Passages

[jbeall]

Harry L. Ettlinger, one of the real-life "Monuments Men"

[L.A.]

Tony Joe White

[flyonthewall2983]

James "Whitey" Bulger

[hearthesilence]

Man, those guys let nothing slide.

[hearthesilence]

Hardy Fox, co-founder and primary composer of the Residents.

[The Fanciful Norwegian]

Louis Cha/Jin Yong, author of much-adapted wuxia novels like Legend of the Condor Heroes, The Deer and the Cauldron, The Smiling, Proud Wanderer, etc.

[mfunk9786]

Willie McCovey discussion moved here

[mfunk9786]

Paul Zimmerman, aka Sports Illustrated's "Dr. Z"

[Brian C]

Dr Z was a true great. Wasn’t afraid to ruffle feathers while also quick to praise when deserved. Worked to describe what really happened in football games instead of trying to advance inane narratives. By all accounts, would frequently go to war to advocate for overlooked Hall of Fame candidates.

I’ve missed his columns since they ended abruptly mid-season over a decade ago when he had a major stroke. His weekly in-season power rankings were always great, but I find myself missing his annual broadcaster rankings more than anything.

[Buttery Jeb]

Raymond Chow

[Polybius]

By all accounts, would frequently go to war to advocate for overlooked Hall of Fame candidates.

Or against ones that he didn't like.

[Lemmy Caution]

jazz trumpeter Roy Hargrove dies at age 49
A very talented musician who had health issues.
He was at the forefront of talented young lions in the 90's, along with Christian McBride (bass) and James Carter (Sax) (and slightly later Sarah Morrow (trombone), who revered the tradition but also could handle avant garde and new directions.

And that leads me to a question that's been on my mind. Is jazz dead?
There was a significant jazz mini-revival in the 90's that Hargrove was part of. Exciting young players with great talent playing and recording genuine jazz. Jazz at Lincoln Center, expensive new jazz clubs like Dizzy's Coca Cola Room.

Then we got a swing revival I think late 90's leaking into the 2000's. Along with a jazz ballad renaissance, with singers like Diana Krall, Stacey King, Jane Monheit, Holly Cole, Nnenna Freelon, plus a surge of older established pop stars like Linda Ronstadt, Sinead O'Connor et al putting out jazz standard recordings. There was also the marketing of so called acid jazz which sometimes did and sometimes didn't have much to do with jazz.

But all that seems more than a decade in the past, and far removed from today. Jazz seems to have receded entirely from the culture. I'm sure it still exists here and there in clubs and record collections and such, but it seems to have faded for evermore. The moribund recording industry certainly hasn't helped music in general, let alone an older style such as jazz. I'm wondering if a film like Whiplash aroused any interest in jazz or just confirms the autopsy.

I'm in China and maybe I've just missed it, but are there any young lions of jazz out there today, is any type of jazz seen as still relevant, is jazz still alive in some form??

[Izo]

Hargrove was a giant (and don't forget Joshua Redman and Brad Mehldau from that 90s group, two of the best improvisational talents I've ever heard), but in recent years there have been a number of talented jazz groups like The Bad Plus, but a trio of newer bands from the UK - GoGo Penguin, Sons of Kismet, and especially Mammal Hands - are doing wonderful things with improvisational music. They may not swing, but I feel like jazz is doing just fine.

Edit: Also, check out Vijay Iyer. He's the best "young lion" that comes to mind and he's a brilliant musician.

[hearthesilence]

I'm wondering if a film like Whiplash aroused any interest in jazz or just confirms the autopsy.

I don't think that film did anything for jazz, and even if it did, I'd be skeptical if it was a lasting impact. Think about Ken Burns's misbegotten documentary series for PBS: despite it's many, many faults as a poor, somewhat sensationalist and very biased critical history of jazz, it gave the music its best marketing push in decades, and sales for jazz records did see a substantial increase. But that faded within a few years - worse, the market plummeted, and it never recovered with many jazz labels waving the white flag by folding up or converting most (if not all) of their back catalog to streaming and burn-on-demand only.

Chazelle is an excellent craftsman, but I said this before elsewhere, his ideas (or really his viewpoint) can be a bit meat-headed, and his views on music are easily the worst example of this. I enjoyed La La Land, but the commentary on music is simple and narrow-minded, so much that I wished Kamasi Washington would crash into the picture and upturn everything he was trying to say about jazz and its current relation to popular music.

Hargrove was notable for playing on some landmark recordings outside of jazz too, and in many ways Washington has done the same to a much greater extent, as seen by his work with Kendrick Lamar.

[domino harvey]

If I had to choose between someone who was passionate about Jazz but maybe didn't have the fullest breadth of nuance or complexities, like Ryan Gosling in La La Land, or someone who exhaustingly nitpicked and obsessively derided depictions of Jazz in popular movies for failing their purity tests, there is no fucking contest which one I'd side with

[Lemmy Caution]

Hargrove was a giant (and don't forget Joshua Redman and Brad Mehldau from that 90s group, two of the best improvisational talents I've ever heard), but in recent years there have been a number of talented jazz groups like The Bad Plus, but a trio of newer bands from the UK - GoGo Penguin, Sons of Kismet, and especially Mammal Hands - are doing wonderful things with improvisational music. They may not swing, but I feel like jazz is doing just fine.

Edit: Also, check out Vijay Iyer. He's the best "young lion" that comes to mind and he's a brilliant musician.

Yes, Redman and Mehldau too. I also left out saxophonist Chris Potter and trumpeter Terence Blanchard.

I've never heard of any of those bands. The name Vijay Iyer is somewhat familiar, but don't think I've heard anything of his. So I'll give a listen.

The other day I was checking out some Bria Skonberg on youtube. She's Canadian, now based in Brooklyn, around 35 years old. Favors old standards, plays a Louis Armstrong inspired trumpet and sings sultry standards. One clip she's seated next to Woody Allen at the Cafe Carlisle. Another she's doing a fun raucous version of Janis Joplin's Mercedes Benz. She has a nice stage presence. Here's her doing Bye Bye Blackbird on a street corner in Vail (the vid is mostly a Vail promo interspersed with the band). Her last album was crowdfunded. So she's one of the only this-decade jazz performers I'm familiar with.
I need to check out her albums.

[hearthesilence]

If I had to choose between someone who was passionate about Jazz but maybe didn't have the fullest breadth of nuance or complexities, like Ryan Gosling in La La Land who also exhaustingly nitpicked and obsessively derided the latest bands for failing their purity tests, there is no fucking contest which one I'd side with

Fixed.

[Big Ben]

If I had to choose between someone who was passionate about Jazz but maybe didn't have the fullest breadth of nuance or complexities, like Ryan Gosling in La La Land, or someone who exhaustingly nitpicked and obsessively derided depictions of Jazz in popular movies for failing their purity tests, there is no fucking contest which one I'd side with

I very much agree with this. No True Scotsman is a thing and I've always detested the completely asinine purity tests set forward by individuals who like gatekeep.

[Caligula]

Ivan March, longtime critic for Gramophone magazine, as well as editor of the sadly departed Penguin Guide to Classical Music

[GaryC]

Eleanor Witcombe, who adapted The Getting of Wisdom and My Brilliant Career for the screen, plus stage and television work. She was 95.

[MichaelB]

I think all the big names (Kazimierz Karabasz, Tomasz Stanko, Piotr Szulkin) were flagged up here at the time, but here's a list of every Polish film and TV professional who died over the previous twelve months.

[MichaelB]

One from a few months ago that I've only just spotted: French director Claude Bernard-Aubert, who died on 25 June at the age of 88.

Probably best known in respectable circles for the 1973 Jean Gabin thriller L'affaire Domenici, Bernard-Aubert is perhaps rather better known in less respectable circles for being one of the most prolific directors contributing to France's so-called golden age of porn, making several 35mm hardcore films a year between 1976 and 1987 under the anagrammatic pseudonym Burd Tranbaree.

[Dylan]

Composer Francis Lai, probably best known for Love Story (for which he won an Oscar) and A Man and a Woman (as well as most of Claude Lelouch's subsequent films), he also scored such films as Emmanuelle II, Hannibal Brooks, Mayerling, Anima Persa, Bilitis, and many more. I've always loved his music.

[bearcuborg]

Keith Wilder of Heatwave

[CJG]

Douglas Rain