Features

Good friend, wise mentor, engaged and storied musicianer, active community leader, strong role model, curator and caretaker of jazz, spirited character: Jim Cullum. This is

The music teaching career of Peter Davis began when he was hired as the warden at the Colored Waif’s Boys Home in New Orleans and

I’ve written a lot about how jazz is portrayed in film, but never paid specific attention to how we jazz trumpet players have been portrayed.

During the 20th Century music became big business, but the 21st Century may lead us back to an older mode of existence for artists. In

Times are tough for school music programs, and for print publications. Here’s an idea that can help with both. Now you can buy a half

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance offers us one of American film’s great moments. U.S. Senator Ransom Stoddard (James Stewart) has gained his position of

Soon we’ll come to the end of life’s journey,And perhaps we’ll never meet anymore;Till we gather in Heaven’s bright city,Far away on that beautiful shore.

Pioneering Lindy Hopper and jazz dancer Norma Miller, known as “the Queen of Swing” to modern Lindy Hoppers, passed away May 5, 2019 from degenerative

Red Allen, Tommy Ladnier, Baby and Johnny Dodds, Pops Foster and many others giged with bandleader Fate Marable, who ran the bands for the Streckfus

One of the wonderful things about jazz music is the enormous back catalogue of B-sides and rarities waiting to be rediscovered, even by long-time fans

British politicians are the bad jazz musicians of Europe. Smugly self-absorbed, they honk tone-deaf, repetitive solos out all time and tune with their confused, Continental

Teddy Wilson (November 24, 1912 – July 31, 1986) was one of the most consequential figures in jazz right when jazz was making its greatest

One of New Orleans’ most unabashedly entertaining jazz combos—the Dukes of Dixieland—started out in the late 1940s strictly as a family affair featuring brothers Frank

On Saturday evening, April 6, 2019, an enthusiastic crowd of nearly 200 welcomed organist Tony Thomas to Pittsburgh for a highly anticipated screening of Buster

Realizing that they had amassed a huge collection of important artifacts of the jazz revival, and hoping to ensure their preservation, The San Francisco Traditional

I owe a debt I can never repay to the community of African-American musicians who had settled in the Los Angeles area years ago. They

On the afternoon of February 12th, 1924 at New York City’s Aeolian Hall Paul Whiteman and his Palais Royal Orchestra held a concert billed as

When I interviewed Gerry Mulligan in 1981, he told me that his dream was to have a television show patterned after Lawrence Welk’s. An odd

In December we announced that a high school trio out of Sacramento was sending two musicians on to The Berklee School of Music. We were

Over the past 70 or so years, traditional and swing jazz have been my primary jazz interests, beginning as a young listener in my early

‘Don’t You Feel My Leg!’ Maria Muldaur, the jug-band chanteuse who scored a surprise pop hit with 1973’s “Midnight at the Oasis,” released her 41st

When given the task of writing about a legend of ragtime, I was instantly struck by how inadequate a few words describing such a life

The Sultans of Swing It’s the Saturday before Halloween at the James Joyce Pub in Santa Barbara, and in the long narrow room with the

In our November 2018 issue, we published an essay, “Record Collecting: Where Do I Begin?” by Terri Bruce. The following is a reader’s response by

The Map In 1932, E. Simms Campbell, considered the first commercially-successful African-American illustrator, created a map of a two-block area of Harlem between Lenox Avenue

Campaign songs became increasingly important with the rise of sheet music from about 1840. The recording era made them even more accessible to the people.

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly About seventy years ago when I was a young teen and a precocious collector of jazz, my mom

The Harlem Renaissance was a cultural, social, and artistic explosion that took place in Harlem, New York and spanned the 1920s into the mid-1930s. It

I’m standing in my favorite flea-markety antiques store panicking a little as I stare at milk crates filled with used records. My husband and I

Dan Barrett shares some of his experiences in playing with legendary trombonist Spiegle Willcox (1903-99) and gives insight as to the interplay among musicians while

A Young Jazz Fan in the French Quarter Ask anyone what street comes to mind when they think of Dixieland jazz and the response, usually,

An Enlightened Jazz Era The Berkshires of Western Massachusetts with its historic landmarks, museums, and performing arts venues have long been a vacation mecca for

Don Suhor spent all but two of his 55 years as a jazz clarinetist and alto saxophonist in his native New Orleans, playing Dixieland and

(What you sow, so shall you reap) While still a high school tuba player I discovered that I could play along with Elvis Presley records

For more than four decades former Stan Kenton lead-trumpeter Mike Vax has traveled the United States and overseas preaching and playing the Jazz Gospel. So

For what, and by whom, you may ask, is Irving Berlin owed an apology? Glad you asked. In the immortal but likely apocryphal words of

“Dancing is poetry with arms and legs.” (Charles Baudelaire) “I can’t feel my legs…” (Ross Konikoff) A few weeks ago I was in a pretty

Circus Culture is alive and well. Young creatives have taken to learning the trades of the sideshow as well as the entertainments of the center ring. Acrobats

This is a special year for Denver’s Queen City Jazz Band. It’s their diamond anniversary, which means they have been entertaining jazz fans for the

While mourning the loss of leader Tony Pringle, the band plays on Cornetist Tony Pringle always told his bandmates in the New Black Eagle Jazz

Tony Pringle was a founding member, cornetist, vocalist, and musical leader of the Boston-based New Black Eagle Jazz Band. Originally from Liverpool, England, he was

Reporting on Dick Hyman’s multi-faceted career is like inscribing a poem on a pinhead. His autobiography is, in effect, “published” in many audio, video, print

One of the few women-only college level jazz programs is coming to an end. The jazz program at Spelman College, a historically black institution for

At the time of his passing, in 2000, Milt “The Judge” Hinton was considered by both fans and fellow musicians the Dean of Jazz bassists.

In these times of heated partisanship this paper tries to be an oasis of unity around a shared musical interest. It’s with some hesitation I even

When I came to be associated with this paper I brought with me an assumption that my obsession with vinyl records and 78s would be

I was twenty-two years old, on my first trip to Europe with a now-legendary band called the Sunset Music Company. People often ask me for

With the continual announcements regarding jazz societies and festivals shutting down, it would appear that the good ship TradJazz is sailing in turbulent waters. But

Located just off of Interstate 5 in Carlsbad, California, 30 miles north of San Diego, the Museum of Making Music describes itself as the only

Joe Bebco’s article (“What Is To Be Done?” March 2018) resonated strongly with me. As someone whose deepest sense of jazz’s immediacy and importance was