APRIL 6 — There’s a running joke that emerged during the first days (weeks?) of the COVID19 crisis – and it doesn’t seem to be willing to die anytime soon.
The joke is that, while the pandemic calls for mass gatherings to be avoided at all cost (more on that later), jazz is safe – because, you know, jazz does not attract masses.
In the words of Lloyd Swanton, bassist and co-founder of The Necks, it goes like this:
“I see Norway is prohibiting any gatherings of five hundred or more.Jazz scene should be fine then.”
Here’s another version – again from Facebook: “Pretty much anything that will attract a crowd is being cancelled. We may have entered a strange new world where only the jazz bands survive.”
Funny, right? Well, except that it is not true – the truth is that jazz bands are struggling. Musicians along with other type of artists and anyone working in the arts, culture and events industry, are among the workers affected by the Coronavirus pandemic, losing their livelihoods within days. According to I lost my gig Australia, so far the events industry has lost $325 million worth of cancelled gigs – and that number is rising daily.
Here’s a random example: Ellen Kirkwood was planning to present her amazing [A] Part suite at Wollongong Jazz,with the Sirens Big Band.
It is one of those rare works of art that are created as a response to the zeitgeist, music that talks about the issues we are facing – in the aftermath of the devastating bushfires, this work gained another kind of urgency. In the era of COVID-19 it has become essential listening; this is the kind of music – insightful, empathetic, human – that we need most of all. The power of music to heal, to connect us and to help us make sense of the world.
To say that things are changing – and probably faster than what we can process – is an understatement.
That ‘jazz club’ joke? That was three weeks ago – or was it? Sometime it still feels like yesterday – others like years ago, when Melbourne woke up to the news of all outdoor gatherings of more than 500 people being ‘suspended’ (a beautiful euphemism for ‘forbidden’), which led to the cancellation of the Grand Prix, followed by the closure of the Melbourne Recital Centre and the Arts Centre, the cancellation of the Melbourne International Comedy Festival and the Melbourne International Jazz Festival and Stonnington Jazz and other large-scale events.
Then there was the ‘suspension’ of indoor gatherings of more than 100 people – The Jazz Lab was first to make the hard but responsible decision to close its doors, followed by Paris Cat, Bird’s Basement, Uptown Jazz Cafe and Melbourne’s two little intimate venues, Lido Jazz Room and Classic Southside. The Ellington in Perth, Doo-Bop and Brisbane Jazz Club in Queensland, Foundry 616 and all the jazz venues in the country did the same.
Some of them were optimistic that they woould reopen mid-April; some have kept their May programs scheduled – but as we move further towards lockdown, chances of this happening are really dim.S o yes, the jazz scene is hardly ‘fine’. Not only because we are all confined at home, not only because venues are closed, gigs are cancelled, recording sessions have been postponed, projects put on hiatus, but more importantly because COVID-19 is taking a toll on lives. Marcelo Peralta, Manu Dibango, Mike Longo, Wallace Roney, Ellis Marsalis, Bucky Pizzarelli — and since I first wrote this, Onaje Allen Gumbs, Hal Willner, Richard Teitelbaum, Andy Gonzalez; the list goes on.
Now more than ever, we need the healing power of music; we need the community building experience of live music performance to cope with the new normal we are trying to adapt to. Self – isolation, quarantine, lockdown, physical distancing – you name it, it will affect our lives for longer than it actually lasts.
Like a wildflower that finds its way to grow through a rock, music stays alive and offers us comfort and hope. Master guitarist John McLaughlin was one of the first of the greats to react – offering his latest release with Zakir Hussain and Shankar Mahadevan for free, as a gesture of solidarity.
“In view of the current situation world wide with Corona Virus and the fact that we are obliged to spend more time at home, we would like to offer our friends the free download of the new album Is that So? until end of April 2020 from Abstract Logix,” reads the message of the legendary guitarist. “Enjoy the music and stay happy and healthy!”
Others have followed his lead – as I’ll detail in part 2, tomorrow. But if you want to read the entirety of my post now, see it here at AustralianJazz.net.
