RIP Art D'Lugoff, owner of the Village Gate.

--Salsa Vs. Latin Jazz: One of Art D'Lugoff's most well-known productions at the Village Gate was the Salsa Meets Jazz series. In an odd coincidence, earlier this week Chip Boaz wrote about the fine line between salsa and Latin jazz. In his characterization, salsa enjoys a predominantly Afro-Cuban heritage geared toward dancing and commercial appeal, while Latin jazz is oriented more toward risky personal expression and a diverse set of influences from traditional jazz to pan-Latin folkloric musics. Of course, a series like Salsa Meets Jazz is designed to entertain by blurring those lines, but Boaz still sees a value in the separate classification. Do you? (Related: a 2008 New York Times piece on D'Lugoff returning to Le Poisson Rouge, the club which now occupies the Village Gate's old space, to guest curate a new Salsa Meets Jazz series.)

--Words, Words, Words: Peter Hum writes on some slippery words abused in jazz writing. As anyone who has ever written about this music before knows, it's difficult to avoid slipping into cliches and potentially-loaded terms for the sake of convenience. (Hum follows up with the point that one can't just write "dude was killin' last night!" and expect that to be meaningful.) Some usual suspects are discussed here: "modern," "voice," "risky," "accessible," etc. Since I could go on about this at length, I'll stop myself at the term "avant-garde." Salim Washington has an interesting essay related to the idea of a permanent avant-garde, revolving around Charles Mingus.

--How To Get To Sesame Street: How to explain all the jazz on Sesame Street over its 40 years? Like, to the tune of Wynton and Branford, Tito Puente, George Benson, Herbie Hancock, Diana Krall, Ray Barretto and Cab Calloway? Perhaps it might be noted that the show has always been modeled after and filmed in New York City.

--Spinal Tap On Jazz: As David Brent Johnson notes, "I guess they've turned their backs on it since Jazz Odyssey."

In reading over yesterday's Billie Holiday discussion, I was reminded of these three photographs of Holiday and her dog, Mister. There's also, of course, this.

Perhaps I was thinking about these shots in light of two Exclusive First Listens we've had up at NPR Music recently: one featuring the new effort from Nellie McKay, the other -- available now -- featuring Norah Jones' The Fall. Ahem:

How much is that doggie in that album cover? (courtesy of Blue Note and Verve Records)

McKay and Jones both like jazz, work with traditionally jazz-oriented record labels and are frequently described as having something about them that is jazz-inflected -- something "jazzy." (I've got nothing against their music, I might add.) They're also both into large canines, apparently.

From a jazz fan's perspective, you could look at their successes in a glass half-empty sort of way. Why is it that these singers, who draw on some sonic tropes associated with jazz, are significantly more successful than their contemporaries who more completely embrace jazz ideas?

But you could also look at McKay and Jones as a good portent for jazz. In 2009, where jazz occupies some 1-3% of U.S. record sales, evoking jazz -- or even just being labeled "jazzy" -- can still help win you widespread success.

Food for thought -- or are we barking up the wrong tree?

If Billie Holiday doesn't get chosen for 50 Great Voices, at least one blogger won't be happy. (William Gottlieb/Redferns)

My boss readily admits that she doesn't know a whole lot about jazz. But she lets me write all this nonsense on the Internet, so I'm not complaining. And at least she's willing to learn. So every week -- or at least as often as possible -- she and I get together to listen to and Instant Message about a different great jazz song.

We at NPR Music recently launched a project we're calling 50 Great Voices, and I've been thinking about which jazz singers I'd put in that list. The last Listening Party we had spotlighted a great vocalist in Ella Fitzgerald; this week, I thought I might feature another pantheon-level talent in Billie Holiday. Specifically, I wanted to feature one of the many great recordings she made with musical soulmate Lester Young.

"Without Your Love," from Billie Holiday, Lady Day: The Master Takes And Singles (Columbia/Legacy). Billie Holiday, vocals; Buck Clayton, trumpet; Lester Young, tenor saxophone; Edmond Hall, clarinet; James Sherman, piano; Freddie Green, guitar; Walter Page, bass; Jo Jones, drums. New York, N.Y.: Jun. 15, 1937.

Purchase: Amazon.com / Amazon MP3 / iTunes

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Boss Lady: Another singer!

me: And a voice I'm sure you recognize too.

Boss Lady: Well, her voice sounds very familiar, and I happened to see her name on the CD jacket...

me: Well, right. Billie Holiday, ladies and gentlemen.
But I want to start this at the very beginning. What's the first thing you hear?

me: What happens to that horn when Billie starts singing? That tenor saxophone.

Boss Lady: It seems to be providing a running commentary on the melody as it flows by. She sings a phrase, then the sax riffs off of it a bit. Kind of a duet, but the sax is letting the singer have center stage.
The sax has a kind of wistful, mournful sound...

me: Whoever it is is a very active accompanist, right? Always adding to the vocals, but never stepping over them.
Notice that after the piano solo and trumpet solo, he's back again, playing backup to Billie.

Boss Lady: Should I be surprised? I mean, she IS the main event.

me: No, not really. It's just that we've encountered this guy before.

Boss Lady: oh no

me: The very first of these listening parties, in fact -- he was a lot bolder and out in front.
His name is Lester Young, and though he could be full of energy and bounce and life, he was a magnificent accompanist too.

Boss Lady: Oh now I remember!
I can see how having Lester Young there makes it easier for her to sing long notes and keep the music moving forward.

me: Sure. That melding of textures is just so seamless -- he with the most tasteful of statements, she with the languid, held phrasing.
His recordings with Billie Holiday are really showcases for how to back up a singer.

Boss Lady: It's funny, her vibrato is sometimes very similar to the vibrato on the sax

me: There's a lot in common about Lester Young and Billie Holiday -- they were responsible for each others nicknames, by the way. "Pres" and "Lady Day."

Boss Lady: Really? How did that happen?

me: Billie Holiday sang for the Count Basie band for some time, which Lester was a star in. That, and the record producer here knew of both talents, and thought to bring Lester into several recording sessions of Billie's. So they were friends for a long time.
But anyway, as you said: she is the main event.
What of it? How do you characterize her voice?

Boss Lady: I'm always surprised by the timbre of her voice.

me: How so?

Boss Lady: You could describe it in ways that would seem unflattering, but are actually part of her charm. For instance, she sounds kind of nasal and tight to me when she's up high, but it also pierces and is full of emotion.

me: It's totally her own, right? A very jazz idea, having your own "sound" -- and perhaps even with physical limitations, but you always work around those.
Miles wasn't as fast a trumpeter as Dizzy; Duke Ellington wasn't as good at piano as Art Tatum. That just meant they had to figure out something different to do -- and they did.
For instance, compare this to what we listened to last week. Is there any vocal improvising?

Boss Lady: Doesn't sound like it ...

me: Right, there's no scat singing. Lots of vocal embellishment to the melody, but not in the same way as Ella, right?

Boss Lady: What strikes me about this song, is that there's this persistent note that she sings, pretty high ... it sounds like a complaint! The whole song hangs on that note that she sings over and over again. When she's on that note, her voice is very piercing and thin, but there's no vibrato on it.
The words on that note are "Without Your Love..." Do you hear what I'm talking about?

me: I do. That note speaks volumes, I think.

Boss Lady: Do tell.

me: Well, only in what you make of it. Some people hear pain, abuse, suffering in her voice. Later in her life, with her biography in mind, that's a possible interpretation.

Boss Lady: So you could say she's meeting the pain very directly, and that's one of the things that makes her so compelling.

me: Yea, sure. But this whole suffering artist thing, while relevant, is overplayed.
I only know that she takes what was probably a pretty generic arrangement of a popular song and stylizes it heavily.

Boss Lady: Right, but her singing is not about being silky smooth. I'm impressed by how honest she sounds. How what she sings seems true.

me: Well, it's not as if she's not true to herself and how she feels like expressing the words.

Boss Lady: Well it's got to be more than that. A lot of people are true to themselves but they're not as good at making other people believe what they're saying.

me: I don't know the mystery of what makes some great voices more compelling than others. I just know that what she does here works for me, and has for so many other people.
What you're wondering seems like the science question of How vs. Why.
Science answers How. Why is a bigger question, much more mysterious.
If you asked me How Billie Holiday is compelling, I'd tell you that it's some blend of phrasing, certain overtones, rock-solid accompanists and some hazily understood mythology.
She's forcing the issue: with that high note you mentioned, and with all her creative use of time -- it seems like the tempo is slower for her than everyone else.

Boss Lady: That's an interesting way to put it ... she packs more into each moment than most? It's true that almost no moment seems tossed off or thrown away.

me: Technically, she's starting earlier, holding longer and ending later than the original melody calls for. One phrase thus seems to flow into the next.
Why that gets us? Why she hits us as ringing so true? Good question.

Boss Lady: Well, some day maybe you'll aspire to answer life's mysteries!

me: Doubt it.

Even John McNeil's press shot is Old School -- or he just hasn't bothered to get a new one taken recently. (courtesy of the artist)

After a swing through New York in early October, I reported on my disappointment at missing trumpeter John McNeil's weekly gig in Park Slope, Brooklyn. I saw no indication on the venue's or artist's Web sites that McNeil wouldn't be there, and even though I still got to see some good music, I left a little miffed.

Yesterday, I got an e-mail from John -- how did he get my personal address? I wonder -- where he was completely apologetic and humbled that I would bother to come up from D.C to see him play. He says that he told the club about his absence, his first in six months, well in advance; he also says that he's 61 and that "I am just learning my way around cyberspace or whatever." (He said "cyberspace"! And used my favorite "or whatever" construction!) He also sends an e-mail newsletter that I'm not on yet. And he signed off as "Johnny Mac." I kind of want him as my uncle.

Still, I think that you jazz musicians and venues out there right now have it really easy, compared to, I dunno, 1987. You can let fans know where you're going to be playing for the cost of an Internet connection and a few minutes every so often.

So let's help John out -- along with everyone else out there who doesn't list his or her own gigs online. Musicians: which services allow you to do this quickly and painlessly? How do you self-promote? Do you hire someone to do it for you? And fans: how do you find out about performances by artists you like? Sharing is caring, guys.

By the way, McNeil also mentioned that he is recording again with saxophonist Bill McHenry (ooh! ooh!) during the post-Thanksgiving weekend. (They're playing two nights live at the Cornelia Street Cafe, if you're in New York). Given the first album the quartet made, 2008's Rediscovery, I would recommend paying attention to the result.

In New Orleans, you can run a Jazz Half Marathon. (I smell an "In Soviet Russia" obverse joke coming on.)

--Another Student Complains About Jazz Education: Marc Myers at JazzWax recently received an e-mail from a music student who lamented his experience at "a rather prestigious university in New York with a world-class jazz program." The student was concerned that his teachers were pushing him toward modern music, and that his fellow students weren't interested in learning, say, Erroll Garner or Oscar Peterson. He also says that his peers are hesitant to discuss the role of emotion, and prize that which is somehow emotionlessly "interesting" instead. (A similar point is made by this guy, whose rant I wrote about here.)

The way this student writes makes it seem like being interested in modern, somewhat free improvisation is diametrically opposed to studying classic recordings, which house the true heart of emotion in jazz. That's a patently absurd dichotomy. Now, if teachers really are pushing only one "bag" -- like, a specific toolkit of techniques -- that truly is lamentable. Teachers should be exposing people to lots of different sounds. But the music educator's job isn't to teach taste and emotion, which are well-nigh unteachable. It's to teach skills to 19-year-olds who have comparatively piddling experience in the real world of professional musicianship. It's up to those kids who actually are good enough to hack it as career musicians to take their skills and follow their own muses. And judging from recordings I've heard this year alone, there are plenty of music school graduates who have found affecting things to say in all different directions.

I don't think the anonymous student really means to say everything I've ascribed to him. This is really more of an illustrative straw man I've set up. Here's one of the growing pains of this field of ours, stuck as it is between the need to live in the present and the need to keep the past alive. And for better or for worse, we're saddled with jazz education to help us navigate that balance. (Further suggested reading: Ronan Guilfoyle defends jazz education.)

Anyway, Marc's post is also worth noting because it mentions that Herbie Hancock bought a really expensive convertible with his royalties from "Watermelon Man." Think on that for a minute. At one time, a 22-year-old jazz musician earned enough money from just one song to buy a sports car.

--Opening Bands In Jazz: Darcy James Argue went to a lot of CMJ Music Marathon shows -- and even played in one -- last week. And in his summary comments, he brings up the idea that there should be more opening acts or double bills in jazz programming. (Further commentary from David Ryshpan.) Frankly, I'd love to see much more of this when artists go on tour in the U.S. Rather than two sets, why not one long set plus one or two openers (which could be interesting local bands)? But as Argue notes, it's of course a (lack of) money issue. It's the Catch-22 of jazz: it needs more "here, you might like this" to a mass audience. It also can't afford to do that.

--iRealBook, The iPhone App: It exists! And it was developed by a serious jazz musician too -- you may know bassist Massimo Biolcati from Lionel Loueke's band (or the more collaborative Gilfema+2 offshoot), or from his own debut record Persona.

--50 Great Voices: Woo! Flash interactive! Vote for jazz singers! And other singers too!

1. The news of Roy DeCarava's death is old news in Internet years, but his photographs live on. NPR's The Picture Show blog put together a nice gallery of images; Fresh Air aired a 1996 interview; and a remembrance ran on Weekend Edition. Here's a man who this blog's readership may know primarily as a jazz photographer, and a black man who broke through in fine art. But his vision was much broader than shooting glossies of musicians. He shot his own, cherished community with the once-radical notion that it too could comprise the subject matter of art -- and that deserves to be remembered.

2. Trumpeter Ambrose Akinmusire was probably going to be discovered whether he had won the Thelonious Monk Competition in 2007 or not. But it certainly opened some doors for him -- including a quintet gig last year at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. JazzSet was there recording, and has highlights in last week's episode. There's a lot to like about the directness and focus of his tone -- when he doesn't admit all sorts of other interesting effects into it -- and it comes with a powerful imagination to match. Everyone in the band sounds equally hungry to find something unique to say -- sometimes all at once -- making for that rich flavor that emerges from the best modern post-bop.

3. Ramsey Lewis will forever be remembered here in Washington, D.C. for The In Crowd. That 1965 album was recorded live at a club called Bohemian Caverns -- it's still around and still booking jazz -- which happens to be less than two miles from NPR headquarters. So we're glad to see that Jazz24 brought Lewis into a studio for a solo performance and conversation. On the set list: a new song, a standard and a Beatles tune.

4. The WBUR-produced, NPR-acquired On Point doesn't live online at NPR.org, but it did book pianist Matthew Shipp and buzzed-about biographer Robin D.G. Kelley to talk about Thelonious Monk's legacy. Check it out here, with an accompanying blog post. I think Shipp puts it well in saying that "Monk offers an infinity of responses." And watch out for more on Kelley's new book in this space soon ...

Philly Joe Jones vants to suck your blood. (courtesy of Concord Music Group)

Something about the historically inextricable relationship of novelty and jazz goes here.

Quoth Philly Joe Jones -- "the bebop vampire" -- in an awkwardly long, but ultimately-endearing-in-a-delightfully-tacky sort of way: "The children of the night make such beautiful music."

Happy Halloween everyone.

"Blues For Dracula," from Philly Joe Jones, Blues For Dracula (Riverside). Jones, drums; Nat Adderley, cornet; Julian Priester, trombone; Johnny Griffin, tenor saxophone; Tommy Flanagan, piano; Jimmy Garrison, bass. New York, N.Y.: Sept. 17, 1958.

Purchase: Amazon.com / Amazon MP3 / iTunes

Happy birthday to the memory of Clifford Brown.

--The Jazz Internet In Pittsburgh: I recently received an e-mail from reader Greg Runco, a video producer and jazz fan in Pittsburgh, Penn. Runco, 24, wrote in to share a few episodes of a documentary-style WebTV series he's been creating and posting in weekly installments on YouTube. According to him, there's a jam session every Monday at the AVA Bar and Lounge in Pittsburgh -- a cross-generational experience with some of the city's top musicians -- and he's been filming the performances and talking to the artists. Jazz needs more of this. You can find all of it so far, plus deleted scenes and other extras, at Runco's YouTube channel. For now, here's the first part of the first episode, with tape of house band the Interval Trio performing (Herbie Hancock's "Tell Me A Bedtime Story," I believe):

--The Art Of The Saxophone Trio: It's been observed by several folks that recent times have seen a glut of really good saxophone trio recordings. You could say that about pianoless trios in general, but saxophone-bass-drums especially: Marcus Strickland, Fly, Donny McCaslin, JD Allen ... and that's just in the "sorta straight-ahead" purview. (Related: JD Allen, whose Shine! easily makes my top 10 of 2009, recorded live at the Village Vanguard.) To that end, Willard Jenkins asked a few questions of Allen, Strickland and Jaleel Shaw about the whys and wherefores of it all. Dig this bit from Allen:

When I'm playing in this configuration (saxophone/bass/drums), I feel more connected to Black American Music. The beat and the bass line seem to come into the forefront in a trio situation. I never felt it was a non-traditional route playing with just the bass and drums, I actually felt like I was linking up more to Urban American music. When I listen to James Brown or Mos Def, I am not listening for chord changes from a piano. I am listening to their delivery (the flow), the beat (drums) and the bass lines (bass).

Everyone also mentions that Sonny Rollins' pianoless trio work was a jumping-off point for them -- as well they should.

--Is There Virtue In Virtuosity?: This is basically an extended PopMatters review of new records from the Chris Potter Underground and an all-star band featuring James Carter. But it's predicated around the idea that virtuosity can be a bad thing in jazz: it can make the music cold and rootless. Writer (and occasional NPR contributor) Will Layman takes Potter and Carter, two of today's most prominent saxophone virtuosos, to task for new album offerings. He ultimately concludes in the artists' favor -- but he does raise an interesting question in the process: with jazz education cranking out more technically flawless players than ever, how is that affecting the sound of modern jazz?

--The Early And The Late "Lou" Armstrong: Here's a 1929 handbill advertising a performance by the Carroll Dickerson band, featuring the "World's Greatest Trumpet Player," a youthful, smiling "Lou Armstrong." (from Mule Walk & Jazz Talk) And here is Louis Armstrong in 1970 singing Pharoah Sanders' "The Creator Has A Master Plan." If you're wondering WTF, that's the same reaction Destination: OUT had when they posted it.

Mike Reed's publicity photograph makes it abundantly clear that Chicago is cold. (courtesy of the artist)

Chicago-based drummer Mike Reed** has a new album out with his People, Places & Things quartet. It's called About Us, and it's a doozy.

The first PPT album, 2008's Proliferation, mostly reconfigured gems written by Chicago jazz musicians in the mid-late '50s, many of them snatched from the brink of ultimate obscurity (Tommy "Madman" Jones?). About Us is full of originals, though. It features top-shelf Chicago guest artists like David Boykin, Jeb Bishop and Jeff Parker, regular bassist Jason Roebke and the bad-meaning-good front line of Tim Haldeman and Greg Ward (tenor and alto saxes, respectively). Because there's no chordal instrument, the rhythmic flow swings rough and unfettered, and the saxophonists weave in and out of each others' solos with thrilling dynamism.

But what I want to write about here is the song most unlike its neighbors. Have a listen:

"First Reading: Paul's Letter To The Ephesians," from Mike Reed's People, Places & Things, About Us (482 Music). Mike Reed, melodica; Greg Ward, alto saxophone; Tim Haldeman, tenor saxophone, Jason Roebke, bass. Chicago, Ill.: Feb.-Mar. 2009.

Purchase: 482 Music

Yea, I said it: Beautiful. If you didn't hear it through the claws-on-a-chalkboard arco bass and atonal noise exposition, I've isolated the melody for you:

Check out the way tension builds, seems to hang indefinitely, and then resolves in a most satisfactory way. And the way that all those dissonant screeches, unconventional overtones and creaky ornaments act as a sort of gauzy curtain -- but how they also occasionally reinforce harmonies. That's all before the "solo" section too -- which is another trip in itself. I can't even fully decipher what instruments are present (melodica I'm told -- are those scraped cymbals too? squeaky saxophones?) but I do know this piece literally made me stop in my tracks the first time I heard it.

It's a great example of one of my favorite phenomena in jazz: the kind of musical beauty that emerges from the conventionally ugly. That could mean fiery extended-technique saxophones, or astringent friction noises, or irregular rhythmic phrasing, or just the clatter of staggered, deliberately sloppy arrangements. But through it all, you can hear a fleeting tune shine through -- maybe only in glimpses, but that's often enough to hit the spot.

Thelonious Monk was a master at creating what seemed like clutter, then cutting through it. His ballads tend to have a jagged, improbable architecture -- one of his tunes is, of course, called "Ugly Beauty" -- but their melodies sing loud and clear. It's accentuated when he performs them solo, and he can throw in a full range of extended voicings, epileptic jabs and signature irreplicable scale runs. Try this 1969 version of "Crepuscule With Nellie," perhaps the most exemplary of this idea:

Personally, my hook into Ornette Coleman and Albert Ayler was their respective gifts for radical melodies. "Lonely Woman" and "Ghosts" don't really need more inexpert exegesis from me, though. Let's not forget Eric Dolphy either, and what he could do with a bass clarinet. Dig his complete restructuring of "God Bless The Child" -- those hypnotic repeating patterns, and those erupting fits of creative liberty, and that nasty bass timbre:

Of course, I don't know if Mike Reed had any of these predecessors in mind when he came up with "Paul's Letter To The Ephesians" -- I presume he has that depth of knowledge, but I would also presume he wasn't trying to ape Ayler or anything. Judging from the title, he probably had other inspirations too. Yet he still managed to tap that same phenomenon, of creating rough in which to find a diamond.

Beautiful songs are quite scarce, and even harder to find when they also stretch the limits of imagination and sonic tolerance. Surely I can't be the only one to have noticed it when it does appear, though. All you out there: do you have any favorite examples of unconventional but gripping beauty?

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**This isn't really a feature on Mike Reed, but you really ought to know more about him if you don't already. He's a music presenter: he directs the Pitchfork Music Festival, and helps run lots of other concert series in the Chicagoland area. He's a percussionist: he plays with all sorts of creative improvisers, and represents them as Vice Chairperson of the AACM. He's a composer and bandleader: in addition to People, Places & Things, he has a group with alto sax, vibes and cello (plus bass and drums) called Loose Assembly -- they're two records in already -- and if you check his Web site you'll see he's up to yet more projects. More Mike: NPR's Jacob Ganz caught up with a sleep-deprived Reed this summer on the last day of the Pitchfork Music Festival.

It's been a while since we finished our Jazz Now survey, asking the Jazz Internet to recommend modern jazz starter albums. But we never really wrapped it up in any authoritative way. So here are a few observations of this whole affair.

There's one more task left still: actually getting some people to listen and engage with these selections. Still in the works from this end. In the meanwhile, some thoughts on the data and the series. This grew to be quite a monster post, so I'll give you a little table of contents:

1. On The Bad Plus & Brad Mehldau
2. I See Black People
3. Different Strokes, Or, To What Audience?
4. Jazz & Not-Jazz
5. The Long Tail

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1. On The Bad Plus & Brad Mehldau

As one might have predicted, The Bad Plus and Brad Mehldau were far and away the artists mentioned most frequently by Jazz Now contributors and commenters. Personally, I'm glad to see a consensus for such genuinely talented artists. I myself listed The Bad Plus, and I really do admire Mehldau's trio records.

But I don't fully understand why so many people have latched on to these artists' recorded works as good "starter" or "gateway" albums. I surmise it has something to do with their loving jazz embraces of not-jazz -- more on that later. That can't be all of it, though. Allow me to work through some conjectures.

It's in part because of the media attention paid these guys. There was once so much coverage around TBP (remember 2003?) and Brad Mehldau ("Is Brad Mehldau the most influential jazz musician of his generation?" --Down Beat, 2007) that they both earned visible backlash. That says something about just how much they were embraced by critics and non-traditional audiences: the jazz world is usually pretty supportive of anyone with real talent, but too much commercial buzz and out come the haters. (Which is ultimately good for jazz: to have your merits debated is to be talked about in the first place.) Still, I think most of the young people who responded don't pay much attention to jazz media. Word of mouth remains the way most young people discover music, and while the press often triggers the spread of that word of mouth, plenty of Down Beat cover artists aren't well represented here too.

(As an aside, I remain unconvinced that TBP and Brad Mehldau represent "the future" of jazz, or any such nonsense hyperbole often bandied around new, original artists. The future of jazz lies in a thousand different directions, and these artists would be the first to tell you that. But that wasn't the question posed by Jazz Now, which asked people to introduce other people to modern jazz.)

It's in part because they're young. There wasn't a lot of Wayne Shorter or Chick Corea or Ornette Coleman in the polling, and I surmise that has something to do with an emphasis on youth. If you want to show someone that jazz is alive and well, you want to present younger artists. Of course, Mehldau and the members of TBP are all hovering around 40. And if we asked twenty-something music lovers to pick music that resonates with their generation, shouldn't the names skew even younger to reflect artists of their (our) generation? Sure, it takes a long time to develop a strong, original voice, and sure, artists' careers seem to be lasting longer than ever, shifting the upper boundaries of "young." (Not to say that 40 is "old" either, 'cause it ain't.) But it might be more accurate to say that these artists' popularity is due to their continued "youthiness" rather than their empirical youth.

It's in part because white artists have always enjoyed more opportunities than black or Latino artists, which has something to do with the fact that jazz critics tend to be college-educated white people. (One might also note that Ethan Iverson and Brad Mehldau also write as if they're college-educated white people.) We're onto something true here, but it's far more complicated. Read on ...

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2. I See Black People

More accurately, I don't observe a whole lot of African Americans in the jazz blogosphere. Which is why I didn't ask any young, black jazz bloggers to be part of the original Jazz Now team: as far as I can tell, there aren't many. (There could be important perspectives that I'm not up on, and if you know of them, let us know -- we've only been doing this blog thing for five months, you know.)

I did, however, reach out to a young reader (and Twitter presence) named Anthony Dean-Harris. He's got a blog which deals with jazz from time to time, and attended an HBCU. So when he submitted his Jazz Now thoughts, I pressed him on it. I believe he was the first black person to submit a list on a blog -- the only one out of twenty, not including the contributors published on ABS -- and I thought he might have some thoughts on the dearth of Jazz Internet from African Americans, especially those in our generation.

Dean-Harris responded in a new blog post. For the most part, he's as stymied as I am, but he does point out that NPR doesn't have a high percentage of black listeners, and that the audience for live jazz is growing older on average -- thus less likely to be following blogs. Combined with the fact that ABS existed for less than four months when Jazz Now started, and that's the beginning of an theory why Dean-Harris was alone in this particular project.

But that still doesn't explain the perceived lack of young, black jazz bloggers at large. At one time, folks like A.B. Spellman and Amiri Baraka were anomalies for cracking the mainstream jazz press, theretofore the sole province of white enthusiasts. Now anybody can play the Web 2.0 game and distribute their opinions. (Many powerful blogging technologies are, after all, free.) So as a sheer demographic issue, I would expect black-run jazz blogs and jazz-related internet entrepreneurship to mirror the percentage of jazz fans who identify as black. This is not the case.

That might be anecdotal evidence that young, black jazz supporters are either not plentiful (in either relative or absolute terms), or not exhibiting their fandom in jazz-specific ways. Perhaps that audience is going to shows and acquiring records, but not participating in the Jazz Internet community as it currently stands.

All this is to help contextualize the fact that Brad Mehldau and The Bad Plus -- and many of the other high poll-finishers -- are white folks. Would the results be different if a different set of fans had chimed in? There's a question I can't answer.

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3. Different Strokes, Or, To What Audience?

It has been noted several times by commenters that not everyone will like everything. Someone who doesn't care much for modern R&B may not be into Esperanza Spalding's latest album; someone who hates math-rock may not necessarily dig Rudresh Mahanthappa's Codebook. To that effect, I like the approach of a fellow named Kevin, who tailored each of his picks to people who are already fans of a certain style of music.

This is an interesting thought, and a different tactic than I tried. I like to think that a heartfelt, intense jazz recording defines its own rules in a sense; gifted musicians bend familiar sounds to their own twisted ends. I also credit people with complex musical tastes, and assume that people assess aesthetics based on individual musicianship. So to that extent, I tried to make varied picks based on recordings which I think most listeners could appreciate if they were willing to sit down and engage with the music.

But does that work? Does one enthusiastically-recommended size fit all? Obviously, in "proselytizing" for jazz, you need to keep your audience in mind. (Ideally, you'd be able to answer their feedback too.) At the same time, the mere presentation of musical breadth in modern jazz is, I think, pretty useful. In introducing jazz to a new listener, it's important to remember that many neophytes think that jazz refers to a narrowly specific set of sounds. Directed listening that emphasizes musical diversity: that's as close to an consensus formula as I can get you.

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4. Jazz & Not-Jazz

Over and over, people made the point (both implicitly and explicitly) that jazz which somehow draws from not-jazz could be a powerful draw for people new to the music. Lucas Gillan: "To be perfectly honest, the jazz that most often packs the biggest emotional punch for me is that which exhibits some awareness of non-jazz styles." Dean Christesen: "I would play the following five albums ... they are all similar in that the elements of contemporary rhythm are crucial characteristics of the music." Other selections from the Jazz Now posse include covers of Britney Spears, M.I.A. and Nirvana.

The novelty of any cover anywhere is one thing, and there's of course the obvious appeal of appearing to come from the same generation as your audience. But there's something more sophisticated than "jazz meets hip-hop!" going on here. The free inclusion of sonic ideas commonly associated with not-jazz stretch the idea of a singular jazz genre to a sort of reductio ad absurdum. Yet the music of Robert Glasper, Todd Sickafoose, Matthew Shipp, Guillermo Klein, John Zorn, Chris Potter -- I could go on -- still (often) sounds like it could be called jazz. It certainly has the structural rigor and improvisational chops characteristic of good jazz, and a quorum of the jazz community has embraced it too.

It's not exactly the mixing of genres itself that appeals to people -- how could it be if most people don't understand music in terms of labels, and if those labels aren't valid anyway? I doubt you can sell an indie-rock hipster on all of jazz just by playing some Aaron Parks or whatever. But you can probably sell someone who likes the dreamy, art-damaged soundscapes of Blonde Redhead on certain tunes from Invisible Cinema. So yes, good jazz which draws from not-jazz helps to prove that jazz musicians don't live in barns; more importantly, it's loaded with a lot of musical details which expand the recruiting for the broad church of jazz.

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5. The Long Tail

Finally, I might point out that while there were many artists mentioned multiple times by survey participants, there were many more artists who were only mentioned once. Add that to the fact that many records from popular artists were only mentioned once, and it's pretty clear: people thought up a lot of entryways into modern jazz.

There are a lot more jazz records being made now than ever before -- it's simply much easier to put out an album in 2009 than it was in 1959. And they're being made in all sorts of styles: We have people recommending acts as diverse as Gordon Goodwin's Big Phat Band, The Lounge Lizards, Derrick Gardner, Tord Gustavsen, Marco Benevento and Roscoe Mitchell. There's something of a consensus at the top, but at the bottom, modern jazz proves itself a wide stream.

I framed Jazz Now as a tactic to get people into jazz at large, a sort of "see, this stuff doesn't hurt" approach. Also, people who really like jazz tend to like a spectrum of different jazz styles. But in thinking about it, a deep appreciation of this stuff takes time. It took several years for me to get from Head Hunters to Spiritual Unity and the Hot Fives. And really, at heart I care more that people find their own way into something -- anything. If Jazz Now leaves anyone with a curiosity about only one artist practicing within one distinct subcategory of jazz, I think this whole exercise was worth it.

The Spanish doom metal band Orthodox forgoes the distorted low-end for clustered piano chords. (Courtesy of the artist)

Earlier today, NPR Music published one of my pieces for Take Five, our weekly jazz feature, called Blast Beat Improv: Metallic Free Jazz. I've come to subtitle it "Or How I Stopped Worrying And Learned To Love Bill Laswell"; the beret-ed bassist and producer is worth his own essay (seriously), in part because he spearheaded a lot of metal-influenced free jazz. (Aka grind-jazz, acoustic grind, death jazz or free death.) It's not swing for the faint of heart.

On the flip side, jazz (free and otherwise) has had a large influence on metal. Often, musicians with jazz backgrounds start thrash and death metal bands, using their knowledge of chord progressions and polyrhythms to inform brutal compositions. Check out some examples below:

Orthodox: These Sevilla, Spain doomsters started as a Sunn O))) worship band, pounding on mega-low B chords at 16 beats per minute. It was all well and good for what it was, even if it wasn't particularly original drone-doom metal. Then upon Orthodox's second album, Amanecer en Puerta Oscura, the band started to incorporate avant-jazz flourishes of clarinet, horn and upright bass. It was interesting at its best -- it likely blew some stoners' minds -- but wasn't fully formed. Enter Sentencia, which loses the low-end distortion in favor of clustered chords from the piano. The heaviness comes not from the immediate sound, but from the looming gravitas. It's fitting (if a bit misleading) that Sentencia's 26-minute track is called "Ascension" (ring any bells?): the composition leans heavily on abstract upright bass bowing, theatrical vocals and, as showcased in the excerpt below, overblown clarinet and keys beaten into submission.

Excerpt from "Ascension," from Orthodox, Sentencia (Alone). Released 2009.

Purchase: Amazon.com | The Stone Circle

"Part I," from Ehnahre, The Man Closing Up (Sound Devastation). Released 2008.

Purchase: Ehnahre's Myspace Page

Bohren & Der Club of Gore: I still can't bring myself to watch the super-creepy Twin Peaks, but if there's one thing I can appreciate about David Lynch's beautiful nightmares committed to screen, it's the noir-lounge soundtracks. Germany's Bohren & Der Club of Gore occupies that same kind of space, but drags quietly-swept brushes and a lonely Fender Rhodes through utter darkness and somber pain.

Cynic: In the early '90s, the Los Angeles-based Cynic was often compared to jazz-fueled death metal band Atheist. But Cynic was always a bit stranger and more ethereal. Last year the band unexpectedly reunited to release Traced in Air, making its ties to death metal even less so. The band has ditched riffs almost completely for melodious guitar lines, yet there's still a heaviness to Cynic's complex jazz progressions that reaches outward to '70s fusion.

Mr. Bungle: I'd be remiss if I didn't mention Mike Patton in a list about jazz-influenced metal. He's made a career of conflating metal, jazz, funk, hip-hop, noise and just about everything else in bands like Faith No More, Fantomas and Tomahawk. He's also collaborated with John Zorn and served as one-time vocalist for The Dillinger Escape Plan. But out of all of his projects, Mr. Bungle was by far the most uncompromising. Albums like Disco Volante were Zappa-like mutants of sound, fueled by Patton's incredibly diverse and frequently avant-scat vocals.

There are countless other examples -- too many to list -- but I do want to know your favorite jazz-influenced metal bands, especially ones I may not have heard.

Anyone planning to subscribe to JazzTimes now that it's offering a lower-priced digital edition?

--SFJ On The Death Of Rap: Sasha Frere-Jones is too smart not to know the ludicrous history of "death-of-genre" claims. He acknowledges this in a recent New Yorker pop column -- and yet posits that hip-hop is in some way dying. (Losing its position at the vanguard of pop music, more precisely.) I generally like SFJ's writing, so I gave it a gloss last week and shrugged "whatever, dude" -- but then Nate Chinen pointed out a loaded assertion in the piece:

As the marquee names nudge rap into its transitional, synthetic phase, a host of traditionalists are doing strong work in well-known older styles. This movement reminds me of metal and jazz, areas where artists work in a larger number of established subgenres that do small but consistent business with loyal audiences. The claim to shock is traded in favor of a reliable form and a reliable following.

Anyone have any thoughts? Chinen's blog has a few comments already.

--Central Brooklyn Jazz Consortium Concert: When people refer to the Brooklyn jazz scene, they're usually talking about events going on in Williamsburg or Park Slope/Gowanus -- fashionable places for the young white middle class. Which is why an announcement from the Central Brooklyn Jazz Consortium caught my eye. (A large chunk of Central Brooklyn is historically majority-African American.) They're putting on a 10th anniversary show in late November with musicians who might fly under the radar of most buzz engines, highlighted by Papo Vasquez's band and a coalition group featuring folks like Ahmed Abdullah and Kiane Zawadi. Here's an article and some press material.

--Wynton Marsalis On CNN: I generally agree with his assertion that "Racism and greed put blues at the back of the bus," as the headline reads. Some of the other things he talks about I find less convincing, but let's not retread those arguments. Even if I were to agree with him wholeheartedly, why can't jazz find other people to speak for it? Why is Wynton the only one who ever seems to represent jazz in high-visibility forums?

--Ricardo Villalobos To Remix ECM Records: Via FACT Magazine. Could be really cool; could be even drier and more spacey. My breath: not bated. But hey, if Madlib can mine the Blue Note vaults ...

--Iowa Jazz Celebrities: Not named Beiderbecke. Reedman Frank Perowsky, 74 -- also, the father of drummer Ben Perowsky -- was one of several musicians recognized last weekend at the Des Moines Jazz Hall Of Fame. Where I might point out: there exists such a thing as the Des Moines Jazz Hall Of Fame, which makes me happy.

Watch Gregory Hutchinson play, and you will understand why fellow musicians call him "Touch." (Josh Jackson)

Joshua Redman's set at the Jazz Standard last Thursday showed tremendous equipoise, and the saxophonist wore the boutonniere of stardom so nonchalantly as to render it a useless ornament. Strangely, this five-night run marks his first appearance at the club. In a set that started with Rodgers and Hammerstein's "Surrey With the Fringe on Top" and ended with Led Zeppelin's "The Ocean," Redman's pianoless trio (bassist Matt Penman, drummer Gregory Hutchinson) invested themselves in a kind of anaerobic workout in front of a capacity house.

By the third song, Redman's "Indonesia," Hutchinson had broken a mallet, and sweat was pooling underneath his drum throne. Penman tethered his bass to Hutch's constant churn, and Redman delivered the melodic forward progress. This was a saxophone trio that promised intensity, and it delivered a few cathartic moments.

The set list covered every base, but Redman was calling options to the band during the applause -- deliberately curatorial to the moment, yet open to suggestion or amendment. Something from Oklahoma? Check. Three originals? Check. Ellington's "Sophisticated Lady"? Check. After the freedom jazz beat of Joe Lovano's "Blackwell's Message," with Hutchinson leaving no part of his drum untouched, Redman invited Bay Area pianist Taylor Eigsti (a "wunderkind," Redman stated, before changing it to jazz parlance as a "bad mf") for a jazz waltz. Check.

I sat right next to the drums, and when I thought I might be paying too much attention to the overwhelming amount of rhythm coming my way, I deliberately panned over to Redman and Penman. They couldn't take their eyes off him either.

Joshua Redman's trio has been recording its tour performances recently: Yoshi's in San Francisco, Jazz Alley in Seattle. The hard drives are also rolling for this weekend's shows at Jazz Standard. Expect to be able to hear what this trio can do, even if you can't make it to New York before Sunday.

Ella Fitzgerald. (George Konig/Hulton Archive)

My boss readily admits that she doesn't know a whole lot about jazz. But she lets me write all this nonsense on the Internet, so I'm not complaining. And at least she's willing to learn. So every week -- or at least as often as possible -- she and I get together to listen to and Instant Message about a different great jazz song.

I've been nudged several times by Ms. Boss Lady about our relative lack of coverage of jazz singers on the blog. To assure her that I actually do love vocalists -- when they're good -- I pulled one of Ella Fitzgerald's standout performances: a 1960 live set recorded in West Berlin. As you can hear, it's at very least a tour de force of vocal improvisation.

"How High The Moon," from Ella Fitzgerald, The Complete Ella In Berlin (Verve). Ella Fitzgerald, vocals; Paul Smith, piano; Wilfred Middlebrooks, bass; Gus Johnson, drums. West Berlin, Germany: Feb. 13, 1960.

Purchase: Amazon.com / Amazon MP3 / iTunes

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Boss Lady: A singer! Patrick, you're going soft.

me: Pretty soon, I'll be listening to smooth jazz in a bubble bath.

Boss Lady: With a glass of wine.

me: Well, you keep asking me: "Aren't there any singers in jazz?" So I've pulled a command performance for you.

me: All true perceptions. I think the former ought to be qualified though --
See, within a certain category of jazz freak which I may or may not belong to, we venerate certain jazz singers, and appreciate the work of many others.

Boss Lady: So you're saying you reserve your declarations of love for singers for more private conversations, not public forums? Are you embarrassed?

me: I'm proud to say I think Ella Fitzgerald is a genius.
But there's a lower barrier to entry into jazz singing than, say, playing the trombone. Which tends to glut the market with ... you get the picture.
Plus, everybody loves singing. So jazz singers are often presented by their marketers and producers in artistically compromising ways -- in misguided attempts to hit that crossover audience. So it's harder to pick the wheat from the chaff.

Boss Lady: Sure, but it's an opportunity for you to help people walk through the thicket. And, as you say, the big picture is that "everybody loves singing."

me: There's little doubt that Ella is the real deal, though. Or, based on this performance, do you think otherwise?

Boss Lady: This is a live performance, right?

me: It is. Live in, of all places, West Berlin, in 1960.

Boss Lady: Sometimes, singers are able to pull off the astonishing feat of making it sound like they're singing just for you. That's not the case here. This is very much a performance for a crowd.

me: Indeed. I think that may be a recorded music vs. live music question. Jazz has always had a funny relationship with recording ...

Boss Lady: This performance seems to be a lot about having fun with variation and improvisation.

me: In any event, if you were at all wondering about Ella's credentials as a 1) raw vocal talent 2) musical performer, they're all answered here.

Boss Lady: Well she's certainly virtuosic! It's like she's taking on the trumpet part.

me: Or at times, the tenor too -- she had some incredible range.

Boss Lady: It's kind of madcap, like one of those old movie musicals with a wonderfully wacky, complicated and fun dance number. And what is she doing with her voice down low at around 5:30 in? Sounds dangerous.

me: Hey, I don't know, but it's kinda hip -- her energy and humor certainly sells it.
When you say "wacky," what do you mean?

Boss Lady: It's a technical term for playful, surprising and on the edge of goofy.

me: Ha, ha.

Boss Lady: So I figured out what that low part sounds like: a Tuvan throat singer.

me: I don't think she studied with any of those, but you know, jazz is full of surprises.
As she does her improvisation, do you hear just how many other tunes she's quoting?

Boss Lady: I'm sorry (and sad) to say, no.

me: Surely, you heard "Poinciana" (start of the scat solo), or "Stormy Weather," or "Rhapsody In Blue," or "I Want To Be Happy," or "A-Tisket, A-Tasket" (her first hit in the '30s), or the interpolation of "Smoke Gets In Your Eyes" as "Sweat Gets In Your Eyes" at the end ...

Boss Lady: Looks like I'd better listen again. Because I was focused on Ella's voice and her pyrotechnics, but all of those references flew by unnoticed. Sigh.

me: ...or Ferde Grofe's "On The Trail," or the Ethel Waters number "Tropical Heat Wave," or "El Manicero," or even a Charlie Parker tune called "Confirmation" "Ornithology" which was based on the chord changes to this song.

Boss Lady: OK, OK, just rub it in!

me: There are more which I don't know the names of ...
But the point is that she's having fun. Sort of free-associating -- trying to throw out pop-cultural references.

Boss Lady: It's funny -- I got the essence of it, but not the punchlines. Gives me a reason to have another listen!
You know, I'm also surprised by how edgy her voice sounds.

me: It's a live environment, she's going for broke -- sure.
It's not the smooth, burrow-in-your-ear Ella of the records she made around this time.
To set this in a sort of historical context, the '50s and '60s were when Fitzgerald experienced her greatest successes on disc.
She worked with an influential producer named Norman Granz to produce "songbook" albums -- interpreting the oeuvres of composers like Gershwin, Cole Porter, Rogers and Hart, etc.

Boss Lady: Even I've heard of those recordings.

me: It also brought her into superstar sessions with Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Louis Armstrong, etc.
This concert was released by Norman Granz's Verve Records -- but it has little of the studio craft, string sections, and so forth of the albums.

Boss Lady: So here's she's letting loose.

me: In the tune before this one in the concert, "Mack The Knife," she forgets the lyrics, but makes up new ones on the spot -- and she has everyone buying it because she's so strong and delivers so well.
Around :53 there's a similar thing going on.

Boss Lady: She's treating the live performance as something completely different than a record. Some artists seem much more liable to repeat their recordings exactly on stage.
Maybe they feel that's what their audience wants ...
Or maybe Ella just had an extraordinary ability to be alive and in the moment in a live setting. Is that what she's known for?

me: One of the things, for sure.
Also, for almost all jazz performers in history, there's little money in recording.
You may do 250 gigs a year performing, and 5 in the studio.
That and the fact that this is a music which is based largely on improvisation -- which seems to demand the live experience in order to really "get."
Of course, sometimes when you have hits, audiences demand you recreate those.
But most jazz performers in history can't recreate the exact way they did it on the recording, and don't care to. They see what they do as a live performance art.
Ella's records did sell well, of course, which makes it all the better that she brings it, raw and uncut, to stage.

Boss Lady: Patrick, I'm beginning to see why you played this for me. It must be your way of getting me to agree to letting you go out to more shows and spend less time at the office?

me: Have I told you how good your hair looks today?

The world has lost another tie to the original New Thing jazz: bassist and composer Norris Jones, better known as Sirone, has died in Berlin, Germany. He was 69.

Leroy Jenkins, Jerome Cooper and Sirone of the Revolutionary Ensemble in 1972. (Larry Fink)

Sirone recorded with Cecil Taylor, Charles Gayle and Phalanx, a group featuring George Adams (tenor sax), James Blood Ulmer (guitar) and Rashied Ali (drums). (Ali also passed away recently, in August.) But to me, his greatest work was in the Revolutionary Ensemble.

"The trio almost epitomized that much-maligned year in jazz," jazz critic Kevin Whitehead said in his 2005 Fresh Air review of The Revolutionary Ensemble's And Now.... "It was a time of re-thinking the available possibilities, when new instrumental combinations and new ways of sorting out ensemble roles became common."

Last winter, I made my yearly pilgrimage to Low Yo Yo Stuff in Atlanta, Ga. while visiting my parents for the holidays. The store always has a great stock of free jazz vinyl, but the one group that came up over and over again in fingering through the LPs was Revolutionary Ensemble. Picking up the trio's debut, Vietnam, the owner got really excited and had me put it on the store's speaker system.

Listening again today as I did in that Atlanta strip mall, it's clear from the outset that Jenkins, Sirone and Cooper were onto something radical. They intersected chamber music, backwoods hoedowns and free improvisation in a way that called out to new thinking. It also happened to be an extraordinarily good time.

Sirone, in particular, is a wonder even at this early stage in his career. He almost never walks a scale, but when he does, fragments are seared in rapid-fire plucks. Sirone mostly disarmed with his bow. He could be as light as Jenkins' playful violin, mimicking his Appalachian-style explorations. But when drummer Jerome Cooper lit the fire, Sirone equalled him in force, hitting the bow to the strings in a tangible, grab-you-by-the-shirt kind of way. It's thrilling. Despite the LP's intentioned protest against the Vietnam War, the call for musical and political change still resonates through a new era.