New York and All That Jazz

Unlike my hometown, which hosts a superb jazz festival every summer, New York City just is JAZZ, the place for it, year-round, nonstop, the best there is. If the great players don't always grow up in New York, they get there eventually, and they stay, because this is one of the few towns where you can play every night. Of course, New York has been the capital city of all the major art forms except film since the 1920s, but its jazz scene has a particularly endearing quality: no media hype or elite chic; just the music, played live by the surprisingly humble souls who somehow make their living at this intricate and passionate craft.

So, if you crave densely-packed musical experience and plan to be in New York for the APsaA meeting this January, you might want to consider organizing a tour of Manhattan jazz spots—especially if budget is a factor in your travel plans.

Birdland is probably the most expensive venue at $30 a head (sometimes more) plus $10 cover charge. If you think that's pricey, compare it to the cost of a Broadway musical. At 315 West 44th Street, not far from Broadway, Birdland takes its name from Charlie “Yardbird” Parker, though it's no longer at the original 52nd Street address where, for example, John Coltrane's hypnotic “Live at Birdland” album was recorded.

Among jazz aficionados, the current location lacks the gritty intimacy of the original, but this judgment is relative, as the following anecdote illustrates. When my wife and I first visited Birdland, the Cuban pianist Gonzalo Rubalcaba was scheduled to play with his trio. We had no idea who Rubalcaba was or any inkling of his musical stature. We caught the last set that night and while we waited to get in, we chatted with a Puerto Rican woman who turned out to be the proud mother of Rubalcaba's new 21-year-old bass player. She told us all about her son's devotion to musical education and hours of practice. Then the young man himself joined us in the line to keep his mother company. The queuing in the street passed pleasantly in conversation with the Puerto Ricans and soon we found a table near the stage, in sight of Rubalcaba's fingers. The point of this story is that we were completely blown away—two unsuspecting analysts from Montreal—by the music. After the show, we chatted briefly with Rubalcaba himself on the sidewalk outside the club while he waited for his lift home. We then made a beeline to the 24/7 Virgin Megastore on Times Square and bought every Rubalcaba CD we could find.

That night we were inspired by an extraordinary combination of personal modesty and musical brilliance, but I would say now that although Gonzalo Rubalcaba is an exceptional individual, similar blends of unpretentious charm and sheer talent are typical of the New York jazz scene. More often than not it is possible to meet the musicians after they perform, and sometimes they will make a point of mingling with the audience as it files out into the bustling night. This is certainly true of the Iridium, 1650 Broadway, at 51st Street, (where you can hear the legendary Les Paul every Monday night), and a majority of the clubs, bars, restaurants, and cafes where jazz music is featured in New York.

Perhaps the most famous of them all is the Village Vanguard at 178 Seventh Avenue South at West 11th Street, which celebrated its 70th anniversary last February. This is a historic site (Charlie Mingus's broken light bulb is still hanging from the ceiling, unreplaced), so one expects a tourist trap, but the atmosphere, though electric, is unimposing. The $30 admission includes a $10 drink credit, though unfortunately the wine list is not like the Iridium's, which offers cru classé and lots of good California cabernets. And if you haven't had a chance to eat, there's no food at the Vanguard; but the intensity of the aesthetic experience, the quality of the musicianship, the intimate press of the 123-seat full-house, and the excellent acoustics will act on you like the hungry baby's hallucinatory gratification in Chapter 7 of The Interpretation of Dreams.

Greenwich Village is a natural focus for jazz crawling: Blue Note (131 West 3rd St), Fat Cat (75 Christopher St., formerly Small's), 55 Bar (55 Christopher St.), and even Zinc Bar (90 West Houston St., if you want to go international and rough it a bit). Notable on the Upper West Side is Smoke (2751 Broadway, at 106th St.), named after the popular film by novelist Paul Auster, who frequented this bar's previous incarnation, Augie's, when he was a student at Columbia. I should also mention Jazz at Lincoln Center, an interesting and controversial education/performance complex founded by Wynton Marsalis.

There is really no end to jazz in Manhattan. If you want to know who's playing where and when, with phone numbers, Google the individual clubs, or go to , or . In print, try Steve Dollar's Jazz Guide New York City (ISBN 1-892145-19-7). New York itself offers a host of jazz periodicals (many of them free) containing informative articles on the current jazz scene, with all the weekly listings.

If you want intellectual background on jazz music, consult John F. Szwed's Jazz 101: A Complete Guide to Learning and Loving Jazz. On the cultural history of jazz age New York, see Ann Douglas, Terrible Honesty: Mongrel Manhattan in the 1920s. And if you are an audiophile-connoisseur, check out the Jazz Record Center (236 West 26th Street (between Seventh and Eighth Avenues).