Jazz Profiles: Pianist Benny Green [Click here to watch Benny play Cottontail with bassist Ray Brown, drummer Jeff Hamilton and the WDR Big Band [Cologne, Germany] 1994]

- Richard Sudhalter, Jazz cornetist, author and critic

“Jazz musicians are their music. Absent that, they're just people making a living, eating meals, paying bills — no different from cops or politicos. But that's just the point: the music can't be subtracted: it's the defining essence, which sets musicians apart, makes them special and ultimately a little mysterious. Makes their various complexes and misbehaviors interesting to writers, chroniclers, fans. Would British writer Geoff Dyer, for example, have found Bud Powell, Charles Mingus, Art Pepper, and the other walking pathologies celebrated in his BUT BEAUTIFUL (Farrar, Straus, 1996) so fascinating had it not been for the music they made? Subtract the music and you have just another chronicle of aberrant thought and behavior. In a review of his book, I wondered whether Dyer would have been similarly drawn to musicians such as Henry “Red” Allen, Dizzy Gillespie, and Red Norvo, no less brilliant, who seem to have led balanced, eminently non-neurotic lives.”

Geugie Hoogeveen's Gift to JazzProfiles and Its Readers [Listeners?]

Hi Steven, You don't know me - and I don't really know you, but I’ve been enjoying your Jazz Profiles blogspot for some time now. (Specifically the recent Roy DuNann piece..) So first of all: thanks for that! Secondly, the reason for me writing you is that I’ve been quite busy organizing my jazz collection and have compiled and uploaded a handful of homemade radio shows on the podcast platform Mixcloud. Initially this was a project intended for Izaak, my son, who’s only two years old right now, but I think they’d be quite interesting for any true classic bop and hard bop jazz lovers. Problem is; nobody's listening to them.. I thought, if you shared my enthusiasm, they perhaps could be linked somehow to your blogspot.. But only if you think that’s appropriate. Two important notes: 1: there’s absolutely no commercial incentive involved here 2: the podcasts are a hundred percent non stop music, so no talking, jingles or add’s etc. Check them out, if you have the time. Right now there are five compilations, each one focussing on on a major jazz label, so there’s Prestige, Blue Note, Savoy, Riverside and Contemporary for now. Ok, so that’s basically it.. Thanks for taking the time and let me know what you think.. Kind regards, Geugie Hoogeveen the Netherlands

Wednesday, December 9, 2009

Pianist Benny Green [Click here to watch Benny play Cottontail with bassist Ray Brown, drummer Jeff Hamilton and the WDR Big Band [Cologne, Germany] 1994]