Jazz Video Contest Winners

PlayJazzNow happily received many fine entries to our Jazz Video Contest. Thanks to all who submitted videos. Here are the winners and their videos:

GRAND PRIZE ($250): Roger Friedman "F Blues Tutorial"





2nd PRIZE ($50): Boris Lebron: "For All We Know" (Vocal)



2nd PRIZE ($50): Alex Hoffman: "Giant Steps Lesson"





RUNNERS UP ($50 in PJN Play-along Tracks):

Anthony Cresci: "Autumn Leaves (harmonica)"



Nathan Hanna: "14 Year Old On Jazz Banjo (Blues)"



Simon LeHaye: "3 and 5 Years Old Samba Dancing Girls and Cuica Dad - "A Felicidade"



Marcio Garcia Sanchez: "Desafinado (piano)"



Kennda Varnum: "Wee Small Hours of the Morning (vocal)"




Congratulations to all!

Recording Sessions 1/10

We spent 2.5 days this past week in the recording studio, working on a couple of new sets of backing tracks. I'm thrilled with the performances of all the fine musicians who played and I think you will have a very good time playing along with the tracks (once we get 'em up and running). Here are a couple of pics:



For more, please visit our Facebook page.

PJN Recording Session 9/09

We just spent a good long day in our favorite studio here in Chicago working on some new tracks. There'll be some jazz standards (including Doxy, Half Nelson and Groovin High), some challenging tunes and progressions in 5/4, 7/4 and 7/8, and a wacky sounding (but very helpful) 12 key trip through all the M7 #5 chords.

We'll be mixing and getting things ready for the release of these new playalongs sometime around Halloween.



For more pix of the trio hard at work, please go HERE.

More Jazz Poetry: Sonny and Joe

I've just posted a couple of wonderful poems by Illinoisian Paul Freidinger HERE. The first piece references the life of Sonny Rollins; the second Joe Henderson.

Jazz Education Network

I am certainly not one to get all weepy over the demise of the International Association for Jazz Education (IAJE). For a variety of reasons I was not a big fan of that organization, which, it seems to me, had outlived its usefulness and grown far too unwieldy for its britches.

However, I do have reasons to believe that IAJE's successor organization, the Jazz Education Network, will do a far better job for all of us who play, teach and love jazz. JEN's mission statement reads:

The Jazz Education Network is dedicated to building the jazz arts community by advancing education, promoting performance and developing new audiences.

It seems like the folks behind the Jazz Education Network have the right idea, in terms of starting small and using the experiences gleaned from IAJE to do things a better way. There are some excellent people involved in the new project, which is just over one year old.

PlayJazzNow is a proud member of JEN, and I invite you to visit their website and join with your fellow musicians in making this organization a success.

Jazz Humor: You Don't Know Where One Is

If you know who wrote this please let us know. We like to give credit where its due.


[Sung to the tune "You Don't Know What Love Is"]

You Don't Know Where One Is

You don't know where one is.
You never know the changes or the form.
Your playing is so far below the norm.
You don't know where one is.

You don't know what beats are.
You cannot tell beat one from that of three.
Just how lame can one poor fellow be?
You don't know where one is.

Don't you know the key or chords
For tunes that you claim you are knowin'?
No wonder you sound so lost
Once you've started blowin'.

I can't tell from your line
Whether you're in three or in five four.
I tell you this and tell you one thing more,
You don't know where one is.

More Giant Steps stuff

Here's a nice post celebrating the 50th anniversary of the release of John Coltrane's Giant Steps. There are links to some entertaining and enlightening videos plus some cool info to go along with my previous posts regarding this wonderful, challenging tune.