No time, military style

My father accumulated many sayings in his 13 years in the military and took every opportunity to use them. So when I started my 1st draft by wishing there were more hours in a day I instantly heard him say, ” wish in one hand, shit in the other, see which one gets full the fastest.”

I guess this is the equivalent of the ubiquitous but much less colorful, ” it is what it is.” In this case we’re talking about a lack of time. Now that I’m heavily involved in the new Madison Jazz Jam I don’t have time to post here as often.

Last fall I let the site lapse for 6 months – that won’t happen again. Posting will be less frequent but the site will not die. My main priorities are the Madison Jazz Calendar  and the Madison Jazz Jam. When I have time or something absolutely needs to be communicated you’ll get a new post.  Of course you can help out by sending in news and info, or writing a post yourself.

Now, for reading this far your treat is another military gem: a recent photo of a lean, mean, jazz-making machine….Tim Whalen, post basic training. Don’t mess with him!

Site changes

Suddenly the site looks different. Why the change? Sorry, I can’t tell you. I went to the site today and was shocked at how it looked (I fixed a few things since then).

I started checking into it and found the theme (the template used for the site) had been changed. I’m not sure how that happened, but more checking revealed the theme isn’t available now. WordPress help is currently down so I can’t tell you if the old look is gone for good or I’ll be able to restore it. We’ll just have to wait a bit and see.

A New Jazz Calendar

Finally a replacement for Uncle Larry’s Crazeology jazz calendar! The new Madison Jazz Calendar makes it easy to keep track of jazz concerts, jams, and other events in Madison.

The previous Madison jazz calendar had many shortcomings and never took off. After that experience I spent a considerable amount of time trying to come up with a system that is user-friendly for jazz fans, and gives jazz artists control over how events are entered and displayed. I think this is a pretty good solution. The calendar is easy to navigate and can be viewed by day, week, month, or in a list format. Entering events is very easy for artists and requires no interaction with an administrator to change mistakes or make updates. More information is at the calendar site. Please check it out.

New Madison Jazz Calendar

The loss of Uncle Larry  also means the loss of his Crazeology jazz calendar. His calendar is currently still useful, but unless someone takes it over soon it will be out of date. I’ve heard someone is thinking about it, but few people can manage years of driving Milwaukee to Madison every weekend for a volunteer midnight to 6 am gig, and I doubt few people can sustain the work of keeping up his calendar over the long haul.

With that in mind, I’ve set up a jazz calendar that I hope can serve the same function while sparing any one person from shouldering the whole load. The new Madison Jazz calendar allows everyone to add events themselves, and it’s success will depend on Madison jazz musicians listing their own gigs and fans helping out when they hear of a gig that isn’t listed. I may enter a few to get it off the ground.

After testing many calendars this one seemed the best. It is easy to use and offers the ability to add links and descriptive text. It is also searchable. I expect it will take time to catch on but ultimately I hope it serves the needs of the jazz community well. 

I am initiating this as a community service but can’t promise meticulous maintainance of the calendar or troubleshooting. I will keep an eye on it to make sure it isn’t abused or spammed, but please don’t hold me responsible for any problems with the calendar.

Blog posting on hold

Just in case anyone wonders, I’m not sick or anything, I’ve just decided to cut way back on the posts and focus on other musical projects. I’ve always thought that the content on the rest of the site is more valuable than my posts. That content will remain and hopefully be useful to those interested in Madison jazz events and performers.

Thanks, and plea for help

First of all I want to thank everyone who has been a guest author on Madison Jazz. Posts from guest authors have been some of the most popular pieces on the site. A big THANK YOU goes out to:

• Patrick Breiner – Patrick’s rant at the Concourse put Madison Jazz on the map , and his most recent article is without a doubt the best article on the site.
• Ray Rideout- Ray provided the material for 3 consecutive posts that together with Patrick’s post were responsible for the busiest stretch in the site’s history: his letter to Kathleen Falk, a copy of the Concourse letter, and his spoof of that letter. Interest in these articles lasted for months.
• David Cooper – Dave  has contributed two heartfelt pieces, one about the demise of the Concourse jam and another remembering Freddie Hubbard.
• Jeff Peronto – Articles about and by Jeff have been extremely popular. The announcement that Jeff’s MATC career is over has been by far the most popular article on the site, and his post looking back at his time at MATC earned the distinction of a mention and link on the Isthmus daily page.

Now, the plea. I need more help writing articles!

I’m proud to say that in less than 4 months this blog has gone from a pipe dream to being an integral part of the jazz community. Many people visit Madison Jazz daily. Unfortunately, running this site and writing daily articles is incredibly time consuming. The rest of my life is suffering, especially practicing my saxophone. Now I also have a new musical project I want to put energy into - something has to give. I need to restore some balance.

Ideally, there would be two posts by guest authors each week. If two people step forward and commit to writing one article weekly that will do it (or four people every other week, you get the idea). If you want to write but need topic ideas talk to me. Otherwise, write on whatever you want, whatever you think  will interest or benefit the Madison jazz community. The only restriction is it shouldn’t be purely self-promotional. 

More guest authors means more diversity, a more interesting site, and a stronger jazz community. Please think about sacrificing a few hours a week to write an article and help keep this site going.