Holiday Gift Guide
Got a friend, family member, or loved one who's a fan of the music (or who would like to be)? You want to acknowledge that fact with your holiday gift-giving, but fear making a faux pas? We've put together this page as a public service to you!
To begin with: how about a gift membership in the RJA? The beneficiary of your largesse will get discounts at RJA-friendly local merchants and access to reserved seating at all our concerts for a full year. And you, o canny and virtuous one, will actually be giving three gifts in one--to your intended recipient, to the RJA (memberships help us pay program costs), and to yourself (since we're a registered charity, your contribution is fully tax-deductible). Details here, or simply:
If that just seems too prosaic, then may we suggest some RJA gear?
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For instance: how about our stylish RJA logo (designed by the great M. Wayne Knight) on a (men's) Hanes Beefy-T 6.1 oz. heavyweight tee-shirt or a (women's) Hanes 4 oz. fitted tee? Men's S, M, L, & XL available in olive, stone, or slate blue; women's fitted M & L in chocolate, pink, or sky blue; either one just $15. Custom printed by Humboldt Outfitters. Full details and ordering information on our Tickets and Merchandise page. |
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Alternatively (or in addition), you could get that same logo on a 100% organic cotton relaxed fit, adjustable baseball cap. (We also have limited quantities of a "structured" flex-fit cap in acrylic for the younger, hipper set.) Swoop "J" on the front, "Redwood Jazz Alliance" in lower case letters across the back. Also a mere $15. Custom sewn by Humboldt Outfitters. Full details and ordering information on our Tickets and Merchandise page. |
And then there are items from which we ourselves stand to gain absolutely nothing, apart from furthering the cause of jazz, that is--which is, after all, our mission. For instance: if the person you're buying for is a discerning reader as well as listener, then you should know that there are three fantastic books that, strangely enough, have appeared just in time for the holiday season:
- Robin D.G. Kelley's magisterial Thelonious Monk: The Life and Times of An American Original, which debunks the myth of Monk as an "untutored genius" (interview here);
- Gary Giddins and Scott Deveaux's Jazz, which aims to provide both a broad-minded history of the art form and some friendly schooling (for non-experts) in how to listen to everything from twelve-bar blues to free improvisation (more here and here); and
- Sam Stephenson's The Jazz Loft Project, which relates the story (supported by plenty of documentary photos) of W. Eugene Smith's open-door New York loft, where everybody who was anybody in the jazz world of the late 1950s and early 60s came to meet, jam, and hang--and be surreptitiously recorded. (A companion radio feature, culled from a longer series on WNYC, is currently running on NPR.)
We strongly recommend, of course, that you order and/or purchase these books from our friends and sponsors at Northtown Books in Arcata, where (if you're an RJA member) you can get a discount as you support your local independent bookseller and keep your dollars in the community. The links above, however, will take you to that famous online mega-retailer--where you can read more about these books before trotting down to Northtown and doing the right thing.
So much for writing about music (which we emphatically do not believe is like dancing about architecture). What about music itself? Do we have any recommendations? Do we!
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For starters, we should point you towards a brand-new Christmas album by one of our favorite artists of all time, the incomparable composer and arranger Carla Bley. Though Bley is known for her sly humor, there's barely a tongue in cheek on this album of sacred and secular songs and carols, respectfully arranged for piano, bass, and improvising brass quintet--unless you count the inclusion of Bley's old standby "Jesus Maria"--and a slightly devilish version of "Jingle Bells." (Want to read about more Christmas jazz? Try Peter Hum's post at jazzblog.ca or this feature at One Final Note.)
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We'd also be remiss if we didn't tell you about an amazing new disc produced by Doug Moody, longtime jazz DJ at KMFB in Fort Bragg and Senior Vice-President at North Coast Brewing, which is without question the music's premiere zymurgical supporter in California, if not the entire nation. In addition to sponsoring the Redwood Jazz Alliance, North Coast is a major sponsor of the Healdsburg Jazz Festival and the Monterey Jazz Festival, and for several years now it has supported the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz with sales of its delicious Belgian abbey-style "dubbel" ale, Brother Thelonious. Now that partnership has spawned the Brother Thelonious Quintet, an all-star group composed of recent Monk Competition alumni: Helen Sung (piano), Wayne Escoffery (tenor sax), Ambrose Akinmusire (trumpet), Alan Hampton (bass), and James Alsanders (drums), with talk-of-the-town vocalist Gretchen Parlato providing vocals on the final track. 100% of the proceeds from sales of the eponymous CD go to support jazz education at the Monk Institute. Available only at the North Coast Brewing online store. |
And then: we'll bore you soon enough with our picks for best jazz CDs of 2009, but for now you should know that the contenders include new music from many of our past guests--and we thought you, too, might like to hear what they've been up to since we last saw them:
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No Holshouser, Bennink, and Moore on wax (or shiny plastic, or even downloadable bits) yet, but Will Holshouser has a brand-new disc called "Palace Ghosts and Drunken Hymns" with his own trio (Ron Horton on trumpet, David Phillips on bass), augmented by the addition of Portuguese pianist Bernardo Sassetti.
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The prolific Dave Douglas, whose "Brass Ecstasy" CD is already turning up on people's year's-best lists, has now released an album of big-band music entitled "A Single Sky," a collaborative effort with composer and arranger Jim McNeely (Vanguard Jazz Orchestra) and Germany's Frankfurt Radio Big Band. (Greenleaf Music is Douglas's own label.)
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Ben Goldberg, Ron Miles, Charlie Hunter, and Scott Amendola have finally released their self-titled "Go Home" CD on Ben's own "BAG Production" label. A mix of live and studio tracks, the album includes much of the music that the quartet performed in Arcata, and some it didn't. Buy it directly from BenGoldberg.net, or check out samples at:
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Ben also has a brand-new album out on John Zorn's Tzadik label, as leader of the reconvened "New Klezmer Trio" (with Greg Cohen on bass and Kenny Wolleson on drums). It's called "Speech Communication."
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Dafnis Prieto renamed his latest quartet after what became its signature tune, "Si ó Si" (which the quartet debuted, with a different bassist, as one of its encores in Arcata last spring). As its title would indicate, this new album was recorded at one of New York's liveliest clubs, the famed "Jazz Standard."
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After a trio date on boss Dave Douglas's Greenleaf Music, Donny McCaslin is back on Sunnyside with a muscular sextet (including guitarist Ben Monder, bassist Scott Colley, keyboardist Ed Simon, drummer Antonio Sanchez and percussionist Pernell Saturnino), augmented by an impressive horn ensemble featuring Alex “Sasha” Sipiagin and Tatum Greenblatt on trumpet and flugelhorn, Chris Komer on French horn, Marshall Gilkes on trombone and Marcus Rojas on tuba/bass trombone. That's some "Declaration."
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Bassist Ben Allison's latest, "Think Free," took a familiar trajectory, reaching #1 on the CMJ jazz charts just a few short weeks after its release. The disc continues Ben's experiments with a new sound incorporating the rock, pop, and film music of his formative years--but with a new band, featuring holdover Steve Cardenas on guitar, Shane Endsley replacing Ron Horton on trumpet, Rudy Royston in the drummer's chair, and Humboldt homegirl Jenny Scheinman on violin.
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We're generally not mentioning new releases by sidemen in the groups we've hosted (if we were, we'd have to tell you about albums by This Against That saxophonist Tony Malaby and pianist Andy Milne, Brass Ecstasy trombonist Luis Bonilla, Si o Si pianist Manuel Valera, and David Berkman/Anat Cohen bassist Joe Martin, among others), but we feel compelled to make an exception for longtime Ben Allison collaborator, trumpeter Ron Horton, and his first new album in several years, "It's a Gadget World"--in part because Allison also plays on it, and in part because it's such a delightful disc that's not getting nearly enough attention.
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David Berkman's first album in much too long is a quiet stunner: the restrained but virtuosic pianist and some eminently able sidemen (including drummer Ted Poor, who was part of the trio that Berman brought to Eureka in 2007) lay down some old and new tunes. You know what they say: where there's smoke...
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Miguel Zenón returns with another fresh exploration of the intersections of jazz and the folk traditions of his native Puerto Rico. The album is "Esta Plena." They don't give MacArthur "genius" grants to just anybody.
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Multi-reedist Marty Ehrlich, who joined Myra Melford and Trio M at Fulkerson in early 2007, pays tribute to one of his mentors, saxophonist Julius Hemphill, with his Rites Quartet (James Zollar on trumpet, Erik Friedlander on cello, and Pheeroan AkLaff on drums).
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Finally, "Trio M" drummer Matt Wilson reconvenes his Quartet for the first time since the passing of bassist Dennis Irwin for an album of lively playing, easy humor, and all-around good feeling. Yeah--it'll stick on you.
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Again, while we've provided the buttons above for your listening convenience, we heartily endorse the policy of buying locally and suppporting independent record stores (remember: RJA members receive discounts at The Works, People's Records, and Missing Link Records) and/or—the economy of jazz distribution being what it is—buying directly from the artists or their labels. If you need instant gratification, consider a compromise: treat yourself to an mp3 copy for your own portable device, then go old-school and buy a physical disc for your giftee.
Do It Yourself
Where do we hear about all this new music? Well, the jazz blogosphere has exploded over the past year or two, for one thing, and we pick up all kinds of good tips from the smart and enthusiastic people who populate it.
- One of our favorite sites is NPR's "A Blog Supreme," where twenty-something Patrick Jarenwattananon presides. Earlier this year, Patrick began a project called "Jazz Now," wherein other young-ish tastemakers from around the Internet were enjoined to "name five albums you would recommend to somebody looking to get into modern jazz." The results were illuminating. A Blog Supreme also maintains a peerless "blogroll" (list of links to other jazz weblogs), though it understandably gives pride of place to a passel of other jazz sites maintained by NPR and/or its flagship jazz affiliate station WBGO, including the indispensible "Live at the Village Vanguard," where you can stream and often download entire sets of music by some of our day's most important working groups.
- Another such site (i.e., one where you can download music by, and interviews with, leading figures in modern jazz--in convenient podcast form) is one maintained by Josh Jackson of the selfsame WBGO: it's called "The Checkout," and it's devoted to...well, checking out new music. It's definitely where we check out new music, and on a regular basis.
