Tuesday, June 19, 2007

Cover Story

Sometimes it seems like the big three jazz magazines just rotate cover stories on Wynton Marsalis, Joshua Redman, and Joe Lovano. They are all important musicians, but it would be nice to see some different artists from time to time, so the cover story on Steve Wiest on the July issue of JAZZed, the jazz educator’s magazine, was a great call.

Wiest is a highly literate jazz artist, as is reflected in his Excalibur CD, which I recommend quite a bit. In the interview feature, he defends the trombone’s honor:

JAZZed: On a scale of one to 10, 10 being Angelina Jolie, 1 being Phyllis Diller, how sexy is the trombone?

Steve Wiest: I’d have to say about a 20! [Laughs] I’ll tell you, it’s a marketing thing. The trombone gets a bad rap sometimes, but it just needs better marketing! It’s the one instrument that best captures the human voice. It bends, moans, growls—does everything a human voice can. That’s just an appealing thing to me.”


Give JAZZed credit. Usually, I just quickly skim it, but if they will be featuring fresher faces, I might spend more time with it.