Astoria is a jazz town. No two ways about it. Folks who live in Astoria love their jazz—they love to listen to jazz live at the local town venues; they love to play and perform jazz (anyplace in town where you can eat and drink you’ll find someone playing some kind of jazz); and they certainly love their jazz radio. The fact that there’s any jazz at all to listen to in this town populated by hard-working folks who work in mostly fishing industries, but there’s logging, construction, and maritime operations. People have called into the show with requests from a trawler navigating its way out through the bar requesting. It’s amazing. So when I was asked by long-time jazz fan and editor and publisher of The Daily Astorian, Steve Forrester, to answer a few questions about my jazz playlists and how I come up with them for a new feature he was putting together, I gotta tell you I jumped at the chance to share a few of my thoughts, especially if they were going to end up in print. Steve e-mailed me the questions, and what follows are the responses I sent back to him. I thought they would make a good 100th blog post. That’s right. This is my 100th post. Hell, I might even be on the brink of callin’ myself a “writer.”
What are you listening to now?
First off, because I’m a jazz programmer at KMUN, I listen primarily to jazz. I’m always on the prowl for anything my audience might enjoy listening to, especially if I know it reflects the diverse musical tastes of our listenership. In any case, a typical playlist for my Tuesday night show usually includes a bit of the old, of the new, and of the unusual. For example, on my current playlist is jazz icon Clark Terry, who passed away last February at the age of 95. His birthday is on Dec. 14, so I’ve been listening to 
his album Daylight Express, which is an amazing showcase of Clark’s artistry on the flugelhorn. I’ve also been listening to the brand-new album Gaïa from the brilliant young guitarist Lion
el Loueke. Loueke is from Benin, West Africa, so his music is this sonic blend of West African modal music and American modern jazz guitar sounds. If Loueke is an example of the direction jazz is going in the future, jazz fans are in good hands. Lastly, and an example of the unusua
l, I’ve been listening to the relatively unknown English jazz musician by the name of Tubby Hayes, in particular his live album Night and Day, recorded at London’s Ronnie Scotts in 1966. Hayes is worth listening to because he is an expert hard bop tenor sax player and one of the few English jazz musicians who actually enjoyed success playing jazz in the states during the sixties. You don’t hear a lot about him because there are few CDs available.
What’s jazz’s special appeal?
Jazz’s appeal for me? I listen to jazz for different reasons, but ultimately I’m drawn to it because it is simply great music and great music never gets stale, never gets old. Jazz in one form or another has been around for a long time, so the music has a timeless quality to it that crosses generations. My parents dug Basie and Goodman because they loved dancing to swing music, and I was drawn to Coltrane and Dave Brubeck in college because they were “cool.” And now my daughter listens to Liz Wright. At whatever age we start listening to jazz, what we quickly discover is that the sound of jazz music, the swing tempo, the blue notes, the improvising, makes us feel really good. Duke Ellington once said “There are two kinds of music. Good music and the other kind.” Good music has always had a universal appeal. The music of Louis Armstrong, for example, has this kind of universal appeal. When he was performing and recording, everybody loved Pops because his music made us feel so good. And because of that, thankfully, his name will forever be linked inextricably with the word jazz. Mention the name Louis Armstrong, and people automatically think jazz because he played really good jazz, and it made us happy listening to it. I will always play Louis Armstrong without fear of over playing his music. The same is true of Duke Ellington. The core of jazz has always been about American jazz musicians playing the American music they helped invent.
How do you choose music for your on-air shows?
First, I have to keep in mind that I am not playing jazz for my personal listening pleasure only—well, maybe a little. I also have to consider the folks who tune in to listen to the jazz I play, and for that reason, if I come across something I’ve never heard before and think about playing it on air, I have to think about whether or not my listeners will enjoy it. I have to say, as a rule, jazz radio listeners—especially in Astoria—are a very discerning group. But I also think it’s good to challenge my listeners, especially the ones who regularly tune in. Of course, I never know what they’re going to like, and sometimes I learn what they don’t like because they’ll call in and tell me so. I once had a listener call in right after I had played Screamin’ Jay Hawkins’ “I Put a Spell on You” to ask me how on earth I could play something like that. That’s not jazz, she told me. I also get suggestions from listeners who call in and suggest a jazz musician I had never heard of and end up playing him on air. That’s the beauty of jazz and public radio.
What advice would you give to discover new music?
As far as jazz is concerned, the best way to discover jazz music is by listening to a wide variety of it. As much as possible. Unlike other music genres like pop, rock, country, and countless others, with the exception of maybe classical music, jazz has particularly intimidating variety of styles and sub-genres which are rich, varied, and sometimes complex, so there’s a great deal of different kinds of jazz music to listen to and explore. But if the question is Where to start, all we need do is look in our own local community. I can’t say enough about how very fortunate we are to live in an area that has such an amazing community radio station right here in our back yard. KMUN has always had great jazz radio programming. When I first came to this area in 1990 to teach at Seaside High School, one of the first things I did was search for FM radio stations. That’s when I first heard the magic voice of Vern Barth on KMUN. He played some of the best jazz I had ever heard, and I learned a great deal about jazz from him. So start listening to our local jazz radio programmers, and I guarantee you will hear something you’ll like. I would also suggest doing an internet search for “Best Jazz Lists.” They always tend to be subjective, but if you want to get a basic idea of who the jazz icons are, it’s a good place to start. Check out the All About Jazz web site. They have tons of recent album reviews, interviews, and features about jazz artists throughout the world. Without question, Youtube has become an amazing resource for both free music and video clips of jazz performances. Probably the best Youtube source for jazz video collections is Bret Premack’s the Jazz Video Guy. The JazzTimes website is especially good for learning about up-and-coming young jazz artists, and there are many. I first discovered the brilliant young singer Cécile McLorin Salvant thanks to JazzTimes. Then, of course, there are the countless web radio and music sites, both free and subscription, like itunes, Spotify, and Rhapsody. But for me, if you want to discover jazz, listen to what KMUN jazz programmers are playing, then take the time to explore the extensive jazz playlists compiled by the programmers and then posted on KMUN’s website coastradio.org.
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