Steve Coleman’s Rebuttal
I would like to thank the current JazzTimes editor for allowing my voice to be heard. This is being addressed two years after Weiner’s 2021 … Read More “Steve Coleman’s Rebuttal”
James P. Johnson: “Carolina Shout” (OKeh, 1921)
The Dead Sea Scroll of jazz piano. (Literally a scroll; a generation of pianists learned the song from its player-piano roll.) Johnson’s performance of his self-composed rag codified the Harlem “stride” flavor of syncopation, ornamentation, and improvisation. It inspired Duke Ellington, Bud Powell, and Jaki Byard; in the likes of Jason Moran and Christian Sands, its spirit lives on today. MICHAEL J. WEST