Jazz Poems

POEM IN WHICH I MAKE THE MISTAKE 

OF COMPARING BILLIE HOLIDAY TO A

COSMIC WASHERWOMAN

We were driving back from the record store at the mall

when Terrance told me that Billie Holiday

was not a symbol for the black soul.

He said, The night is not African American either for

your information,

it is just goddamn dark,

and in the background

she was singing a song I never heard before

moving her voice like water moving

along the shore of a lake

reaching gently into the crevices, touching the pebbles

and sand.

Once through the dirty window of a train

on the outskirts of Hoboken, New Jersey,

I swear I saw a sonnet written high up in a

concrete wall,

rhymed quatrains rising from the

dyslexic alphabet of gang signs and obscenities

and Terrance said he saw a fresco

of brown and white angels flying

on a boarded-up building in Chinatown

and everybody knows

there’s a teenager genius somewhere out there,

a firebrand out of Ghana by way of Alabama,

this very minute in a warehouse loft,

rewriting Moby-Dick-The Story of the Great 

Black Whale

When he burst out of the womb

of his American youth

with his dictionary and his hip-hop shovel,

when he takes his place on stage

dripping the amniotic fluid of history,

he won’t be any color we ever saw before,

and I know he’s right, Terrance is right, it’s

so obvious

But here in the past of that future,

Billie Holiday is still singing

a song so dark and slow

it seems bigger than her, it sounds very heavy

like a terrible stain soaked into the sheets,

so deep that nothing will ever get it out,

but she keeps trying,

she keeps pushing the dark syllables under the water

then pulling them up to see if they are clean

but they never are

and it makes her sad

and we are too

and it’s dark around the car and inside also is very

dark

Terrance and I can barely see each other

in the dashboard glow.

I can only imagine him right now

pointing at the radio

as if to say, Shut up and listen.

TONY HOAGLAND | 1953~2018

from Jazz Poems ~ Selected and Edited by Kevin Young

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Elissa Lala was born on April 30, 1958 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the daughter of a professional trombonist. She began singing professionally at the age of five and by the time she was in her early teens she was doing background vocal sessions at Philadelphia’s Sigma Sound Studios. Although heavily influenced by R&B, she would be quietly singing Michel Legrand’s You Must Believe in Spring while walking to that all girl Italian high school.

Struggling with a hearing impairment never affected her pitch and falling in love with jazz guitarist John Valentino made the jazz thing stick. The couple performed together at every major venue on the east coast, eventually marrying and moving to Los Angeles, California. While singing at a Burbank studios jazz club, Aaron Spellings’ music supervisor heard Lala and hired her to sing All the Things You Are for the ABC miniseries Crossings.

More film and TV studio work came her way and her credits multiplied. A bout with tinnitus led to more hearing loss and learning about hearing loss. Elissa became trained in hearing instrument fitting and helped hundreds of hearing-impaired children and adults hear better through the use of digital hearing instruments.

As a lyricist she wrote for Ralph Towner’s I Knew It Was You. She has written and/or recorded with Blue Note recording artists Pat Martino, Narada Michael Walden, Michel Legrand, Alex Acuna, Tommy Tedesco, and Bennie Maupin. Her approach to improvisation is fresh, moving, and very in the moment, or documented, recorded or live.

Vocalist Elissa Lala continues to perform, work in film and television, and tour.

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Andrea Ventriglia was born in Capua, Italy on April 29, 1953 and studied the saxophone with the masters Franco Florio in Salerno and Eraclio Sallustio at the GB Martini Conservatory in Bologna, Italy. He later studied the flute with Aldo Ferrantini.

His professional career began while he was still a music student around the end of the 1960s, following the rhythm & blues and soul of James Brown, Wilson Pickett, Aretha Franklin, Ray Charles and Joe Cocker in fashion at that time and still today. At a very young age he was part of the best and

As a soldier Andrea was part of the National Band of the Italian Army. He moved to Verona, Italy in the mid 1970s and began playing in small bands in night clubs. He was invited to join the Big Band Citta’ di Verona directed by Maestro Mario Pezzotta, in the first tenor saxophone. At the same time he performed in Fernando Brusco’s small orchestra as an arranger and saxophonist.

Moving to the United States he initially played in small bands that performed on cruise ships where he met among others Count Basie, Mercer Ellington, Sarah Vaughan, Harry James and Bob Crosby. Settling first in San Francisco, then in Los Angeles, California he played on the road with small bands collaborating with Harry James and Bob Crosby in the latter city.

Back in Italy he gained membership into Franco Rosselli’s orchestra and did the night club circuit in Florence, San Remo and Riviera Romagnola. Leaving Roselli he toured with Bobby Solo throughout Italy. His passion for jazz and big band led him to the Luciano Fineschi Orchestra, again sitting in the first tenor saxophone and flute chair.

After the orchestra disbanded Ventriglia went on to play in other big bands, duos, artistic partnerships, and guest appearances. For a decade he was a professor of saxophone at the Giuseppe Martucci Music High School in his hometown. He trained musicians currently working with famous artists or with their own groups and some of whom practice the profession of musician in the USA.

By the Eighties the public became more sensitive towards jazz, so Andrea led quartets performing in various Italian jazz clubs. that sprung up a bit everywhere in Italy. During his career and for professional reasons, saxophonist and flutist Andrea Ventriglia has performed on nearly every continent and continues to perform, tour and record.

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Scott Robinson was born on April 27, 1959 in Pompton Plains, New Jersey and was the son of a piano teacher and National Geographic book editor. Graduating from the Berklee College of Music in 1981, the following year he joined the college’s staff, becoming its youngest faculty member.

Robinson has appeared on more than 275 LP and CD releases, including twenty under his leadership, with musicians Frank Wess, Roscoe Mitchell, Ruby Braff, Joe Lovano, Ron Carter, Paquito D’Rivera, David Bowie, Maria Schneider, Rufus Reid, Buck Clayton, and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s. Four of these recordings won a Grammy Award. He has received four fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts.

In 2000, the U.S. State Department named him a jazz ambassador for the year 2001, funding a tour of West Africa in which he played the early works of Louis Armstrong. Material from these appearances was released on the album Jazz Ambassador: Scott Robinson Plays the Compositions of Louis Armstrong by Arbors Records.

Throughout his career, Scott has worked to keep unusual and obscure instruments in the public view. His main instrument is a C-melody saxophone, however he has recorded with the ophicleide, and the rare contrabass saxophone.

Saxophonist Scott Robinson has operated his record label, ScienSonic Laboratories since 2009, in addition to his performing and recording.

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Massimo DeAngelis was born on April 25, 1958 in Rome, Italy. A self-taught drummer, he began playing at the age of twelve. As a composer he plays and writes in various styles and genres across the musical spectrum, favoring high-energy instrumental jazz fusion.

He has performed with many groups, including I Percussionisti di Roma, a percussion ensemble. Throughout his career he has been invited to perform at several jazz festivals throughout Europe.

In 1986 Massimo emigrated to the United States and has been performing live and recording with numerous bands. Teaching privately for several years, he is now focusing his energy and time on composing, arranging, recording, and producing.

Drawing his inspiration from surrealism and improvisation, drummer, percussionist and keybordist Massimo DeAngelis’ music is intended to fill those many musical voids that exist around us. He continues to composer, record and perform.

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