ESSAYS

This section includes essays on various jazz subjects, written by a number of writers. Contributions are welcome. Writers interested in contributing are welcome to contact the editor by filling out the form in the CONTACT tab. Photographs to illustrate those essays are welcome. Readers can click on the INDEX button for a list of articles in this folder.

MAX ALDUCA’S MONASTERY

by Ian Muldoon

August 30, 2025

I met Max Alduca at a Pocket Trio gig in Redfern in June 2021 and more recently in Bellingen, NSW, when he was touring with the group Microfiche.  On Thursday, August 21, 2025 at Melbourne’s Jazzlab he'd brought his own quintet south. He looked in very good nick whilst sprinkling joi de vivre around the club. He’s a yoga practitioner so that obviously helps in coping with the demands of touring the East Coast of Australia launching his first album Monastery (Earshift Music, 2024) a suite of originals he’s had in mind for up to ten years. I looked at him again and at the members of his quintet which included James Waples, drums; Hillary Geddes, guitar; Luke Sweeting, piano; and Michael Avgenicos, tenor and soprano sax…

JEX SAARELAHT'S 2025 ESTO-CUBIST JAZZ FESTIVAL TRIUMPH

by Ian Muldoon

September 28, 2025

On my daily Spring walk around Albert Park Lake in Melbourne, birds chittering, swans paddling, luminescent plum and peach blossoms smiling, it seems a galaxy far away from the 2025 bitter smog of hate pooling in the gutters of some minds - like the minds of neo-nazis marching in the city centre attacking First Nations people. For respite I resort to my headphones listening to Lammar Wright Sr (1907-1973) on trumpet playing New Vine Street Blues (Moten) with Bennie Moten’s Orchestra and then Geri Allen (1957-2017) playing Intermission (Williams) from her album Zodiac Suite Revisited dedicated to Mary Lou Williams (1910-1981)…

EUGENE BALL'S ELLINGTONIAN ORCHESTRA NEON LIT KLUDGE

by Ian Muldoon

October 7, 2025

What do we talk about when we talk about Edward Kennedy ‘Duke’ Ellington? If it’s the man, then we speak about elegance, sophistication, intelligence, poetic speech, and generosity of spirit. He had a profound effect on the self-image of African Americans much more so than Jackie Robinson or Louis Armstrong, both of whom filled the designated roles acceptable to American white power - the sportsman and the entertainer. Ellington had a dignity and elevated presence that was the purview of the likes of Bernstein or Copland yet if you go the world-wide web and type in greatest American conductors/composers of 20th Century music, John Williams, Jerry Gray, and Paul Weston get a tick, but Ellington is nowhere to be seen. Why oh why might that be?