DISCHORDS

JazzChord, the newsletter of the jazz co-ordination program based in Sydney, New South Wales, commenced in magazine form with  Edition No 11 (Jan/Feb, 1993). In Edition No 15 (Sep/Oct, 1993) a column called 'DisChords', usually written by Jazz Co-ordinator Eric Myers, was introduced to canvass issues that were currently alive in the jazz community. Generally it was a forum for the editor of JazzChord to air his personal views, and to document the achievements of the jazz co-ordination program. Additional photos, not possible in JazzChord, have been included.

DISCHORDS

A column by Jazz Co-ordinator Eric Myers

JazzChord, Jun/Jul, 1997

In the last JazzChord I mentioned that Wynton Marsalis received the 1997 Pulitzer Prize for Music for his work, Blood on the Fields. In the Masterpiece program, shown on SBS on April 21, 1997, this work was described by Andrea Stretton as an epic opera. I don’t want to buy into the pro and anti-Marsalis arguments here, except to say that his music - where he primarily should be judged - has always seemed to me to be full of interest and beauty…

DISCHORDS

A column by Jazz Co-ordinator Eric Myers

JazzChord, Aug/Sep, 1997

I was interested to read the report (Sydney Morning Herald, 14/7/97) that the trombonist and bandleader Glenn Miller did not die in a plane crash after all, but died of a heart attack in a Paris brothel in 1944. A German journalist Udo Ulikotte apparently unearthed the information in US secret service files while researching a book on Germany’s BND intelligence agency, and published it in the German newspaper Bild…

DISCHORDS

A column by Jazz Co-ordinator Eric Myers

JazzChord, Oct/Nov, 1997

There has been some controversy over JazzChord’s two articles on jazz in the media by a writer using the byline ‘A Special Correspondent. (See Jun/Jul, and Aug/Sep, 1997 editions). Why did that writer not have the courage to put his or her name to the articles? Well, as editor of JazzChord, I have no problem with the fact that his or her identity needed to be withheld. Some people wear a number of hats in a very small jazz world, and it is entirely conceivable that our ‘special correspondent’ could be severely disadvantaged in other roles, wearing another hat, if his or her identity were known...