Features

I was eleven years old when I hit one of Life’s lotteries, and began playing the trombone. I thought it might be fun. Because of

This Jazz Age tale takes you from the streets of South Philly and the Boardwalk of Atlantic City to the nightclubs, vaudeville palaces, pool halls,

I’ve been attending jazz parties and festivals for twenty years, and each one has its own character. So to call one “the best” would be

Over the five fascinating years I’ve been interviewing jazz musicians, a curious trend has emerged. It has interested, confounded and occasionally annoyed me—the last probably

If you never heard of Porter Brown and only skimmed the broad strokes of his biography, he might seem like an obscure sideman whose life

Fumi Tomita is Associate Professor of Jazz Pedagogy and Performance at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. He is the author of The Jazz Rhythm Section:

I could be the wrong person to report on a ragtime festival. My first piano hero was Teddy Wilson, so the crowd at the Scott

Like most pianists who have devoted their lives to ragtime and early jazz, they remember the precise moment—and maybe even the exact work—when they first

Olli Soikkeli is from a family of nonmusicians. His parents, however, tried to interest his two older brothers in playing some instruments, but the only

There’s probably no better memorial to the legacy of legendary producer Michael Cuscuna than the release, expected in June, of a seven-CD set titled Classic

“Mommy, the Bix Beiderbecke jazz festival is coming up soon. . . can we go, please?” I pleaded with my fingers crossed. I had heard

In recent years, the song “Lift Every Voice and Sing” has reentered the public consciousness. Depending on who is telling the story, the work is

Just a few weeks before his death at age 75, Willis Conover had still been doing what he had done for more than four decades—spreading

There is only one seven-piece New Orleans-style jazz band with a steady gig in New York City—the High Society New Orleans Jazz Band, co-led by

I’m sure I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again anyway: the true joy of vinyl is not so much having some superlative sonic

NOTE: This is an edited excerpt of the interview I did with Steve Provizer after reading his new book, As Long As They Can Blow:

NASA hasn’t perfected the robot that would be the ideal reviewer for a jazz festival like the Jazz Bash by the Bay in Monterey, California,

1924 found America deep in the Jazz Age with speakeasies, bootleggers, and hot jazz as the soundtrack. Calvin Coolidge was president (winning re-election in November),

Hal Smith: Well, Brother Kevin…It seems like forever since we “talked shop” for an article in The Syncopated Times. Before another year slips away, what

YouTube is just full of surprises, isn’t it? For instance, today I learned that there’s a channel called Electro Swing Thing, which recently uploaded a

Traditional jazz and ragtime are back in St. Louis these days and as vibrant and joyful as in the days when the Goldenrod Showboat graced

Multi-keyboardist Dick Hyman, born March 8, 1927, will turn 97 years old this month. With a prolific career behind him he’s no longer performing publicly,

From the 1920s to the 1940s my great uncle Harry Berman had a multifaceted career as a performer on stage, screen, records, and radio. His