Like a lot of people I’m ambivalent about Christmas. You don’t have to be Jewish to be ambivalent about Christmas. All the usual complaints apply: crass commercialism, sentimentality, religion gone south. If you’re Jewish, you typically ignore Christmas, though some celebrate it to be part of the holiday spirit, maybe to assimilate. Christmas is the […]
Christmas Music
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Jazz and Politics: An Essay
I’m undertaking a new book that will explore the connections and disconnections between jazz and politics. As readers of this blog know, I get worked up about these things. Here are some preliminary notes made for an Introduction. Please feel free to comment. Jazz and politics are both modes of self-expression—one through the medium of […]
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Christmas Music Redivivus
I first published the piece below, now slightly updated, in 2015, an eternity ago, like everything pre-Trump. In a week that demonstrated the president’s total ineptness, it’s good to change the subject and think about some of the more eternal verities we live by. Like a lot of people I’m ambivalent about Christmas. You don’t […]
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Jazz Endures, Somehow
This will be my last blog post for awhile. I’m taking a sabbatical after five-plus years of doing this every week. At the end of a crazy and disorienting 2018, don’t we all need a break? Thanks to you loyal readers for bearing with me during the musical and political excursions we’ve all been through, […]
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