In reference to NO JAM TODAY (AT SYMPHONY SPACE):
A New York City jazz musician whose opinion I respect gently reminded me that even in these days of fifty-dollar gigs, putting together my imagined jazz group for a Symphony Space gig would require more than five hundred dollars so that the players I so esteem would not be underpaid. He is correct of course, just one more reason for my not being an impresario. No doubt I had caught a touch of the prevailing minginess in my calculations.
I had just wanted to make the point that the sum the Space might be paying one of their high-powered “name” guests to moderate an evening’s presentation (could this be Mr. Cavett?) would be enough to hire a wondrous jazz cornucopia for a string of concerts celebrating 1939 and have funds left over for cookies at the intermission. Fresh cookies, too — not ones baked seventy years ago. But I digress.