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<DIV><FONT face=Arial>Hi! email threaders and fellow
DJMLers,</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial>A current summary of opinions/comments listed as
follows:</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial><STRONG>Luis Daniel Flores,
Argentina</STRONG></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial>Answering to "As far as jazz, most of the leading
exponents in the various styles have<BR>been in this country and so no desire to
look further. "<BR>what about in present days...., are there more and better
jazz band<BR>outside...USA?<BR><STRONG>Jim Beebe reply & some previous
comments</STRONG></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial> It is hard to say as there is less and less interest
in any kind of jazz here in the US.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial><FONT face="Times New Roman"><FONT face=Arial>So, Tom, all
of this to acknowledge your concern at our insularity and<BR>to try and explain
it. <BR></FONT></FONT></FONT><FONT face=Arial><STRONG>John Petters reply &
some comments</STRONG></FONT></DIV>
<DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial>Quite agree. Arguably the only non American innovator was
Django. Though we have produced and do produce good players, there have been few
original voices outside the USA.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial>As far as jazz, most of the leading exponents in the
various styles have been in this country and so no desire to look further.
Also a contributing factor in the low interest in non-American jazz groups has
been the unavailability of foreign recordings.</FONT></DIV></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial><STRONG>Bill "Thimbles"
Gunter<BR></STRONG></FONT><FONT><FONT face=Arial>How can "jazz" be mentioned in
the same paragraph as "insularity"? One of the reasons jazz <BR>was able to
spread around the world as quickly as it did was because the <BR>language is
universal! That's why!<BR><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; BACKGROUND: white; COLOR: navy; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"><FONT
color=#000000 size=3><STRONG>Morton
Weintraub</STRONG></FONT></SPAN></FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT><FONT size=3><FONT color=#000000><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; BACKGROUND: white; COLOR: navy; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">I
won’t sign on completely to either view. Certainly, xenophobia is not an
exclusively American sickness. I grant you, we have had our moments.
</SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; BACKGROUND: white; COLOR: navy; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">But
insularity, as a national trait, I don’t think it fits. In the world of OKOM the
name that comes to mind first is Django Reinhardt. Come to think, I can’t make a
second </SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; BACKGROUND: white; COLOR: navy; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">name,
but its early on Sunday. </SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; BACKGROUND: white; COLOR: navy; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">Tom,
I do a fair amount of sail boat (never say yacht) racing. Think of it this way.
Jazz is to </SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; BACKGROUND: white; COLOR: navy; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">America</SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; BACKGROUND: white; COLOR: navy; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"> as
racing boats is to Kiwis. It’s in the DNA.</SPAN></FONT></FONT><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; BACKGROUND: white; COLOR: black; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"><BR></SPAN></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial></FONT><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT><FONT face=Arial
size=2></FONT><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT></FONT><FONT face=Arial
size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial>Some of the replies seem to be at cross purposes to what I
was trying to say so it is my fault for not explaining myself
properly. As a person with no focus on life, with low self-esteem,
basically lazy and without any marketable skills</FONT><FONT
face="Times New Roman"><FONT size=2><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman'; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-AU; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA"><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> <FONT face=Arial size=3>I respond to all the
above in this e-mail. I respectfully agree to all the following:
</FONT></SPAN></SPAN></FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Times New Roman"><FONT size=2><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman'; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-AU; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA"><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"><FONT face=Arial
size=3></FONT></SPAN></SPAN></FONT></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Times New Roman"><FONT size=2><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman'; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-AU; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA"><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"><FONT face=Arial size=3>There is less and less
interest in any kind of jazz here in the US. (and generally overseas as
well)</FONT></SPAN></SPAN></FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Times New Roman"><FONT size=2><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman'; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-AU; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA"><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"><FONT face=Arial size=3>There have been few original
voices outside the USA. (emphasis on the
original)</FONT></SPAN></SPAN></FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Times New Roman"><FONT size=2><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman'; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-AU; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA"><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"><FONT face=Arial size=3>A contributing factor in the
low interest in non-American jazz groups has been the unavailability of foreign
recordings.</FONT></SPAN></SPAN></FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Times New Roman"><FONT size=2><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman'; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-AU; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA"><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"><FONT face=Arial size=3>One of the reasons jazz was
able to spread around the world as quickly as it did was because the
<BR>language is universal. </FONT></SPAN></SPAN></FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Times New Roman"><FONT size=2><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman'; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-AU; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA"><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"><FONT face=Arial size=3>Jazz is to America as racing
boats are to Kiwis</FONT></SPAN></SPAN></FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Times New Roman"><FONT size=2><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman'; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-AU; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA"><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"><FONT face=Arial
size=3></FONT></SPAN></SPAN></FONT></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Times New Roman"><FONT size=2><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman'; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-AU; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA"><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"><FONT face=Arial size=3>However, even though America
is a large country (and beautiful with many excellent
musicians) it never-the-less is smaller than combined Europe plus
other English speaking countries excluding (say) all the so called third
world countries. I rest my case on statistics - lets assume that the
population of jazz musicians TODAY ranges somewhere between 0.01 and 0.10
percent of the population, say between 25,000 and 250,000 in USA. Then
over (approximately) two-thirds of the current (as distinct from past) jazz
world musician population live outside America. To ignore anything
outside USA, in my humble opinion, can be construed as having slightly
insular thinking (polite snipe) and I think it is arrogant. However, I
suppose most of us are now living in the
past.</FONT></SPAN></SPAN></FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Times New Roman"><FONT size=2><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman'; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-AU; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA"><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"><FONT face=Arial
size=3></FONT></SPAN></SPAN></FONT></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Times New Roman"><FONT size=2><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman'; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-AU; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA"><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"><FONT face=Arial size=3><FONT size=2>International
Jazz festivals exist in places that probably (if speaking honestly) some listers
will have never heard of, such as Turkey, Tunisia, Malta, Iceland, Belize, Czech
Republic (where Australia's Graeme Bell virtually introduced jazz) Cuba,
(where there are probably more musician per head of population than anywhere
else in the world), Dominican Republic, Hong Kong, Gibraltar, Israel, Hungary,
Finland, Portugal, Singapore, Thailand, to name only a few as there are about
260 countries in the world of which perhaps 100 or so have no jazz
experience. For example, there has been jazz in the Peace Hotel in
Shanghai since before the revolution over 50 years ago. The Nottingham
Rhythm Club in UK just pips Australia's Annual Jazz Convention as being the
longest continuously running (as far as I know) jazz event in the world. I
think the Merseysippi JB in UK have been playing together for over 50
years. I respect the American history and was introduced to jazz via Bunk
Johnson, Kid Ory and George Lewis. We had an unofficial visit to our
Climax JB Stud Club in Edinburgh in 1959 when the full George Lewis
band played and jammed together with us. Our Climax
JB </FONT><FONT size=2>had a 40 year reunion in 1993 (good God its now
50 years!) with all members still alive (each running their own bands) and
kicking.</FONT><BR></DIV></FONT></SPAN></SPAN></FONT></FONT>
<DIV><FONT><FONT face=Arial size=3><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman'; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-AU; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA"><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"></SPAN></SPAN></FONT></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial>Tom (respectful submitter) Wood</FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>