Perspectives

With all that's going on in the world, this topic hardly seems to be of any importance to the world at large. People are starving and suffering and dying in ways we, that is most people lucky enough to have this thing we call "internet access," couldn't imagine (or want to).

But, plight is plight. And, this is about more than a single man's plight, but the implications about the state of some of the pioneers of an artform. About the state of people who've given as much to their art as people like Bruce Lee ®, Inosanto, Tatang, or Uncle Bill have given to the arts I currently study:

Jazz Musicians, After the Spotlight Fades
by Felix Contreras

All Things Considered, April 18, 2005 · Just as many baby boomers face the prospect of caring for aging parents, the jazz world is faced with caring for a generation of aging musicians like Frank Foster. Now 76, the tenor saxophonist, who played with the Count Basie Orchestra, has suffered a stroke and can no longer perform, leaving him with an uncertain financial future.

Although collectively these jazz greats are revered for being the principal architects of a sound that revolutionized jazz after World War II, many now face low wages, little or no health insurance, and often no royalty payments for the recordings that made history.

I saw Frank Foster head the Basie band twice. I have the CD they were promoting at the time, Live at El Moracco. The man I remember doesn't look like the picture in the article, but I suppose age and a stroke will do that.