Plainsong: Best wishes and a full and speedy recover to ace jazz publicist Pat Courtemanche who underwent surgery during the June Twin Cities (St. Paul-Minneapolis, Minn.) Hot Summer Jazz Festival which he handled with his usual expertise and enthusiasm. HSJF founder and promoter Steve Heckler and Courtemanche would do well to get in touch with classical conductor Andrew Litton, artistic director of the Minnesota Orchestra's Sommerfest concert series. Litton has said he wants to bring more jazz to Sommerfest. What could be better than Litton and the Orchestra teaming up with the HSJF and utilizing the bountiful jazz talent on hand in Minnesota, especially our traditional jazz and ragtime players? HSJF already has worked with the orchestra, most recently bringing in Chick Corea's group "Return to Forever" this year. Adding a relationship with Sommerfest would be logical and mutually beneficial, I believe.

At the same time, Heckler and Courtemanche undoubtedly were interested to learn July 28, along with the rest of us, of the appointment of New Orleans trumpeter Irvin Mayfield as the Minnesota Orchestra's first jazz director. But if the RAG™ readership thinks this guarantees a flood of trad and ragtime artists will be appearing at Orchestra Hall, Minneapolis, well, maybe not. Responding July 30 through his publicist to a series of questions about his plans for a new jazz series at Orchestra Hall starting in 2009,  Mayfield said, "My plans for the concert series will be and always is (sic) to celebrate the music unapologetically, at all times to its true core. I'm still contemplating on the artists, but it will definitely be a true authentic New Orleans experience. Throughout the series, you will hear similar sounds from some of my favorites: James Booker, Miles Davis,  Duke Ellington, Aaron Neville etc….Most importantly, I would like to take what we do at the bottom of the Mississippi River and bring it to the top and just celebrate the tremendous American culture." Stay tuned.

A museum dedicated to the great bandleader Glenn Miller is to be built in his birthplace (1904) community of Clarinda, Iowa. A news release from the Glenn Miller Birthplace Society announced the project recently and urges Miller fans to contribute with financial donations and memorabilia. Leading the effort is Society president Marvin Negley. Learn  more about the project at www.glennmiller.org.

Minnesota native trumpeter Charlie Caranicas told us by e-mail recently his career continues apace in his adopted home of New York City. Dividing his gigs between trad and modern, Caranicas reports he recently played at Nantucket/Cape Cod with The Big Apple Jazz Band; a central Connecticut festival with Jeff Barnhart's all-stars; a festival in Orange County, Calif., with The Independence Hall Jazz Band and he's preparing for a two-week gig in September in Brazil with Judy Carmichael. "It's more traveling in a three-month period than I've done in many years, but the variety is nice," says Caranicas.

Retired Minnesota Public Radio jazz broadcaster Leigh Kamman reports he is making good progress on researching and writing his history of jazz broadcasters.

Veteran Minnesota classical, jazz and pop trumpeter Danny Tetzlaff died July 11 at 88. He once wrote the "Trumpet Talks" column for the magazine International Musician. He played a trumpet with an upwardly angled bell ala Dizzy Gillespie. 

The Jazz Bookworm: The life and magnificent achievement of Waukesha, Wis. native Les Paul, now 93 and still going strong, is told in The Early Years of the Les Paul Legacy, 1915-1963,by Robb Lawrence, published by Hal Leonard, 287 pages, $40 hardback. This is the first of a two-volume set and is an absolute "must" for guitar players, historians and those of us who have been listening to his jazz and revolutionary pop music for decades. To order, 1-800-554-0626; sales@halleonard.com.

Minnesota poet Bill Holm (an amateur pianist whose repertory ranges from Bach to Joplin) has been named 2008 Distinguished Artist by the Minnesota-based McKnight Foundation.

Footsteps in the Dark: The Hidden Histories of Popular Music by George Lipsitz, University of Minnesota Press, $22.95 paperback, www.upress.umn.edu, contains a chapter entitled "Jazz: The Hidden History of Nationalist Multiculturalism" that I recommend highly to RAG™ and all other jazz-loving readers. It deals with race, nationality, eras, styles and personalities in a way that is new to me in jazz literature and may be to you as well. Prize-winning author Toni Morrison prefaces the chapter with: "Nobody agrees on anything about jazz (except that it has survived beautifully and blossomed), but everybody thinks they know all about it, anywhere in the world. There is an interesting ownership of jazz."

August 2008 issue | © 2008 The Mississippi Rag

P.O. Box 19068, Minneapolis, MN 55419.