After surviving a near-fatal marriage and returning once again to the Original Geniusdome, the site of some of my best work (remember that really funny thing I wrote about jazz that time?), I recently took some time to reflect upon my contributions to Our Music. As the Dean of American Jazz Humorists©®, I have long considered it my responsibility both to demystify some of the more esoteric aspects of jazz and to loosen the death grip of the zealot so that the music can breathe. And if by fulfilling these duties, I should somehow end up rich and famous, romantically linked to unspeakably hot actresses like Christina Hendricks and/or Scarlett Johansson and given a lifetime supply of beer by the Anheuser-Busch corporation for my work promoting the consumption of their product by tireless example, well, then, so be it. But in the process of sifting through my collected works, a glaring oversight was pointed out to me by my parakeet/bodyguard Luca Brasi. "Yes, we get it, {{Wynton Marsalis = 1914}} has a very round head. But where in all this do you give JazzNoobs a lesson in how to listen to this sometimes daunting music?" he said, making a valid point for someone who spends a significant portion of his day chirping at his own reflection in a mirror.
Sure enough, in eight years of occupying my mantle here at AAJ, I had not once addressed the very basic issue that is probably most responsible for keeping people from making a more dedicated foray into the seemingly impenetrable depths of Our Music that lie beyond the safety and comfort of the familiar kind of jazz one hears on those 1970's TV shows where people in polyester bell-bottoms and crocheted sweater-vests are supposed to be hip.
For more than 20 years, singer/songwriter, pianist/composer, and band-leader Bruce Hornsby, has proven to be a survivor in an ever changing music environment. From winning multiple awards including a Grammy for Best New Artist in 1987 for the multi-platinum album The Way It Is (RCA, 1986) with his band The Range, to dual releases in 2007 (on Sony/Legacy)--a foot-stomping bluegrass duo Ricky Skaggs & Bruce Hornsby and the swinging jazz trio outing Camp Meeting, with drummer Jack DeJohnette and bassist Christian McBride--Hornsby has thrived in a variety of settings. 
Oz Noy's Schizophrenic (Magnatude Records, 2009) is the perfect moniker for the Israeli-born, New York-based guitarist. With an array of influences ranging from Charlie Parker to Jimi Hendrix to Stevie Ray Vaughan, Noy melds elements from funk, rock, blues and jazz into his own unique, personal take on modern instrumental music. 
As of today, All About Jazz will publish articles in Spanish under the editorial direction of 
It's been an out-of-the-ordinary career trip for Roberta Gambarini--a trip that's seen her go from a young girl in Italy, scatting along with records by American singers Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald, to struggling to get singing gigs in her native land, to grabbing an opportunity to come to the United States, to gaining recognition by respected elders like Benny Carter, James Moody, Clark Terry and nonagenarian pianist Hank Jones, who has proclaimed her "the best jazz singer to emerge in sixty years." 
As legendary jazz vibraphonists Teddy Charles describes him, "It's not easy to be Chris Byars. With an incredible array of talents brought to bear on his composition, arrangements, and cooking jazz performances, it's no wonder he's worked his way to the forefront of the myriad of jazz players overwhelming the scene."
British musician Theo Travis has one of the most varied performing and recording histories to be found among contemporary jazz musicians. A talented saxophonist, flautist and composer, Travis has performed solo, in duos and quartets, in straight ahead jazz combos and in electronic, improvisational groups.
From the start of his career as a sideman in the 1970s for such jazz luminaries as Joe Henderson, Art Farmer and Stan Getz to his own ensembles and solo projects, there has always been a great diversity and intensity to Fred Hersch's art. Having won a Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship for composition (2003) and having been the first piano player in The Village Vanguard's 70 year history to do a week's solo residency, Hersch has managed to be both a musician's musician and resonate in the jazz public's consciousness without ever compromising his own artistic vision.