good time, they don't like "JAZZ" they don't come back. Cannonball sure knew how to make a connection and take them on a journey.
Comment by Yve Evans on February 21, 2009 at 10:51pm
Dear Nelson,
I have forwarded your written words and transparent passion to every jazz musicians' address that I possess! After many years in the radio biz as an announcer, newscaster and finally a program director...and as an avid radio listener and supporter, even now; I can imagine the tenor of your voice and the speed of your keystoke as you dictate your metabolized thoughts to cyberspace. In agreement, with all commentary before me, I must also add that here on the Left Coast, there has been a resurgence of listening rooms. These venues have been encouraged, booked and performed in by jazz musicians...who knew??!! They are promoted with print ads but the internet subscriber base keeps these venues full. LIVE music. Technology has permeated virtually everything we Left Coasters do to promote our offerings and also makes our world smaller through networking. Bravo...bravo and AMEN, Brother! Yve
Comment by Mick Karolac on February 21, 2009 at 10:44pm
Dr, Nelson,

Your insight and daring with words is refreshing!!! WONDERFUL.
I am fired up from them, thank you!!

I am not a 'jazz musician' like many here - just a jazz lover really, and I am a freak that lives to go wild on a djembe.
At one time, and in the midst of many years of playing rock and roll drums with "give me a break" bands in rinky-dink bars, I had some kind of odd fantasy of being a professional musician - someday - when I grew up.

Well, I have grown up - at least in relation to years on the planet - and I have abandoned the fantasy of playing music professionally.It is all-good.

I am now on a different journey altogether, one that is much bigger for me than the prospect of playing music for a living would have been!!!
Yee haw.

What I am getting to is this: your WAKE UP, was a powerful reminder for me that indeed we all sometimes need to hear that. Maybe we need to hear that a lot.
Thank you for advocating wakefulness!

WAKE UP
WAKE UP
WAKE UP,
---

.... whether it be music, and the prospects of really getting down and dirty with it, whether it be ushering in a new future (OBAMA all the way baby!!!!) and a new society and culture in this country, or even the day to day relations and conditions in our own community.... yes...WAKE UP!!!!

Right now, personally, I am over my head.
I am undergoing an advanced college education in order to get the training to create a career for myself that is FAR beyond anything I have ever envisioned for myself.
(Briefly, I plan to go into community organizing, and in the bigger picture, I am committed to work on one of the biggest problems we have in this country: Race relations/inequality - especially black and white relations!)

I am awakened.

I am awakened and I am relatively clueless as to exactly how my future path will unfold.
As well, a huge part of the time, in the back of my mind, I am saying to myself,"OMG, what am I thinking?" -- "What if...blah blah blah?" --- and: "... but who am I to be the one...?" --- bottom line is that I know I am WAKED UP (!) by the fact that I am completely outside of any comfort zone I have known.
My future is uncertain as hell, my day-to-day feels like I am at the edge of not even being able to keep it together (school), yet I am more ALIVE than I have ever been in my 40 something years on this planet.

I have taken on a game for myself (though not quite sports, it is all related, as everything is ultimately a game on some level) and in playing it, I have gone from being in the stands looking on, assessing the action, all that BS --> to being an active participant, someone with something to say about how things are going in my life and all around me, --- and I now have power that I never knew I had.

The secret is to WAKE UP.

No one can tell anyone else exactly what that looks like for them.
Only we can see that for ourselves.
But Dr Nelson,
I am with you on the level of let’s do it - the time is ripe now, (always now, right?)

Jazz...
Relationships...
Your family....
The bigger world at large... each of us has a say.

What is needed is to once more: yes--->

WAKE UP and have that say.
I am talking, Dr Nelson, you are talking, are the rest of us loudly having our say?
Are YOU talking?

Thanks!
Mick Karolac,

(djembe player. Current and Future World Changer!)
hahaha

Here is one of my favorite quotes of all time:

"Be brave enough to live life creatively.

The creative is the place where no one else has ever been.

You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition.

You can’t get there by bus, only by hard work and risk and by not quite knowing what you’re doing.

What you’ll discover will be wonderful, what you’ll discover will be yourself."

- Alan Alda
Comment by Ken Lamison on February 21, 2009 at 10:20pm
Nelson,
Well said. I've long thought it's time for a new paradigm. At one point, musicians traveled to private residences to perform their art for their employers' listening and dancing pleasure. Prior to Edison, it was the ONLY was to hear music. At some point, live music took on the role as a soundscape to the club scene where people came to socialize, smoke and drink. That scene has changed radically, with smoking laws, DWI enforcement and the advent of home theater systems. I recall a time when every hotel had a band in the lounge six nights a week. Those lounges have been replaced by fitness spas As for the carpetbaggers, a musician friend told me "once Pennsylvania gets those casinos in place, bands will be working again". My response was "never depend on a politician for a gig". The internet is a great tool, and allows listeners to directly access music they like. Just like Linux has cut into the Microsoft monopoly, internet radio will supplant a segment of the terrestrial radio bandwidth. Realize that five years from now, we will be involved daily with some technology as yet unseen. Just like email, cellphone cameras, You Tube, or text messages became ubiquitous, so will some other innovation. Why shouldn't it be a musical breakthrough?
Ken

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