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In an upcoming MusicLifeandTimes podcast, my partner jazz pianist Kevin Bales and I exchange stories about life on the road as musicians. Unlike most other professions, musicians don’t typically work in the same building every day (or night). Playing different locations means we’re often out of town, away from what we call home. That leads…

The other day I engaged my podcast partner, pianist Kevin Bales, in a discussion of pianists who have influenced him. There were many, he told me, and many more musicians other than pianists whose influences you can hear in his playing. But the one that stands out, at least to me in our discussion, and…

In light of ongoing racial injustice and the Black Lives Matter movement, universities have been pressured to better represent a more diverse music, to include more Black composers. But too often they’re only picking composers who write in the European tradition. Duke Ellington never seems to come up and yet he’s the most important American…

I’m sure you know the song “My Funny Valentine.” It’s from Babes in Arms, a 1937 musical by Rodgers and Hart, and has been recorded more than 1300 times by more than 600 artists, from Frank Sinatra to Sarah Vaughan to Miles Davis to an enshrined version by jazz trumpeter/vocalist Chet Baker. I guess those…

It’s no stretch. Jazz is an expression of democracy. So much so it was outlawed in Nazi Germany, and later banned in the Soviet Union where it was not uncommon to see signs like, “If you let people play jazz they will revolt,” or “if you play saxophone, you’re a degenerate.” What makes jazz so…

The other night I was watching a report on the unrest on college campuses over the Israel-Hamas War and heard a student leader respond to an interviewer’s question of what he wanted from the opposing side as “see me, feel me, hear me,” paraphrasing the line from the Who’s 1969 rock opera Tommy. It was…

In a recent blog we talked about The Great American Songbook, the collection of songs composed in the first half of the 20th century by the likes of Cole Porter, Hoagy Carmichael, Jerome Kern, Irving Berlin, Richard Rogers, the Gershwins, and Duke Ellington. It was the first truly American popular music genre, and those songs,…

One of our favorite things to do with our Music Life and Times podcasts is to interview other musicians about their perspectives and pathways. Vinnie D’Agostino—saxophone, clarinet, and flute—first performed as an 8-year-old and started playing professionally at 15. Throughout his youth he was convinced he would live his life as a professional musician. But…

The other night my trio performed at an event where the crowd was so loud we could hardly hear ourselves playing. It can be frustrating. Hours of practice getting ready for the gig. The afternoon spent hauling equipment and setting up. Then such a lack of respect for the players and the music. Are we…

You’re probably familiar with the American Songbook, the collection of songs composed in the first half of the 20th century by the likes of Cole Porter, Hoagy Carmichael, Jerome Kern, Irving Berlin, Richard Rogers, the Gershwins, and Duke Ellington, the songs jazz musicians call “standards.” The American Popular Song is another name for the genre,…