[Dixielandjazz] Bud Shank's response to how he was fired.

[Steve barbone]

List mates:

Here is Bud Shank's response to his recent firing from "his" workshop and
festival.

Cheers,
Steve Barbone

FROM BUD SHANK

This, I hope, will be a monthly message to my friends and fans. It
might be more at times, and other times less. The topic this month is
my departure from Centrum in Port Townsend. I was Artistic Director
there of my Workshop and Festival for more than twenty years. I had
anticipated that the interest in the subject of my being fired from
that position would have died down by now, as it happened in July. But
instead the emails, phone calls, letters, and faxes have only
increased. This is thanks not only to our legion of friends world-wide,
but to the marvelous and flattering letter written on the subject and
posted by Phil Woods. It seems that Phil's letter has circled the world
twice now! Many of you in your communications have asked the question
"What really happened?". Well, here it is.

About ten years ago, at my request, two advisory committees were
established, one for the workshop and one for the jazz festival. The
members were mainly people involved with jazz radio, newspaper and
media types, concert producers, former students - in short people who
knew something about the jazz business. Also at the meetings was one of
Centrum's board members, who was probably there only because the
meetings were held at his house. His name is David Marriott and at one
time I considered him a friend. He has two sons who are fine musicians
in New York (also products of the workshop). Soon after these meetings
became an annual event, a recurring theme emerged from Mr. Marriott.
Our faculty was stale and stagnant, and so were the performances which
they donated in the clubs and mainstage in order to help Centrum hold
to its minuscule budget. Imagine, Pete Christlieb, George Cables, Bobby
Shew, Bob Florence, Ray Brown - STALE" Mr. Marriott requested that I
tell these faculty members to take a few years off and then maybe they
could come back. These people were on the faculty with ridiculously low
salaries because they are my friends and I asked them. Many have been
with me for twenty years. Do you think Bobby Shew would come back after
being replaced by Jon Faddis for two years? Do you think that musicians
of this calibre such as Jim Hall, Bennie Golsen, Jon Faddis, or any of
the rest of them at this level would even accept such a heavy duty week
for so little compensation? So the stage has now been set.

I had been too naive to see what was happening, despite warnings from
my wife, who has a better nose for treachery since she had been the
victim of it at Centrum herself years ago. David Marriott was the first
of five people mainly involved in my dismissal. The second was a man
named Joseph Wheeler, who is the founder of Centrum and was Executive
Director at the time I took over the workshop. He and I ran the
workshop and festival all the years it ran until he retired a few years
ago. We were assisted by a steady stream of "program directors" who for
the most part wanted to be chiefs, not Indians and didn't know squat
about how to run a Jazz event. After his retirement, Wheeler was
officially uninvolved with Centrum until he came onto the board.

Now enter the third member of the cabal. This is a person named
Thatcher Bailey who was hired in 2003 to be the new executive director
of the foundation. This person was on staff at Centrum years ago and I
never could figure out what he did. His primary claim to fame is
founding a hospice in Seattle for AIDS patients, a worthy cause but
hardly preparation for running an arts foundation. These are the three
people that convinced the Centrum Board that I had to go by telling
them that I had indicated a wish to retire. This is absolute bullshit.
I feel like I am playing better than I have ever played in my life.
Aside from a couple of "old guy" aches and pains I have never felt or
been better. My wife Linda takes great care of me. She does all the
work in her office as well as assisting our agent with bookings and
promotion and answering thousands of emails every month. She also
frequently tours with my various bands as manager and "band mom". I
have a million reasons to be grateful to her. She has given me the time
I needed to practice, play, compose, and finally learn how to play the
damned piano! As I said in my departure speech from the stage, the only
way the word "retire" has passed my lips was when I bought new tires
for my pickup (the one with the clarinet in the gun rack).

When the true story began to surface the board members, not to mention
our faculty, students, and audiences, were horrified. This was a
monumental con job that was perpetrated for the sole purpose of
replacing me with one of my faculty members. The letter they sent three
weeks before my event stated that they were removing "all" of the main
artistic directors. However, in the end only myself and the man running
the writer's workshop (who had a long history of enmity with Bailey)
were fired. A new "direction" was required, they said. WHY? Our student
numbers were climbing every year. Our faculty and student surveys were
glowing. Our audiences grew every year, and the media raved over our
musicians and our festival. So if it ain't broke why fix it? Read on.

Now enter our last two members of the team. Two years ago a student at
our workshop offered to use a sum of her husband's large fortune to act
as main sponsor for my workshop and festival. Not long after she
suddenly appeared on the faculty roster, even though her ability level
did not begin to approach that of the other faculty members, all of
whom are professional musicians, and many of whom are leaders in their
own right. We let this go by, being grateful for the financial support.

So, about a year ago, our new sponsor placed a conference call to me
while I was on tour back east, a call that also included the executive
director at that time and her husband, and the program director, none
of whom said a word after saying hello. She proceeded to grill me in an
hour long inquisition, demanding to know my future plans, my thoughts
about faculty, when I was going to "finally" retire, etc. etc. Talk
about completely out of line. This woman was a student for years at my
workshop. Where does she get off thinking her money has bought her my
event? This is a sponsor talking. Sponsors don't talk. They hand you
their money and wave to the audience and keep their mouths shut about
the artistic direction of an event. They certainly don't - or should
not - dictate policy or program mandates.

I knew the handwriting was on the wall, and was making plans
accordingly. Two years ago we were approached by an organization in the
South west to move our workshop and festival to that area. At that time
I declined out of loyalty to Centrum. After receiving the infamous
letter, Linda called these people. They said that they had just been
waiting for the telephone to ring. So it looks like within a few weeks
we will have a major announcement to make regarding the Bud Shank Jazz
Workshop and Jazz Southwest Festival for July 2005. We are moving on,
and taking our faculty, our students, and our reputation for the best
Jazz camp in the USA with us. Thanks for caring. We will be in touch.

Bud and Linda - September 2004

Copyright © 2004, Bud Shank. All Rights Reserved.
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The above article is an excerpt from the original document
which will shortly be available in full on Bud's own website
at www.budshankalto.com