Women's History Month: Women in Jazz w/ Eric DiVito

It is the fourth of March. Being Frank kicks off March with a special edition of our program to celebrate Women's History Month. We're going to feature some of the great women from the world of jazz music. Generally, when we think of the great names and the history of that music, we tend to come up with only men. But that does a disservice to the many great women who added so much to that uniquely American music. Well,

my guests and I intend to fix that. Welcome back for some intelligent conversation and a little bit of great music. He's a musician educator and jazz historian and a contributor here at Being Frank Welcome back, Eric Devido, Thanks again for joining us.

And you know, so you see it when we study Beethoven in Mozart. If I ask people to name, you know, twenty composers, more people will probably name Bach and Beethoven and Mozart before thinking of maybe Fanny Mendelssohn or Clara Schumann or the women. So, you know, I just think it kind of falls in line with the overrepresentation of of you know, male figures, and that's just kind of something that I think is kind of dominated society throughout time.

You know, I don't think it's initially you know, it probably started out kind of unconscious maybe, but you know, the more that people champion for women's rights, the more we started to see representation by women. And of course that's more of a fairly modern thing. So it's funny as you move from classical music, which you know, especially from the earlier periods you know, the Baroque and the Romantic or the classical period. In the Romantic period, you

see less female composers. When you get to jazz, which

is more modern, you start seeing more. And then when you move into later in the twentieth century with pop music, and you start to see even more, you know, so I think it really just kind of shows as we progress throughout the time and we champion more equal rights, we see you know, more women being celebrated and contributing, no different than we've seen, you know, when it comes to African American representation amongst you know, the different genres.

As we kind of champion towards more equality, we see them represented more. There's a lot of there's there tends to be, just like anything else, a lot of systemic you know, inequality that exists that we're kind of breaking down. So now bringing it, you know, per se to jazz, you know, I think it's and I think if you ask any jazz musician, especially one that you know from a while ago or somebody that went to school for jazz, you know, you it's it's always been common to see

have more male peers than females. I think that by its nature, jazz tends to be a bit competitive. It has a little bit more maybe male traits associated with

some of it. I don't want to say all of it, because you know, there's a lot of uh, you know, if we're talking about feminimity, feminimity in terms of musical characteristics that's certainly present in jazz, as you know, But there's a lot of kind of like alpha male things that I think have traditionally been associated with jazz it can you know it bebop, especially as a tradition of being cutthroat and being kind of maybe more having some

more male alpha qualities. That's not to say that there weren't females though that we're going to talk about today, that we're really champions of the genre, and in many cases there were many females that were leaders and really innovated the genre. But I feel, like anything else, when it comes to women, this often happens quietly behind the scenes. I feel like, you know, my wife always reminds me

of this. Women have a funny way of kind of leading from behind the scenes and sometimes fooling men into thinking they're in charge when they're Often maybe women are a little more savvy that way in many cases. So there have been some really great women who when it comes to the early the blues and jazz, and then

of course more so in in rock and roll. But yeah, I think the genre itself is very much associated anyways with some more you know, male types of stereotypes, you know, and jazz especially being born in underground clubs and speakeasies and places that you know, during prohibition, maybe we're kind of thought out as being not so uh, you know, family friendly and things like that, and I feel like women were kind of not you know, it was more

unexpected maybe during that time to see women and being associated.

But it's funny, you know, I think back to when I was in school studying jazz, and there were so many of my peers you know, were male, but there was a few you know, women, and it's almost it's almost like sometimes they have a harder you know, like in many cases with females and societies when to make it to the top is even harder for many of the females because they have to push through such a

male dominated society. So when you see them there, there tended to be a lot of respect, and you know, maybe that was misplaced respect, or maybe that's a bit stereotype, but I remember all of the women really gaining a lot of respect because they had to sift through a lot of men's crap to kind of get to the spot that they were and earn that respect, you know. And I think you see that in a lot of fields, not just jazz or music in general.

not only music, but on culture. And we started in eighteen eighty six with my RAINI tell us, Yeah.

to record and tour nationally. She started her career in like nineteen twenty three, and she really helped transition the rural Southern blues into these like more urban vaudeville kind of circuits and the emerging recording industry. So she really helped kind of elevate this very you know, folk like southern blues thing into this more national, you know, culture

and form of entertainment. And for that, you know, I think we really owe a lot of just elevating the art form of the blues to her, but also her unique style, you know, was a She had this powerful contra alto voices, deep low voice. She was very theatrical and dramatic, and her lyrics are very candid, you know, and again going back to what we kind of expect

from men versus women in society. When you hear My Rainy sing and you hear her deep, you know, voice and her guttural sounds and then the candid lyrics that she's singing, you know, things that were you know, maybe

a little bit taboo and things like that. I think it really spoke about her ability to kind of transcend genre and also her phrasing, her emotion that she brought to the music that really kind of laid the foundation later for you know, everything that blues and jazz musicians were looking to do to take their having their own unique voice and interpretation. She was doing that, you know, very early in her career.

in the recording industry. So it's a great movie if you want to check it out. But it's not like a horse historical portrayal per se.

successful black recording artist of the nineteen twenties. She had a very commanding projection, and she you know, had this dramatic storytelling through her music, and that also really kind

of shaped jazz phrasing. And also I think, you know, something that popped up a lot in that I think of a lot both with Maraini and Bessie Smith, is this kind of idea and then you see it later with other singers like Ella Fitzgerald and Sarah Vaughan, this idea of like vocal authority where it's that you're commanding this presence and you're clearly like leading, you know, and

this and the music is revolving around your presence. And you know, these these women were doing that at a very early time and something I think wasn't easy for a woman woman to do is in the nineteen twenties. But Bessie Smith really had also this great vocal authority and she recorded. You know, she did a lot of recording sessions with all these great leading jazz musicians at the time, including Lewis Armstrong and her work, I think also really helped solidify the vocalists the singer as kind

of this central interpretive force in jazz. A lot of people later, you know, on their instruments would emulate singers, you know, people initially Now it's funny now with more modern jazz, voices often emulate instruments, but initially instrument like Louis Armstrong when he was first solo, he was emulating singers, you know, he was trying to phrase his trumpet how he would sing in other singers, and I think Bessie Smith is one of his examples of these singers is vocal,

you know, presence that instrumentalists were trying to emulate.

I think that's a great example of that. You know, it's funny with these really old blues recordings of course, and early jazz of course. Like the technology back then and the recording technology was you know, so you know crude. So there's often this kind of like out of tune warbleness that you always hear with these old recordings, And sometimes I feel like not that it does it a disservice.

Sometimes it has a nice vibe to it, you know, it has this vintage vibe, but you know, I'm always thinking like it's it definitely would have sounded much different in person, just because you're not you know, you're hearing it through this dated recording technology that in a way has become associated with the time period.

encouraged Louis Armstrong to begin his solo career. And I didn't know that part actually when I was when I was looking up some of this stuff, how influential she was in terms of his solo career. You know, I know Louis Armstrong was course big, and you know, I think maybe his his you know, he went from being this great famous musician to being this like mega icon, you know, the equivalent of a superstar as a soloist,

of course. And I guess she had sure I was gonna say, Taylor Swift and okay, right now, keep it in the woman the women's theme going here, But you know, I guess she had really a lot to do with that influence, you know. So so anyways, but this was also a time when women band leaders were very rare, you know, as we said, especially and you know, when you're talking about being a band leader. There's more than

just being a great musician. You know, there's dealing with clashing personalities and annoying men and annoying people, you know, and you know, I could tell you being a band leader comes with his own its own set of headaches. You know. Sometimes it might pay more, but sometimes it's nice to just show up, play and go home and all the headaches or somebody else's problem. So, you know, she was doing that in a time when when doing it were kind of rare. But also she really played a big role.

you know, has more or less been kind of associated that instrumentation is associated with the genre and we often think, you know, Lewis Armstrong being central to that, and you know, according to what I'm learning about here, also Lil Harden Armstrong, who was doing a lot of maybe arranging on her own time or maybe behind the scenes too, so just as important, another great example I think of the kind of the quiet, behind the scenes influence that women often had in music.

She was an arranger and a piano player, and I didn't know this, you know, I knew how involved she kind of was and how she kind of transitioned into bebob, but she actually was a mentor to these bebop pioneers like Dizzy Gillespie and Delonious Monk, which I didn't I wasn't that aware of, you know, So she really is starting to kind of you know, maybe maybe we could think of her as one of the first well known women to really bridge from the swing period into more

modern jazz or bebop, you know, where all these giants came out of, like Charlie Parker and Disney Gillespie and Delonious Monk and all these people like that. So she had such a great presence and these guys were giants, and so, you know, learning that she mentored these guys, I think says a lot. Again, behind all these great men was this woman, like, you know, being so influential and Mary the Williams. Also she composed the cool, like large scale works which could almost like quasi you know,

orchestral classical, you know, genre bending kind of stuff. She had something called the Zodiac Suite and these sacred jazz masses. So she was really bridging multiple errors kind of jazz evolution, you know, not unlike people like Duke Ellington would do later and even you know soun Ron, these like modern kind of musicians that were blending and transcending genre. Well, she was kind of pioneering some of that way back when.

So yeah, and there's a great tune called Rollam that you're listening to.

to drugs and prostitution and all of these things. Society really, you know, dealt her a tough hand, a tough deck, and so you know, she she dealt with it through music. And to me, lots of people play the blues, but they don't all have the blues. They don't all experience the blues. You know, some people are good at faking it and things. But Billy Holliday really encompassed the blues, and it was almost like she couldn't help. Every note she plays is dripping with the blues. And that's one

of the things that always stood out with me. And you know, compared to Ma Rainey and compared to Bessie Smith, I don't always think of her as having this commanding, powerful voice. She kind of had this, you know, she had this very unique voice. You know, whether it was the elements of life taking a toll on her physically and things like that. But she had this very nuanced voice and it was to me maybe more introverted, almost like there was she always left, there was always something unsaid.

You can always feel this kind of emotional distress in my opinion coming out of Billie Holly, and it was like she couldn't help but be so authentic. There was no way she was faking anything, even when she was singing a happy song, you know, in a your key and an upbeat standard. To me, it was like it was always the Blues, and it was always had this element of sadness to it, and I think that really

encompasses what the blues is, you know. You know, of course she has her epic recording of Strange Truth, and I don't know if you know anybody's not familiar with

Strange Fruit. I don't want to give it a spoiler alert, but it's a pretty dark song that really ties into a lot of you know, a lot of symbolism and compared to you know, correct a lot of really racial and racially terrible things, and it's you know, it's a poem and it's a really to me, it's a poem with this beautiful hauntingly terrible ending, but at the same time it's kind of like this beautifully weaved poem. You know, it's like you're seeing it through the eyes of the singer.

It's and it's haunting and it's terrible and beautiful and horrible all at the same time, which to me is you know, that's what this music does at its best. And also her you know, she has this famous version of God Blessed the Child. It was one of the standards she always sing would sing and it's it's almost like she's singing to you know, to you in a way more so I feel like than a lot of

other singers. It was like she could have been singing to nobody, or she could have been singing to everybody, and it wouldn't really change how how you hear it. So I just think her music is some of the most kind of commanding, but not in a overly uh in an extroverted way. It's almost like in an introverted way, she draws you in and you can't help but you know, intently listen to every every nuance that she's singing.

is actually about. It kind of you could see it in their eyes when it kind of clicks, and it's very kind of like transformative in a way. Yeah, Billy Holidays to me kind of the the giant of you know, jazz and blues singing, but in a very reserved, genuine way. I guess the word I like to use very is like authentic. That's authentic. There was it was just so

real exactly. She wasn't interested in the in you know, when you look at somebody like Bessie Smith or Ella Fitzgerald, who were very theatrical, and that's not in any way to devalue the showmanship part of it, but I feel like that wasn't Billie Holiday's concerned intent. It's just about authentic, you know, communication, and it's perfect.

scat improviser with her voice. And you know, we talked earlier about instrumentalists really mimicking the voice in jazz, right, because when you try to find your voice on your instrument, you're really going back to you know, trying to mimic

the voice. But I feel like Ella Fitzgerald's really popularized using her voice to imitate instruments, you know, because now you know, she she's coming from a time you know, earlier, during the swing period, but she was performing all the way into you know, the later part of the twentieth century with modern jazz and and of course bebop earlier on, and she was playing with a lot of bebop musicians who were playing these very fast, technically dazzling bebop phrases

with you know, chromatic harmony, and she was doing those things. She was emulating that on her voice, which is technically, you know, pretty amazing. Sometimes vocalists, I feel like, get a bad rap. Sometimes it's warranted about you know, not being as maybe knowledgeable when it comes to harmony and theory, because you know, and sometimes jazz instrumentalists kind of are really more into that, and a lot of vocalists don't

need to be into that or aren't. But Elifitzgerald's was really acutely aware of, you know, a lot of these more advanced harmonic things that bebop musicians were doing, and she would emulate them with her voice. And I always thought that was really cool. You know, when I think of some of my favorite scat singers, I think of Lewis Armstrong, of course, and then I think of Ella Fitzgerald.

more so than others became she could be associated. Of course, I think the example I gave you was how High the Moon? You know, it's probably she probably did that, I don't want to say at every gig, but the crowd kind of expected Ella fitzgeral version of how High the Moon, and she would just you know, go take it way out and really go, you know, go lots

of places with her scatsing. But she really helped that established a Great American Songbook too, as this, you know, such a popular thing, and I think she helped elevate you know, in general, helped jazz kind of come out of the I don't you know folk music category or maybe the you know, she helped bring it to I think art, you know, the level of an art music.

I think she had a lot to do with that too, where audiences who weren't musicians really understood how technically and musically superior it was.

So yeah, great, great record. And you could hear you know, she she had that thing that Louis Armstrong had, that showmanship. She had the crowd in the palm of her hand. You know, she would joke with the crowd. You know, she wasn't worried about messing up. You loved when Ella Fitzgerald messed up. You loved when there was a mistake because it was like funny. She would joke and play it off and she would turn it into something great and every yeah, and it was like anything could happen.

It was very I think people people went to see that too. Just as great as she was, it was fun. You know, you didn't. Sometimes you watch these jazz conscious and it's a little bit serious and oh and don't clink your glass and Ella like when you go here, Ella, it was fun. I mean she was having fun. She didn't. She just wanted to see where it was gonna go. And she you know, you could. You felt that you got that energy off of her.

and flawless. You know, when you listen to Ela Fitzgerald, she's great and technically the thing she was doing, but I feel like sarahvon On just had this more beautiful instrument, almost like an opera singer might, but she also had

this great knowledge of bebop kind of fluency. So she was doing these things and she had this beautifully rich kind of a I feel like maybe her phrasing was more sophisticated in a way, not to say that other singers were less sophisticated, but she was really thinking, I think, a little bit more harmonically sophisticated and tone wise, more like maybe an opera singer might, but it was so very you know, beautifully you know, in beautiful jazz music.

But I think she was a little more you know, using more modern jazz harmony and really mastering or show showcasing the technical mastery and tone of her voice. And she just had this amazing range. When you hear a sing like her recording of Misty, if you if you hear the listeners, check it out. Just you got to check out her rain and her the depth of where she goes with it is really intense. She's just kind of always been one of my favorite jazz singers and she's just a great one to check out.

not a household name. She was not somebody that probably the audience even necessarily came to see.

just really like, it's like, who is this person? And yet she's so influential and so important, And I just love that. I love when people do that. I love people who are these kind of quiet, unsung heroes. And it's great to kind of learn about somebody new. And then as you start going down the rabbit hole being like, wow, you know, I started finding these cool recordings and like I said, I don't even know, I've never I had never heard of her name and heard a jazz musician

speak her name. But yet she so right there in the mix with all of these jazz giants, and so I found her very inspirational.

great use of advanced harmony. And but also you know, she blended bebop with all these Japanese musical influences, and she had this like acclaimed big band. She really helped expand jazz to this kind of globe, have this global voice. And you know, she worked with I think she was married right to Lou Tobaccan. I think they're they're married and she so they would work together. And Lu Tobaccan

is this great woodwind player. He play all the horns and flute, and they collaborated a lot, but Tichiko was the piano player and writing most of the compositions. And her band is just phenomenal. I mean, if it's like I remember just from hearing it being totally drawn in, that's I think how I really got into the modern

big band. And I like a lot of these modern big bands, like Maria Schneider Orchestra, who I think we'll mention later the Village Band Guard Orchestra, and you know, they come from that tradition, the older bands, from the Count Basie Band to the Thad Jones Meluspan. But I feel like to Shiko Aki Yoshi's work really influenced a lot of these modern band sounds and arranging and she's just so unique and I love it.

was very emotionally authentic. She's almost is like kind of this interesting storyteller and singer at the same time poet, and I feel like when I listen to her music, it's part jazz, part poetry, part freestyle, you know, impromptu storytelling. She also you know, going back and forth between using her voice like an instrument. So just really really important.

I think influence and so so such a strong voice, you know, during the Civil rights era and uh, which jazz you know, was a central part of you know, when I think of musicians like Charles Mingus or At Coleman, musician Eric Dolphie, you know, musicians that were also using jazz kind of as a platform to make political statements, I feel like Abby Lincoln really also belongs in that category.

We're honoring the women of jazz for Women's History Month right here on Being Frank. Don't go anywhere. Got a brief commercial break. We're back with more, so don't go anywhere yet.

iHeart Radio and all the others. And because every Being Frank is archived, you can listen to any of our programs anytime you like. You can find a link to Being Frank on the Hudson River Radio Facebook page or at our website Hudsonriverradio dot com. Just click and you're there. Okay, we're back with our very special guest, Eric DeVito, and we are honoring the women of jazz for Women's History Month. And we've gone through a rather extensive list so far

and we're going to continue. And next up is Carla Blay. Tell us about Carla Eric.

You know, she's this beautiful, beautiful piano player, and she's very kind of I always found her music to be full of all these great surprises, and she's kind of unassuming and very quiet. You know, she wasn't this big personality, maybe compared to somebody like Ella Fitzgerald or some of

these other, you know, really personality forward personas. But Carla Blair, I just think her music is so beautiful and different and she just unique, you know, and avant garde jazz is a very you know, acquired taste for a lot of people, and I think she really does it, did it? You know, she really put her own stamp on the music. One of my favorite tunes actually is this tune of hers called Lawns and It's and it's actually just the recording I have from it. I used to do it

at gigs. After I heard it, I was so inspired by It's ah and It's. It's one of the more less avant garde things actually that I recall listening of hers. But it's just really beautiful and kind of like this understatedly sophisticated. I don't know if that's a weird. If that's a weird, what do you call it? Dichotomy understatedly

sophisticated things. The piece of music, you know, it's beautiful, there's so many more layers to it than you actually notice, and then you know, especially when you start digging into the music. But also she had some very app on guard you know, things too that she did and you didn't see a lot of or I didn't always know when I think of avant garde jazz, you know, you always might think of late Coltrane and Burnette Coleman and Eric Dolphie and uh Son Raw and things like that,

and you don't always think of women. But Carla Blay was really influential in the with her avant garde jazz. She has a great, great composition called sing Me Softly of the Blues. So it's a really great women women women composer that I think maybe also like a lot of jazz musicians know, but not a lot of non jazz musicians are as familiar.

loved her so much. And it just as much as it as it went in and out of all these genres, it did so with jazz. It's funny, my first experience with Joni Mitchell was through her recordings with jazz musicians, so I kind of heard that first, and maybe in a way that's what kind of got me interested in her. And then I sort of explored all of the amazing, you know, genius that she was and all the other things.

But yeah, so she's known as this singer songwriter of course, but you know, every one of Joni Mitchell's songs to me is this very unique composition and part of that As a guitarist, I'm always fascinated because she used so many unique guitar non standard guitar tunings, you know, and it's like you can't play a lot of her music correctly if you don't know the different tunings that she used and they're not these standard obvious tunings and a lot of that, you know, after if you read some

of her some of her biographies and things, you learned that she had polio as a child, and she had a physical issue with her hand, and she couldn't play the guitar conventionally without pain. So she learned to change the tunings around to get make it easier for her to get a lot of these harmonies and chords. But in doing so, she discovered and invented all of these new interesting tunings that are far more interesting, and they're just as an important part of her songs as the

songs herself, like these beautiful tunings. So anyways, she's like, you know, I like to think for she's a composer when her songs are just as compositional to me, whether it's just her by herself with a guitar or with all these other musicians. And her music always encompassed to me, even if it wasn't something that was traditionally jazz, she approached it to me like a jazz musician in terms of improvisation, in terms of structure and form, in terms

of collaboration with other musicians. So I always found that she I felt her music was very much drawn to jazz, but she also collaborated with these jazz giants, Charles Mingus, Wayne Shorter, some of my you know, Pat Mactheney, Jocko Pastorius, Michael Brecker. And that's actually how I kind of got into listening to her. And you know, it's funny. When I was in college, I remember this masterclass with Michael Brecker,

one of the you know, the greatest saxophonists. He died in the early two thousands, but I remember him coming. Maybe it was like nineteen ninety nine and two thousand and he came and gave this masterclass and it was cool. We had a chance after listening to him play, you know,

he gave a great concert. We had this like he had like a Q and A and I remember him saying some of the most challenging and rewarding experiences he had was working with Joni Mitchell, and she would tell and he was a giant, you know, even back you know, he was a jazz giant, of course, but when he was younger working with Joni Mitchell, he was telling I remember him telling us how she would always remind him, you know, because she had a lot she was working

with people like Michael Brecker, who was technically amazing and was doing all these sophisticated things, but it would always remind him, don't forget about the melody, don't forget about

the words. And I remember him saying, like Joniy Mitch would always remind him, you know, you make sure you know the lyrics to this tune that you're playing over and to keep him kind of grounded to I just always remember that story about how influential Joni Mitchell was to this, you know, modern giant of jazz, Michael Brecker. But she was certainly not a traditional anything. Joni Mitchell certainly not a traditional jazz vocalist. I can't really recall

her singing many jazz standards at all. The some of the jazz tunes she did were, you know, kind of more esoteric, and she was very harmonically sophisticated. She had this very improvisational approach. And some of my favorite works that she's done are her interpretations of jazz tunes, for instance, and I put this one on the listening list. This is one of the first tunes I ever heard Joni Mitchell sing was Charles Mingus's Goodbye Pork Pie Hat, and that in itself is a very kind of not so

standard jazz tune. You know, all of Mingus's tunes are very unique, often kind of being very politically charged, and it has this There's a lot of famous recordings of this tune. And Joni Mitchell took the outdo saxophone solo on the on the on his recording, I think it's

on Mingus. It is the name of the album. And she took it like note for note and set words to it, and then she sings it and and that a lot of other vocalists have done that, and I'm not sure if Joni Mitchell was the first to do that, but I remember hearing that for the first time and already having the saxophone solo memorize this improvised saxophone soul, and then hearing Joni Mitchell's version of Goodbye pork by Hat where she then sings and put words to that

saxophone solo and sang it. And you know, for her to be able to do that, you know, it almost gave her a lot of, like we call it jazz cred. I guess this like street cred of she really did her homework. She really knew these jazz you know, the ins and outs of this jazz music. Even though she wasn't maybe associated with it, and that's kind of one

of the things I just love about her. And and I think through that, it was kind of through her work in jazz that really made me appreciate her and then go explore all the other things that she'd done. So to me, she has to be on this list.

big deal. And I think she had to be you know, we talked about this earlier. You kind of had to be a lot more together. I think when you're the you know, quote unquote underdog, you really have to have it together because you're gonna go through a lot more scrutiny, you know. I think women have to deal with that, whether it's in the workplace or in the professional artistic field and professionally, and so you know, Jerry Allen was

just this phenomenal musician. She really you know, she blended gospel music with bebop avant garde traditions, and I think she really helped get greater recognition for women in jazz history. And she's you know, played with every all these giants, of course, and I feel like I often hear a lot of more modern women in jazz talk about and refer back to Jerry Allen and kind of her influence on them and.

look forward to going. Whenever Maria Schneider's like got Birdland or she always gets me tickets, like for my birthday. It's like it's she knows like that that's a great gift because we love it. She works with. Her band has so many of these great New York musicians in it that are in other bands.

You know, they're like part of her working man. And the way they transform her music, you know, or take her music off the page is amazing. And she to me is just this like beautiful soul to even watching her conduct, you know, she she's almost like part. Her conducting to me, is like just as important to the music that's going on. She's such a great interpreter of her own music, and it's so sophisticated. Her music. It's so complicated, you know, but it's also so simplistic at

the same time. You know, one of some of my favorite records are she has a record called sky Blue, and you know, you hear elements of classical music, and she's also done some great work more in the classical genre, you know, collaborating with you know, classical vocalists and classical instrumentalist and you just kind of it's almost like her music just weaves in and out of all these genres, and I just that's what I love that, you know, That's why I like musicians and composers like that that

kind of transcend genres, like Joni Mitchell does, or like Pat Metheny does. And she has this lush orchestration, tons

of improvisational freedom. She really like all the great composers, especially jazz composer, she writes with her musicians in mind, so she knows, you know, when she writes a song, she's thinking, oh, Rich Perry's gonna play a solo and this this is going to feature him, or this is going to feature Ben Mandra on guitar, This is going to feature you know, the late Frank Kimbro who was her piano player for many years, who passed away a few years ago. And and so there's such this connection

between the styles of the musicians. And by the way, Duke Ellington did that, and Count Basie did that. You know, they wrote for those musicians, Coody Williams, you know, they was written for you know, those those composers wrote for those people in mind. That was part of the sound of their band. But Maria Schneider's music, to me, it's so large scale, you know. She you might listen to a piece of hers and it's like a suite. In fact, she's written some of these suits and the places it

takes you. It's just like this journey and man, I just disappear into it, and it's like, it's just as as much as I love listening to my eyes closed, I love watching the band play and watching her conduct, and you know, she shilled. Sometimes she'll conduct without her shoes on, and she's she's this very organic, beautiful kind of soul. And so it's just her music's phenomenal. One of my favorite songs in the entire world. And I

don't often call jazz music songs. When I do that, usually it kind of hits me in a different way. But this is this track called the Pretty Road, and it's really long. The thing about Maria Snayer's music is

you can't really get anything at it. Not that you can't get anything out of it, but you can't really do it justice with a thirty or a sixty second clip, of course, although you know you have to, but where you end up is so much different from where you start and the journey it takes, and I just think that that's just so important, you know, in her music. So yeah, she's one of my all time favorite composers.

I just love I love her music, and she's you know, she's an educator too, and she always advocates, you know, I feel like for gender equity when it comes to jazz performance and education. I think she's done a lot to help bring awareness to help women be more represented

in jazz. But when you listen to her, you know, you don't just hear traditional jazz, but you hear you know, rock and roll, you hear R and B and funk and even you know, hip hop and and and a very you know, she has brings a lot of modern influence to jazz and at the same time really being a voice for women, you know, being represented in jazz. So she's just so great.

kind of took off. And I think one of the reasons that she's been so popular is not unlike Terry Lynn Carrington actually, but she really is blending more modern styles of music, you know, and jazz does kind of get sometimes a bad rap maybe as being old, even though you know, we don't think that way as jazz musicians. But you know, jazz is certainly not mainstream popular music

like it was in the nineteen thirties and forties. But Esperanz's Faulding really brought in elements of also funk and hip hop and soul, and I think really helped resonate jazz with a younger audience. And I think that's not only been so important for her career, but for the genre itself. But at the same time, she's worked with traditional jazz giants like Wayne Shorter and all of these, you know, amazingly you know, amazing influential jazz musicians from

the past. Also, ess Of Spaulding is a bass player, so kind of like Terry Terry Lynn Carrington, Uh, you know, not always what you might think of, you know, often we often we think of jazz women in jazz as being vocalists, and so many of them have been vocalists. But Terry Lynn Carrington being a percussionist, Esperanto Spaulding being a bassist, I think that's so important. I think it really helped women's uh say like, hey, you know that

that could be me. And I think it really did a lot to bring women into to celebrate them more and have them more represented and instrumental jazz also Esperans Spaulding. One of the things I love about her is she's this amazing vocalist, and it's it's there's a lot of great vocalists who are pretty good musicians on an instrument, and there's a lot of fantastic instrumentalists who are really great vocalists, but there's not There hasn't in too many that are equal. I can only think of a couple

that jump out, like Lewis Armstrong. I think of Nat king Cole. A lot of people don't realize, you know, Nat king Cole was marketed to be a vocalist, but he was meant to be a piano player. But you know, commercially they said, well, as a vocalist, you're going to make more money. That was never even his intent from what I researched. But Esbroan des Spaulding is another one. When you hear her sing, she's not a bass player who also sings. She's not a vocalist who also plays

the bass. She's both. And what I find amazing is she does them at the same time. And you know, I've been playing the guitar a long time, and I struggle to sing. I don't really sing at all, but man is it hard to do both? She does both so well, it's like amazing to hear. And well we have a part of her sound. Oh you have a clip? Great?

She's probably right, but and a lot of times there's a resistance to moderniz you know. Miles Davis noticed that, and that's part of the rea. You know, he alienated a lot of his fans because he modernized, because he was trying to appeal to a younger crowd, and a lot of the more purists thought, oh he's sold out, or his music isn't as sophisticated anymore. It's it's dumbing

down or whatever people wanted to call it. But I feel like Esbron's Spaulding really is helping take jazz to a different place where there's a lot more interest, and not doing it in a way that sells out, and not doing it in a way that devalues it or makes it less sophisticated. You know, you hear such an influence there of soul and R and B and funk, and that doesn't make it not jazz, you know. I think some jazz purists will say, oh, it's not jazz. I mean, if you just listening to the piano, the

harmony and the rhythms, and that's jazz, you know. But I think it's really important that younger jazz musicians are starting to do that because you know, sure it's great to if you want to just keep sounding like, you know, playing bebop and playing post pop and all that stuff is great you could set in your whole life, but you know, the music is changing and we want to keep it. We want to keep our audience engaged in it.

And I think a lot of musicians like Esperanza Spalding have realized that, you know, jazz is not it's still jazz, but and we can blend it with these other styles that are going to bring more of a wider audience and a global appeal to it. And I just think she kind of struck that balance so perfectly well.

Council of Rockland. And so I'm going to be producing a monthly jazz concert series and it's very very new in the works, so I don't even have one hundred percent of the details or some of the details I might and could end up changing, but as far as we know, we're looking to do it on the second Friday of every month at Mora's Kitchen in Nyack, and this would start April tenth, the second Friday in April. And I don't know if you're familiar with Morri's Kitchen,

it's a great place. You know, it often features great music and often Latin music and Latin American music. So we're gonna look to bring a lot of Latin jazz influence there as we do it for sure, and I don't even have the exact time. It could be six to nine pm, it could be seven to ten. I'm not even one hundred percent sure. We haven't even nailed down the exact instrumentation. I can tell you as much as I can make it. It's going to feature myself

on guitar, maybe some other you know. It might could be a quartet, could be a trio, different weeks, different things. We want to kind of see how it goes. So this grant, I'm very grateful to visit Nayak Inc. And Acre for having faith in me and helping me fund projects like this where we can bring a regular jazz concert series to the local community in Rockland County. And I you know, you might remember last year I was promoting that Jazz Evolution series I did, which was kind

of scattered throughout the year. To go with this project is I really wanted to get something that was regular because I felt that, first of all, when it's something is occurring regularly, it builds up a buzz and it becomes part of the culture and the fabric of the community.

So I really it was important to me that we could try to get something monthly, you know, at least, so that'll help people like you know, oh yeah, the second Friday, there's always you know, this jazz happening at this venue, So a place that to help it kind of become a destination that people can kind of set their calendars around and set their watches around. So that

was part of it. And also something that's very accessible, so that you know, Morris Kitchen is a place, you know, it's family friendly, it's you know, we want us to do it at a time when we can you know, maximize how many people can come experience. There were still in the works we might add a jam session component to it where we can have local musicians come and sit in and jay and make it a place to just bring more participation and awareness and increase public's enjoyment

and appreciation for jazz. So right now we're looking at Friday April tenth, and then every month the second Friday after that at Morris Kitchen and Nayak And there'll be certainly more information on that on my website at www dot Ericdivito dot com, and of course, Frank, I'll keep you updated if any of that information change as it's kind of like I said, it's very much in the development stages right now. We're hoping to get everything sorted out for April tenth when we start.

introduce your song coming up in just a bit. But since we spoke of Ella Fitzgerald and she made our list, I thought it appropriate to get a quote from her, and she said, just don't give up trying to do what you really want to do where there is love and inspiration. I don't think you can go wrong. Okay, Eric, what are we going to hear music wise?

of mine that I've always loved. I revisited it often and it's Her and Him. By the way, h y m n. It's a little play on words. The beginning is supposed to kind of sound like a hymn. The way it's kind of a voiced and orchestrated terrific.