World traveler Bill Gallagher sent along his photograph of the latest Nice Jazz Festival lineup:
Some of my readers will rejoice at the names of venerable jazz players Rollins, Corea, and Burton; others will be pleased to see younger players.
It must mark me as someone of a nearly-extinct generation when I write that I miss the old days. European friends, over the years, sent me on-location tapes from Nice festivals in the Seventies, featuring Bobby Hackett, Ruby Braff, Sweets Edison, Bill Coleman, Vic Dickenson, Benny Carter, Teddy Wilson, Joe Venuti, Jo Jones, Sir Charles Thompson, Mark Shane . . . proving that swinging jazz was what prevailed.
Now they’ve been replaced by James Taylor?
Of course, many of the players at Nice in the Seventies are now dead. But there are five or six dozen younger musicians — from Kellso to Caparone, Block to Blake, Dorn to Nick Ward . . . who would show anyone that jazz existed before Madeline Peyroux.
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James Taylor’s late in life appropriation of the great American Songbook and a flimsy makeover as a torch singer is nearly as disgusting as the infamous Kenny G overdub of Louis Armstrong.
And the old boomer wreck eats a lot of money, like 750 grand to do a show at tanglewood that’s a half hour bicycle ride from his doorstep.