contributions

Jazz writers are invited to contribute to this section of the website. All interested in contributing are welcome to contact the editor by filling out the form in the CONTACT tab. Photographs are welcome and should be attached. Readers can click on the INDEX button for a list of articles in this folder.

JACK MITCHELL RECEIVES OAM

 by Ciara Bastow

Lithgow Mercury, February 7, 2019

Hundreds of jazz records line his office, newspaper clippings cover his desk, photographs of jazz bands from another time and books that he has written are laid out proudly. Lithgow resident Jack Mitchell has dedicated over 40 years to the jazz scene in Australia, making sure that its legacy lives on and is remembered, which is why he has been awarded an OAM…

HOW ‘STRANGE FRUIT’ KILLED BILLIE HOLIDAY

by Brandon Weber

The Progressive, February 20, 2018

Strange Fruit may have been written by American songwriter and poet Abel Meeropol (aka Lewis Allen), but ever since Billie Holiday sang the three brief stanzas to music in 1937, she’s owned it. Holiday, born Eleanora Fagan, said she always thought of her father when she sang Strange Fruit. He died at age 39 after being denied medical treatment at a Texas “whites only” hospital. Because of that memory, Holiday was reluctant to perform the song, but did so anyway to tell people about the reality of life as a black man in America…

FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION WITH A GROOVE

Ken Burns interviews Wynton Marsalis

Excerpt from the book “Jazz: A History of America’s Music”, by Geoffrey C Ward and Ken Burns

Wynton Marsalis is the best-known jazz musician in America. Trumpet player, composer, educator, and creative director of Jazz at Lincoln Center, he was born October 18, 1961, in New Orleans. His father, Ellis, is a jazz pianist and teacher. His mother, Dolores Ferdinand Ellis, is a home economics major and the mother of six sons, four of whom are musicians. Marsalis acted as Senior Creative advisor for the Jazz film project, and Ken Burns spoke with him on camera several times over the course of the five years it took to complete it…