DARLA CASTRO, 80, on Aug. 12 in Three Rivers, California. Wife of Charlie Castro, longtime drummer with the High Sierra Jazz Band. She often traveled with the band and was well known and liked by many fans on the festival circuit. She worked for 27 years for the Valley Oak Credit Union, retiring as Executive Vice President. Known for her sharp long-term memory which enabled her to do crossword puzzles in pen.
Lew Shaw started writing about music as the publicist for the famous Berkshire Music Barn in the 1960s. He joined the West Coast Rag in 1989 and has been a guiding light to this paper through the two name changes since then as we grew to become The Syncopated Times. 47 of his profiles of today's top musicians are collected in Jazz Beat: Notes on Classic Jazz. Volume two, Jazz Beat Encore: More Notes on Classic Jazz contains 43 more! Lew taps his extensive network of connections and friends throughout the traditional jazz world to bring us his Jazz Jottings column every month.
