Jazzed up 2006 NEA Jazz Masters

VOL 2 / 2006 A GREAT NATION DESERVES GREAT ART All Jazzed Up 2006 NEA Jazz Masters 2 HONOR ROLL Awards 6 3 BEYOND BRICKS NEA JAZZ IN THE AND MORTAR SCHOOLS 7 6 FROM THE ARCHIVES COOL JAZZ AND THE COLD WAR 11 CONGRESSIONAL TRIBUTE TO SHIRLEY HORN The NEA and Jazz A Commitment to One of America’s Treasures This special 12-page edition of NEA Arts celebrates the Arts Endowment’s deeply held commitment to jazz, which is best illustrated by the NEA Jazz Masters initiative. The NEA’s support for jazz goes back to 1969, when the first grant was awarded to George Russell, who later received an NEA Jazz Masters Award in 1990. Since that first grant, funding has exploded from an annual budget of $20,000 in 1970 to more than $2.8 million in 2005. The Arts Endowment has consistently supported jazz programs over its 40-year history. For example, Milt Hinton, years before he received his NEA Jazz Masters Award, received a jazz music fellowship from the NEA, which he used to not only support his music but also his extensive photography collection, documenting the history of jazz through the 20th century. In collaboration with the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, the NEA Youth perform live at basketball games as part of the NEA-supported supported JazzNet, a five-year initiative to support Jazz Sports program. Photo: Courtesy of Thelonious Monk Institute commissions of new music and performances around of Jazz. the country in partnership with local presenters. The NEA also funded Jazz Sports, developed by the Dana Gioia Chairman Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz, which provides stu- James Ballinger Don V. Cogman dents with instrument training and performance oppor- Mary Costa tunities at basketball games in Los Angeles and Katharine Cramer DeWitt Makoto Fujimura Washington, DC. These are just a few of the jazz activities David H. Gelernter for which the NEA provided grants. Mark Hofflund Teresa Lozano Long The NEA also has taken the lead in developing Maribeth Walton McGinley Jerry Pinkney research on the jazz field. In 2003, an important report Deedie Potter Rose was released on the current state of jazz musicians: Gerard Schwarz Terry Teachout Changing the Beat: A Study of the Worklife of Jazz Dr. Karen Lias Wolff Musicians. This report provides a detailed examination of - working jazz musicians in four major metropolitan areas: Sen. Robert Bennett R-UT New York, Detroit, San Francisco, and New Orleans. Sen. Mike DeWine R-OH Sen. Patrick J. Leahy D-VT Jazz is one of America’s treasures, one of the great Rep. Betty McCollum D-MN art forms born and bred in the United States. Through Rep. Howard “Buck” McKeon R-CA Rep. Patrick J. Tiberi R-OH its support of many jazz programs, and especially through its own NEA Jazz Masters initiative, the NEA is committed to fostering vitality in and increasing access Don Ball, Editor Paulette Beete, Victoria Hutter Contributors to jazz music. Anne Masters Design, Inc. Design : NEA Jazz Masters Jimmy Heath (left) and Paquito D’Rivera trading solos at the 2006 NEA Jazz Masters Awards ceremony. Photo: Tom Pich. 2 All Jazzed Up 2006 NEA Jazz Masters Awards special concert and award ceremony during the Chairman Gioia joins the 2006 class of NEA Jazz Masters. From top to International Association for Jazz Education (IAJE) bottom and left to right: Chairman Dana Gioia, Buddy DeFranco, conference in New York City were percussionist Ray Chick Corea, Bob Brookmeyer, John Levy, Tony Bennett, Ray Barretto, Barretto, singer Tony Bennett, composer/arranger and Freddie Hubbard. Photo: Tom Pich. trombonist Bob Brookmeyer, keyboardist Chick Corea, clarinetist Buddy DeFranco, trumpeter Freddie In the late morning of January 13, 2006, a crowd of Hubbard, and manager John Levy, receiving the A.B. onlookers formed, necks craned, for a peek at a group Spellman NEA Jazz Masters Award for Jazz Advocacy. gathered for a photo shoot in the lobby of the New York Hilton. The group, average age 75 years old, greeted The evening concert and awards ceremony was each other with smiles and hugs, laughing and joking hosted by jazz greats Ramsey Lewis and Nancy Wilson, with each other. Reporters and photographers waited and A. B. Spellman, former NEA deputy chairman and anxiously for their turn with the group, and it became noted author of Four Jazz Lives. The award for jazz clear that this was not just any ordinary group of older advocacy was named after Spellman last year for not Americans. In fact, these prominent artists were among only his contributions in the jazz field as a writer and the greatest names in jazz history, and all were NEA advocate, but also for his invaluable contributions to Jazz Masters. expanding the NEA Jazz Masters program. The NEA Jazz Masters Awards, America’s highest Chairman Dana Gioia provided the opening remarks, honor in jazz, are given annually to those artists who stating, “Most everyone will agree that the two greatest have made significant contributions to the development artistic exports from the United States are jazz and film. and performance of jazz. Receiving the award later at a Film has its internationally famous prizes—the Academy 3 Awards. Now, finally, after a century of great jazz, we NEA Jazz Masters Slide Hampton, Paquito D’Rivera, and Jimmy Heath, have the equivalent: the NEA Jazz Masters Award.” as well as Chick Corea and James Moody (not pictured) join along on Two big bands provided musical entertainment for stage during the 2006 NEA Jazz Masters Awards ceremony. the evening’s festivities: the Jon Faddis Jazz Orchestra of Photo: Tom Pich. New York, which opened the event and included a ver- sion of John Coltrane’s “Countdown,” in an arrange- ute to the 1961 recording Duke Ellington Meets Count ment by NEA Jazz Master Frank Foster, and the Count Basie, with dueling soloists battling. NEA Jazz Masters Basie Orchestra, under the direction of Bill Hughes, Chick Corea, Paquito D’Rivera, Slide Hampton, Jimmy which played during the second half of the ceremony, Heath, and James Moody joined the band onstage for a highlighted by vocalist Nnenna Freelon’s rendition of rousing finale. And in an impromptu illustration of the Erroll Garner’s “Misty” with NEA Jazz Master Barry NEA’s mission to bring jazz to new generations, the ven- Harris on piano. In between the performances, the NEA erable group was joined on stage by 10-year-old trum- Jazz Masters award was given to the 2006 class. peter Tyler Lindsay, who held his own and staked a claim The artists receiving the award were clearly moved. to the NEA Jazz Masters class of 2056. Chick Corea said, upon receiving his award, “I’m The next day of the conference, the NEA held a panel encouraged now to really give it back so I’m going to on the 2006 NEA Jazz Masters. Moderated by A. B. turn up the heat.” And Tony Bennett, who received rous- Spellman, the panel included Barretto, Brookmeyer, ing applause from the audience, said, “This is amazing. DeFranco, Hubbard, and Levy. Less a panel discussion I’m overwhelmed…More than anybody else, I’d like to than a rollicking conversation centered around jazz, the thank Count Basie for teaching me how to perform.” session began with Spellman intoning, “There are no For the grand finale, both orchestras played, in a trib- stories like jazz stories.” Indeed, there were plenty of 4 “We went to the Apollo Bar, next to the Apollo Theater, to see Charlie Parker and Parker was late. We started to jam and then Charlie Parker was in the house, so we started to get off stage. Parker put his hand on my shoulder and said, ‘You stay.’ It was like being touched by the hand of God.” —Ray Barretto stories and plenty of laughter from the audience. The NEA Jazz Masters, whose careers practically The IAJE conference being an education conference, spanned the history of jazz, also shared anecdotes about the artists began by offering suggestions to young per- their influences. “The first time I saw Charlie Parker,” formers. DeFranco and Levy talked about how young said DeFranco, “I was spellbound. I couldn’t sleep at musicians needed to feel the music more, rather than night thinking about what he did.” Barretto was also just playing fast, and learn the canon. “Benny Carter awed by Parker: “We went to the Apollo Bar, next to the told me,” offered Levy, “‘I don’t know how anybody can Apollo Theater, to see Charlie Parker and Parker was improvise without knowing the melody or the words.’” late. We started to jam and then Charlie Parker was in Brookmeyer offered advice to young composers: “They the house, so we started to get off stage. Parker put his have to form their own bands to play their songs, find hand on my shoulder and said, ‘You stay.’ It was like their own venues, like the Art Ensemble of Chicago or being touched by the hand of God.” Hubbard talked the World Saxophone Quartet did. Find a place and about his first influence being Chet Baker, but “after I make a place for your music to be played.” heard Clifford Brown, when he played the trumpet, it touched me.” At the end of the hour session, the enthu- NEA Jazz Masters Chick Corea, Roy Haynes, and Ron Carter in siastic audience gave the group a standing ovation, one New York City for the 2006 NEA Jazz Masters Awards ceremony. richly deserved by all the 2006 NEA Jazz Masters. Photo: Tom Pich. 5 NEA Jazz in the Schools A New Multimedia Curriculum for High School Teachers history of jazz, integrating that story with the sweep of American social, economic, and political developments.

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