JazzWeek with airplay data powered by jazzweek.com • June 5, 2006 Volume 2, Number 28 • $7.95 In This Issue: New Orleans’ National Jazz Center and Park Announced . 4 Fund Created to Benefit Ailing Hilton Ruiz. 6 Dimmed Lights Planned To Honor John Hicks. 6 Music and Industry News In Brief . 7 Reviews and Picks . 15 Real Jazz: Jazz Radio . 18 Q&A With XM Radio’s Smooth Jazz Radio. 25 MAXX MYRICK Radio page 11 Panels. 24, 29 News. 4 Charts: #1 Jazz Album – Karrin Allyson #1 Smooth Album – Brian Culbertson #1 Smooth Single – Brian Culbertson JazzWeek This Week EDITOR/PUBLISHER ver the Memorial Day weekend, I got to spend some time with my fif- Ed Trefzger teen year-old nephew. It was fascinating to watch the way he uses mu- MUSIC EDITOR Osic. He’s surrounded by it constantly, but not once in three days did he Tad Hendrickson listen to terrestrial radio. He had something like 400 megabytes of music on his laptop and select- CONTRIBUTING EDITORS ed tunes from that on his iPod mini. And when we rode in his mother’s mini- Keith Zimmerman SUV, with factory-installed Sirius, he quickly navigated from metal to blues Kent Zimmerman to Planet Jazz, each channel among his favorites. His laptop collection ran an CONTRIBUTING WRITER/ even wider gamut, from fusion, to punk, to some sort of German speed met- PHOTOGRAPHER al, to ’60s pop to some of his own electronic pieces. Although as a budding Tom Mallison young musician – adept on guitar, trombone, keys and sequencers – he might PHOTOGRAPHY be expected to have broad tastes, his use of music fits the norm for his gen- Barry Solof eration: he has diverse tastes in music, he uses the internet to discover music, and he doesn’t use the radio, which for the most part today, stinks. Founding Publisher: Tony Gasparre There’s an opportunity sitting at our feet to attract young listeners – and I include those in their twenties and thirties in that category – to jazz. How ADVERTISING: Devon Murphy do we do it? We incorporate music with interesting rhythms and sounds that Call (866) 453-6401 ext. 3 or email: [email protected] include the vernacular of younger audiences; we avoid the stodgy and sleepy; and we make radio fun (see below) and not preachy, tedious, or pedantic. Jazz SUBSCRIPTIONS: didn’t end with swing, bebop, post-bop, or fusion ... but sometimes jazz radio Free to qualified applicants can sound as if jazz is a dead art. And some DJs! I’ve met undertakers with Premium subscription: $149.00 per year, more joie de vivre. w/ Industry Access: $249.00 per year Jazz radio isn’t in trouble in markets where it’s willing to stretch and To subscribe using Visa/MC/Discover/ AMEX/PayPal go to: grow; it’s in a precarious position where it has become too dull and too pre- http://www.jazzweek.com/account/ dictable. subscribe.html ••• XM Radio’s Maxx Myrick is our radio ... er, satellite ... guy in the hot seat this week. He spoke in his interview with music editor Tad Hendrick- AIRPLAY MONITORING BY son about his philosophy of making jazz radio fun. And I’ll bet it’s a fun job – I had a chance to tour the XM studios at Jazz at Lincoln Center. It’s hard to imagine a better place to have a jazz radio studio. ••• Mediaguide This year’s JazzWeek Summit will run from Thursday, June 15 through 1000 Chesterbrook Blvd. Suite 150 Saturday, June 17, coinciding with the final three days of the Rochester In- Berwyn, PA 19312 ternational Jazz Festival. A schedule is on page 10. The host hotel will be the Rochester Clarion Riverside. Reservation information for the hotel is online JazzWeek (ISSN 1554-4338) at jazzweek.com. Registration is at jazzweek.com and a registration form is is published weekly by also included on page 30. Artist performances at the Summit include Eldar, Joe Locke/Geoff Keezer Duo, Mark Elf, Marilyn Harris, Avishai Cohen ������������� Trio, Bob Sneider/Paul Hoffman Duo and Josh Workman. 2117 Buffalo Road – Ed Trefzger, Editor Suite 317 Rochester, NY 14624 phone/fax: (866) 453-6401 [email protected] Copyright ©2006 Trefzger Media LLC jazzweek.com • June 5, 2006 JazzWeek 2 Contents June 5, 2006 News . 4 National Jazz Center and Jazz Park Announced for New Orleans . 4 Fund Created to Benefit Hilton Ruiz . 6 ‘Lights Out’ Set To Honor John Hicks . 6 Music and Industry News In Brief ... 7 Birthdays . 9 JazzWeek Summit Schedule of Events (subject to change) . 10 4 Features Industry Q&A: Maxx Myrick . 11 Reviews . 15 Trio Beyond . 15 Hank Jones & Frank Wess . 15 Roberta Gambarini . 15 Gnappy . 16 11 Ray Mantilla . 17 Jazz Charts . 18 Jazz Album Chart . 19 Jazz Add Dates . 20 Jazz Current CDs . 21 Jazz Radio Panel . 24 Smooth Jazz Charts . 25 Smooth Album Chart . 26 18 Smooth Singles Chart. 27 Smooth Current CDs . 28 Smooth Radio Panel . 29 Closing Number Just Five of Many From Grant Green . 31 25 Cover Photo: Maxx Myrick (photo provided by XM Radio) JazzWeek Volume 2 Number 28 jazzweek.com • June 5, 2006 JazzWeek 3 News National Jazz Center and Jazz Park Announced for New Orleans NEW ORLEANS -- Plans have been tality. tive material for this complex and im- announced to create a 20-acre perfor- Several buildings will be relocated portant project,” said Mayne. “It is mance arts park in New Orleans that to create a great lawn that stretches six now that our work will begin in ear- is to be anchored by a new National city blocks, creating an open-air Jazz nest -- to engage and collaborate with Jazz Center. The plans were created Park. the community and with the project’s by Pritzker Prize-winning architect “The advisory board has created a stakeholders to further refine our ini- Thom Mayne, and his firm, Morpho- bold plan that transforms the Hyatt tial concepts in order to most effective- sis, and also call for an outdoor audi- area into a world-class urban area and ly and sensitively begin to rebuild this torium, new city government build- destination. Rather than an under-uti- key part of the great city of New Or- ings, a new civil courts building and lized adjunct of disparate sports, ho- leans.” major redevelopment of the Hyatt Re- tel and city facilities, the Hyatt Jazz “The new Hyatt Jazz District is a gency site and announced by Governor District will be a grand destination transformative project that will change Kathleen Blanco, New Orleans Mayor that provides the citizenry with an un- the very nature of New Orleans for the Ray Nagin and the Hyatt District Re- matched urban cultural experience,” better, much as the Superdome did birth Advisory Board. said Geller. a little more than 30 years ago,” said Laurence Geller, chief executive The National Jazz Center will re- Wm. Raymond Manning, the lead lo- officer of Strategic Hotels & Resorts, side in an iconic building designed by cal architect in planning and design of the Hyatt Regency’s owner, said the Thom Mayne. It will house the New the district. “Unlike one iconic build- plans were created in consultation with Orleans Jazz Orchestra (NOJO) as ing, however, the planned Hyatt Jazz an advisory board of leading New Or- well as performance space, studios, District will integrate our civic infra- leans and international experts from classrooms, a library and offices. structure of courts and city hall with a fields including architecture and plan- “The plans and studies that we major tourist destination and park that ning, the arts, economics and hospi- have done to date will be the genera- (continued on page 5) �������������������������������������� ���������������������������������������������������������������� ������������������������������ ����������������������������������������������������������������� ����������������������� ���������������������������������������������������� ������������������������������������������� ���������������������������������������������� �������������������������������� ������������������������ ������������������������ ��������������������������������������������������������� ��������������������������������������������������������� ���������������������������� ���������������������������� jazzweek.com • June 5, 2006 JazzWeek 4 News National Jazz Center And Park (continued from page 4) Strategic Hotels & Resorts An architect’s rendering of a portion of the National Jazz Center and Jazz Park slated for the Hyatt and Superdome area of New Orleans. will link to other areas of the City, in- will be significantly altered and im- ture and infrastructure into a design cluding the Quarter, Convention Cen- proved to accommodate the Jazz Cen- that creates for the first time a world- ter and Riverfront,” Manning said. ter. The Hyatt was devastated by Hur- class National Jazz Center and park. Irvin Mayfield, artistic director of ricane Katrina, but its superstructure Creation of a National Jazz Cen- NOJO, said, “The new National Jazz remained relatively intact. ter and park will transform the Hyatt Center and Park will be the catalyst Estimated costs for the Nation- area into a year-round destination for that stimulates the revitalization of the al Jazz Center and Jazz Park are esti- tourists and people who work in the New Orleans economy rightfully cen- mated at $716 million and are expect- area. For the first time, jazz will have tered around jazz, our most abundant ed to generate more than $6 billion in a permanent home in New Orleans, natural resource. This will be the finest economic benefits over 20 years. An with facilities that will spur a rebirth structure for jazz in the world.” economic study commissioned by the of world-class jazz not far from Louis “The new National Jazz Center can Board and conducted by Dr. William Armstrong’s childhood neighborhood. be a focal point for rebuilding our tal- Oakland of Tulane University and The park will start at the foot of ent pool of jazz musicians as well as Dr. Wade Ragas of the University of the National Jazz Center and extend other artists, cultural troupes and en- New Orleans estimates that the plan north across green space six blocks trepreneurs that the Cultural Com- will generate almost 14,000 man years to a new, public outdoor amphithe- mittee of the Mayor’s Bring New Or- of construction work and create more ater.