{"id":238,"date":"2006-01-19T15:00:12","date_gmt":"2006-01-19T23:00:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/?p=238"},"modified":"2006-01-19T15:00:45","modified_gmt":"2006-01-19T23:00:45","slug":"iaje-nea-a-4-bar-intro","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/?p=238","title":{"rendered":"IAJE & NEA: A 4-Bar Intro"},"content":{"rendered":"

Each year, the kick-off event to the IAJE conference is a Gala Dinner (black-ie optional). During the affair, the primary purpose of which is to thank the convention sponsors and major IAJE donors, awards are given, and a student ensemble (the Clifford Brown – Stan Getz Fellowship All-Stars) provides musical entertainment. Cocktails were followed by dinner in the Trianon Ballroom. John wore his tux and we were seated at the host table with Nancy Wilson, IAJE President\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Award honoree Clark Terry and his wife, Gwen, NEA Chairman Dana Gioia, and IAJE President David Caffey. Across the room I spotted George Wein and Jesse Jackson, the latter in town to eulogize Lou Rawls. <\/p>\n

It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s all about seeing and being seen, and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s often the only opportunity to see folks who are on hand for the convention but who you might not otherwise see because of conflicting schedules. For us, those hellos included composer and band leader Maria Schneider (an amazingly talented young lady who I had the privilege of managing for five years), Doc Severinsen, bassist John Clayton, and pianist Mike Wolff. Nancy introduced all the Jazz Masters past and present, getting predictably emotional when she spoke about John, who has not only been her manager but also the steadiest and most reliable force in her life for nearly fifty years, through ups and downs, births, deaths, and marriages. Two nights later at the NEA Concert and Award Ceremony she would say “John Levy is one of the most special men I have ever known in my life. I want to thank him for being my father. I want to thank him for being the man who made me.”<\/p>\n

When Nancy introduced the five high school student all-stars she set the bar high, suggesting that they would have to be really good to hold their own with the Sisters in Jazz Collegiate All-Stars. Perhaps it was an unfair contest to pit high-school against college, but something worth striving for. Sad to say, in my not so humble opinion, this year\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s young men were not up to the challenge \u00e2\u20ac\u201c they had plenty of technique, but little else. The usual excuse given for such a weak ensemble performance is that the group had little if any opportunity to work together, but I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t buy it. Jazz is not a solo sport, and it seems to me that young players today are either not taught to listen, or they are not interested in the art of listening \u00e2\u20ac\u201c everyone was way too busy showing off their chops.<\/p>\n

After a video segment featuring one of his inimitable performances of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Mumbles\u00e2\u20ac\u009d \u00e2\u20ac\u201c a hilarity that never fails to amuse and delight no matter how many times it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s been heard \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Clark Terry walked onstage looking very dapper, right down to his blue patterned shoes. (Perhaps alligator?). He has received so many proclamations, citations, city keys, and hall-of-fame inductions, not to mention multiple honorary doctorates, three Grammy nominations, the French Medal of Honor, and a German knighthood, that the IAJE award might have seemed a small thing, but not to CT. He was truly moved, and so was the audience.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Each year, the kick-off event to the IAJE conference is a Gala Dinner (black-ie optional). During the affair, the primary purpose of which is to thank the convention sponsors and major IAJE donors, awards are given, and a student ensemble (the Clifford Brown – Stan Getz Fellowship All-Stars) provides musical entertainment. Cocktails were followed by … Continue reading “IAJE & NEA: A 4-Bar Intro”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-238","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-jazz-ears"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=238"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=238"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=238"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=238"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}