[vNQmO2BF]

Ok; here goes. I have lived in North Vancouver for almost two years. I moved from Mississauga, Ontario, just west of Toronto; that's where I started my jazz career only a few short years ago having finally made a long overdue switch from the classical end of things. Now, I do have to preface everything I'm about to write by saying that I don't believe that the grass is greener everywhere else but here. In fact the grass is very very green here for a number of reasons, not the least of which is the rain.

The Greater Toronto Area has more venues; period. But, there are also more musicians gunning for those venues. I think on the whole that balances as far as it being tough to get work. The jazz exclusive venues draw pretty good crowds, but often I think that it's just because they have a ton more people walking by. The last time I played The Rex, I had a great young band Gord Webster, Brandi Disterheft, Sly Juhas and Bob Brough sitting in (Ok Bob isn't that young), I advertized, told all my friends, and still most of the crowd (a good 80 people) was there "by accident"...just walking by and hearing the music. I don't know this city well enough to know if there is a location that could do that. So it's a numbers game. I don't care who you have playing, hell I saw Jimmy Smith playing in a hole in the wall in Mississauga on a Tuesday night (he was in town for the Oakville Jazz Festival) and there were only 25 people there! Only a few years ago!! Jimmy Smith!! But, no one was walking by this place on a Tuesday night to happen to hear some great music and stop in.

I don't know what this means...just stream of consciousness observations.

I've had a tough time getting a feel for this city musically and frankly, I thought it would be easier to get re-established. Trying to get something happening on the North Shore was a bust, partly due to the venue owners not advertizing at all, but there were a lot of people who viewed the threads that I posted about the gig who didn't show. We had some good folks playing in a great venue with decent cheap food and beer ....our max crowd for a Thursday night was about 25....our lowest number 4...5 if you count the bartender. ???? I don't know.

Ah well, we all chose this crazy career...or was it forced on us by constant parental nagging? I don't know if I have a point, but this was cathartic anyway.

By the way, the current population of the Greater Toronto Area is 5.8 million just to help promote the population vein of this thread.

[petrarkaponye]

The population of greater New Orleans WAS about 1.5 million (now it's probably about 76).

Okay, I'll stop speaking in the past tense, it's too depressing. 1.5 million, making it significantly smaller than greater Vancouver. Approximately 160 clubs featuring live music at least some of the time.

So much for the 'population base' theory.

[vNQmO2BF]

Ok, a numbers game and a years of being known to the world as an entertainment mecca game. But, good point...just makes it more confusing to me.

[clitlyphype]

It's not fair to introduce the birthplace of jazz and Mecca to all serious music fans into the equation, John! People travel from all over the world to hear New Orleans music (and little else). People travel from all over the world to Vancouver for other reasons. I think New Orleans is an aberration because of its storied history. No city in the world compares favourably to it for its jazz tradition. And how many of those 160 clubs featuring live music at least some of the time are featuring jazz? And are they packing them in every night? My wife went to New Orleans jazz festival once. I looked at the lineup and it was mostly pop and rock music. It made our festival look positively traditional!

[petrarkaponye]

Well, yeah it might be a bit unfair to bring in that kind of heavy lumber. But my point is that having a small population base is no excuse for undersupporting the arts. If there is real motivation at the municipal level, it's possible to be a 'music town' even if you don't have a huge local market to draw on. Branson Missouri and Austin Texas are two examples that spring to mind.

And no, there aren't huge numbers of straight ahead jazz clubs in New Orleans either (although there's more than here). Jazz is, as others have pointed out, not a music with broad popular support.

I really believe though, that a healthy scene with lots of live music of all kinds is good for jazz. It's sure good for musicians. I used to make a halfway decent living in Vancouver playing in R&B bands. That would be impossible now.

I like to play the saxophone. I like to play jazz. But I like to play other kinds of music too.

[opdirorg]

I hear you Terry.. I brought in New York harmonica giant Hendrik Meurkens on a recent Saturday Night... Maybe 25 people for the first set..second set a bit better..

Hendrik told me that he only had one complaint about Vancouver.."not enough jazz clubs" he said.. with the kind of support you and I describe, there's no wonder this city has trouble supporting one dedicated jazz club..

[Poeetiol]

The issue with Vancouver is quite simple. With the water and mountains surronding us and the sheer picturesque beauty that this city possesses, we will always have trouble supporting live music of any kind. People seem more interested in their SUV's, surrond sound stereo systems and their cell phones in Vancouver. I think that our biggest competition is the water and the mountains. Its that simple.

[hernkingAnank]

In competition with the enviroment. I've heard that conclusion before and I personally agree with Cory on that feeling. However Vancouver's has always had the enviroment issue even when the scene was far more vibrant. I wonder if Seattle has the same issues. If not I wonder why. Just curious about that.
Maybe Seattle doesn't have that problem and if that's true, I'm wondering if it's because there's so much more media support for the local Jazz scene there. What about San Fransisco or San Diego?

Anyway you'd know better then me Cory but I can't help but think that people aren't getting the message. It says something when you can actually pick up an American publication and read about Vancouver players in a magazine like NorthWest Jazz Profile. Other than referring to this website or doing an internet search on an individual I don't know where you can get in depth information on the local Jazz scene here. There isn't a Canadian publication serving our needs. There used to the Jazz Report Magazine but to be honest about that, it's a Toronto publication which used to have representitives from various eastern and western cities chiming in on what came and what's coming and what's happening now. At the risk of sounding ungrateful about that and with all due respect to Bill, I felt this was largely gratuitous. I don't know that the attempt did much to make the Canadian Jazz scene as a whole feel more cohesive. I thought the effort was good but just not done in the right way - so what's the right way.
The issue with respect to that publication seemed to raise more animosity and questioning whether or not the 'representitive' contributor was truely qualified to represent the respective Jazz communities. The infighting tended to alienate people with the realization that perhaps the Canadian Jazz community was actually not one big happy family. Well it isn't and I don't believe it ever has been but what I DO believe is that the country is filled with regions experiencing unique obsticals. I happen to be of the opinion that the Jazz scene in Edmonton is very healthy and respected both within the city - the local media and across the country. Calgary too for that matter which has an abundance of 'grass roots' support from it's musicians - interactive media not to mention an alternative Jazz Festival out board of the WestCan. But how about in our own back yard - like Victoria?? There's lots of music going on over there, an unbelievable amount. Personally speaking, 50% of what I have been doing in the last month has been over there. Now what gives with that? I think it's support on all levels - If ever there was a place with the potential of the local Jazz scene being at odds with it's enviroment? That has to be the place.

Now, here's something unrelated albeit speaking to the subject of media - Guitarist Peter Leetch (sp) originally of Toronto was quoted in print once of stating - 'Jazz came up the Mississippi from New Orleans, it didn't come down the Don Valley Parkway from Humber College'

For what it's worth - food for thought

Cam.

[opdirorg]

Well Campbell.. maybe I can chalk up my sentiment to the fact that I moved back here a little over a year ago and am still "plugging in" to the Vancouver community after a prolonged absence.... In the 92-95 years that I was here, the Glass Slipper(where I used to volunteer both for Museart and Coastal) was a super happening place and I seem to recall there were a lot more places to perform in Vancouver than there are now.. The Cellar has (thankfully) picked up the torch but I often wonder how it manages to stay afloat.. People have to support the club or it won't stick around in this expensive city...

Aside from the "environment" issue that Cory points out, competition for the entertainment dollar get more fierce in a deteriorating(rising interest rates, inflation etc) economic environment.
Your reference to Victoria is interesting because as the seat of the Provincial Government and a good chunk of the civil service, the City is relatively(?)economically better off(??) than most of the other cities in the Province(??) I'm not an economist but when folks have to cut back on their discretionary spending, the entertainment budget is often the first to be axed when competing with other items of the household budget..eg: kids, mortgage, hydro, groceries etc..

The other thing that galls me is that the Province of BC is the national embarrassment when one looks at per capita funding for the arts, BC is the worst of all the Provinces.. Quebec ranks at the top of this list so lets just say that the Arts funding lobby needs to bark a lot louder to bring BC up to the national average for arts funding..

Otherwise, i don't think there are any easy answers or explanations for the current situation other than the one thing we can count on is that it will change in one way or another.. I look at the arts as a public service..much like education, health and social programs/welfare.. you can't run public services on a for profit model but that is at odds with the way the BC government(and Ottawa) thinks... these so called public services are being privatized out to "for profit" companies.. that's why we're in this mess with our schools, hospitals, the arts, etc..

So ultimately, until people in the community start looking at the arts (music in this case) as a public service that improves the quality of life in our community, we are going to be stuck in this "for profit" mentality that is going ruin all sorts of the public service benefits that the previous generation of Canadians fought for that this generation risks losing if we don't make a loud fuss... the federal election might be a good place to make our sentiments felt(??) but I don't like mixing music and politics!

[Poeetiol]

Seattle is a city that I have often tried to draw comparison to although it is a little bigger I don't think its much healthier down there although there seem to be a lot more 'presenters.' I frequently visit the Jazz Alley site and more often than not they are booking the more 'smooth' jazz acts which I'll talk about in a minute. Other than Jazz Alley there is Tula's which pretty much stays local. Someone please correct me but you never really ever see the likes of Fathead Newman, Charles McPherson, Frank Wess, Benny Golson, Frank Morgan, Mulgrew Miller etc. The reason I bring these names up is because these are the people I have brought in and can never ever find anywhere for them to play in Seattle and if I do they don't want to pay the money that I pay.

The thing that Seattle and pretty much every other U.S. market has is pretty much every major market in the States has at least one radio station that features primarily jazz whether its a public or private station. I can't stress enough the importance that this has. CBC, Gavin's show, my show when its running all do great jobs but those shows are destination shows meaning only peoiple who are in the know tune in and only for those specific times do they listen. If we had a radio station that was all jazz, blues and even world music where people could be hammered with jazz whether it is local or not would greatly change the landscape of the scene here.

I know, I know, its never going to happen but if it were to happen it would greatly improve the local scene and the suport it gets.

[petrarkaponye]

Awrite Cory!

I'll say it again. Jazz press. Jazz media (radio).

If you don't have those things, it doesn't matter how many great players are around, the scene will remain the preserve of a small group of 'in the know' people.

I've seen three great, great gigs in the past three weeks, the Roadhouse artists at Rime, and Terry Deane/George Colligan and David "Fathead" Newman at the Cellar. I have not seen or heard one mention of any of these thing in any newspaper or broadcast medium, with the exception of Gavin Walker's show.

If stuff doesn't get talked up, how are people to know it's even happening.