Borrowing the title from Art Taylor and his wonderful book of interviews with fellow musicians. Good summer read if you are looking. Peculiar detail I love: It’s 1968-1972 so he asks everyone, including Thelonious Monk, what they think of The Beatles. No spoilers here.

Thank you
Thanks to everyone who came out the Village Vanguard in May to hear The Gifts Quintet. That was the special-est of weeks. We’ll be back!

Thanks Tonearm Team for a wonderful job collecting and presenting this conversation. Lawrence, thanks to you for your patience and sympathetic ear. Also a good read in the transcript.

New Music
I wrote and recorded a 12-song cycle, set to lyrics provided by author David Hajdu. The band is a very special sextet with Erik Friedlander, Matt Penman, Gary Versace, Rudy Royston, and Nathan Nakadegawa-Lee. There are eight vocalists: Aubrey Johnson, Alicia Olatuja, Karen Oberlin, Dominique Eade, Fay Victor, Sami Stevens, Aoife O’Donovan, and Donnie T. Smith. More about this later, it’s still in production, but the writing and arranging took more than a year. A very exciting and different, for me, process. I can’t wait to share it.

The Book
My book is coming along. I’ve been writing for about five years now. It’s a musical-philosophical narrative memoir. I’m contracted to Equinox Publishing and they are exceedingly patient and helpful with drafts. The rest of the summer I will be composing and writing, catching up with long term project ideas. I’m grateful to have the time and space to complete these projects. The book: I anticipate about another year of daily writing, with a release a year after that? Who knows. Maybe that’s what I should call the book.

Congratulations
Speaking of Aubrey Johnson — Hey, she received support from Chamber Music America New Jazz Works to compose a new set of music for her very special band! Congratulations, Aubrey!

Kaisa Mäensivu was named Artist of the Year at Pori Jazz Festival in Finland! She and the band will be playing July 18.

Back in Print
Brazen Heart Live at Jazz Standard Complete Set (2015), capturing the quintet with Jon Irabagon, Matt Mitchell, Linda May Han Oh, and Rudy Royston at its apex, has been reissued! A major box set that is now available again at Bandcamp and other outlets. 

Sheet Music
We continue to prepare and release sheet music! The goal is to finally catch up with every one of my records in the catalog. Stay tuned!

Coming Up
Festival of New Trumpet Music returns September 14 – 20. Hold the date and watch for the full schedule to be announced very soon.

A Final Thought
Last month, the collision of disturbing national news and the joyous celebration of Juneteenth led me to post this on Instagram:

There’s a silver lining: if we can spend this much money on corruption, war, and backward facing policies, it means we have enough money to feed everyone, give education to all, and provide everyone free health care. Let’s do that. Happy Juneteenth.

And happy July 4 and all summer. Best wishes to all. Let’s do that.

Dave