[Dixielandjazz] Jazz Educators

[Stephen G Barbone]

The recent demise of the IAJE is tragic. What now?

One course of action is to do nothing. Or wait for a new organization  
to form and hope that they will support trad.

But will they? Perhaps not because the vast majority of music teachers  
are young and they believe trad jazz is Bop. Not their fault, they  
were raised in an era when OKOM was passe.

Perhaps the best course of action is to get behind the TJEN. Here is a  
group that supports OKOM and already has somewhat of a base.

One thing we might remember is to keep OKOM flexible, and relevant to  
the young. Sometime IMO, we try and shove King Oliver or (insert your  
favorite name) as the only true OKOM form. Give the kids jazz freedom  
to develop their own versions of  polyphonic counterpoint as the late  
Jim Beebe called OKOM  more than once on the DJML.

The other thing we might remember is that when we (over 70 year old  
jazz musicians) were in schools, there was no jazz taught. Many of the  
legendary players came up without school training. Perhaps we should  
rethink how and why that happened and how we can enable it again.

Cheers,
Steve Barbone
www.myspace.com/barbonestreetjazzband