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.

SIMA & THE VISIT OF DEWEY REDMAN IN 1986

by Eric Myers

The Australian, January 8, 1986

"The political economy of jazz in Sydney equates artistic standards and originality with the ability to keep a drinking crowd happy, or a wealthy audience entertained.” With these words, the Sydney Improvised Music Association (SIMA) began its provocative manifesto, published during the 1985 Festival of Sydney. It raised a few eyebrows in the jazz world. Here was a new concert entrepreneur audacious enough to distinguish between contemporary, creative or innovative jazz on the one hand and, on the other, the commercial, mainstream jazz being played in most city venues...

MARIE WILSON: A MUSICIAN’S SINGER

by Bruce Johnson

Jazz Magazine, Winter/Spring 1984

The jazz vocalists in Sydney who can actually sing, can be counted on one hand (give or take). Too often they use jazz tricks to conceal problems of voice production — poor intonation, inappropriate breathing, simple musical ignorance. Fast and flashy scatting at indeterminate pitch, bum notes which, it is presumably hoped, will be perceived as harmonic adventurousness. Much of the time, and for most of the public, the flashiness carries the day (and this applies to the performances of a lot of instrumentalists as well as singers). Everything about this LP, and everyone on it, embodies the very opposite of all these things…

MARIE WILSON: SKETCHING NUANCE ONTO A CANVAS OF SUBTLETY

by John Shand

Sydney Morning Herald, October 1, 2002

Jazz can be as oceanic as the music of John Coltrane or as neatly contained as the piano playing of Count Basie. Marie Wilson favours the latter approach. Her art is to sketch nuance onto a canvas of subtlety. The winner of this year's Mo Award for Best Jazz Singer was presenting a show called Marie Wilson sings Ella, Billie & Sarah…