It’s terrific.
In track by track detail:
The economics of jazz and the broader music economy – the important role of the government
•June 19, 2025 • Leave a CommentI’ve been posting in my substack “Music and Our Lives” a three-part series on this important topic, which includes:
NYC Council and Federal small business support in the recovery from the devastation of jazz clubs during the COVID 19 pandemic,
the historical role of the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), Small Business Administration… in supporting Arts in the United States,
the good and the bad in the use of artists in State Department endeavors,
What may the future hold?
Parts one and two are already posted, with part three coming soon.
Part 2: Federal funding and the music and Arts economy
Part 3: Further thoughts about Federal funding of jazz and other musical arts – tours & the Internet
March 20, 2025: publication date for “The Musical World of Paul Winter” (Terra Nova Press)
•March 17, 2025 • Leave a CommentSpring Equinox, March 20, 2025
The Musical World of Paul Winter
by Bob Gluck (Terra Nova Press)
https://www.terranovapress.com/books/musical-world-of-paul-winter
There are surely many saxophonists and environmentalists, but very few environmentalist/saxophonists. Most influential is Paul Winter, about whom Bob Gluck has written the first book, now available from Terra Nova in a paperback, expanded edition.
Gluck’s narrative follows Winter’s fascinating path, from a small central Pennsylvania railroad town to touring South America at the invitation of the U.S. State Department, playing at the Kennedy White House, recording in the Grand Canyon, playing music to whales in ocean, and for four decades, crafting an annual multi-media celebration of the Summer Solstice at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City. Gluck traces the evolving story of Paul Winter’s “Consort,” a group modeled upon an Elizabethan-era ensemble while incorporating music of many cultures and species.
Paul Winter has, for five decades, harnessed his gift for melody, love of aesthetic beauty, and infectious optimism to increase societal empathy for endangered species and this fragile planet. In this book, Bob Gluck captures the wonder and adventure of Paul Winter’s musical odyssey.
Bob Gluck, writer, pianist, and rabbi, is the author of Pat Metheny, Stories beyond Words (2024) and two other books from University of Chicago Press. The latest of his fourteen recordings are Early Morning Star (2020) and the forthcoming Transcendence, Music of Pat Metheny (both from FMR Records). Bob Gluck is Professor Emeritus at the University at Albany in Albany, New York.
Critical commentary about Bob Gluck’s books:
The Musical World of Paul Winter: “This book goes beyond one musician’s story directly into your own. It gets you to musing, “Where do I really fit in? Where does anyone?” – W. A. Mathieu, pianist and author of The Listening Book, Discovering Your Own Music
Pat Metheny, Stories beyond Words: “For anyone who wants to think about and, perhaps more importantly, feel music more deeply, more intensely, and more profoundly.” – Kevin Fellezs, author of Birds of Fire: Jazz, Rock, Funk, and the Creation of Fusion
The Miles Davis Lost Quintet and Other Revolutionary Ensembles: “One of the best things about this book is Gluck’s ability to connect all the dots: the relations between players and movements, between seemingly disparate musicians and the collective music they created.” – Scott Yanow, New York City Jazz Record
You’ll Know When You Get There: Herbie Hancock and the Mwandishi Band: “A fascinating look at the development of a musical identity… At its core, the book is a study about how an artist accumulates a sound and the experiences that shape his musical views.” – Jon Ross, Down Beat
“Pat Metheny, Stories beyond Words” – Reflection 15 – creative work, patience and endurance
•August 29, 2024 • 2 CommentsThe cycles of writing books and making musical recordings, working towards their publishing, their release, and life in the world… involve series of waiting games. I’ve now published four books, with a second soon to be released in another language edition, and thirteen recordings (another is already recorded and mastered). Each follows a similar pattern from initiation to completion.
Each of these projects begin with an idea, followed by the excitement of discovery and creation. Coming next are long periods of organizing, researching, notating, learning parts and teaching them to others, writing and rewriting drafts, crafting descriptions of what I’m working on, waiting as others listen to or read and critique drafts, submittions or invitations by publishers or record companies, rewriting and rewriting. Or there are rehearsals, recording and post-production, writing or commissioning liner notes, advance promotion… you get the idea. Each cycle includes bursts of creativity, labors of refinement and reworking, expansion and contraction of material, anticipating reactions and then being thrilled, disappointed, annoyed, and/or inspired by them, followed by further rounds of work in response. And then there is editing or reviewing edits, mixes, masters, layouts, crafting an index and bibliography, outlining or developing promotional materials and revising them.
The writing and composing of books or recordings is largely a waiting game. Deadlines approach and then arrive, followed by new deadlines; work is delegated and fulfilled or not, reminders and nudges sent, planning meetings held.
The release date of the book or recording is finalized, publicity work begins, promotion and events contacts solicited or invited, books or recordings sent to prospective reviewers, interviewers, and venues. Social media begins to be generated and published – some of it is broadly noticed and others are not.
All of the sudden, the release date arrives. Another round of waiting immediately follows as it is often unclear where or when the first reviews will appear, release events scheduled, and then comes the anticipation and excitement of preparing for talks and rehearing for concerts.
The new work begins its life in the world, on book shelves or digital devices, electronic downloads, streams, or physical playback media, radio, public readings, concerts, and interviews. Notifications arrive that a review, or two or three has been published, a feature article has appeared. I’ve generally been really lucky in receiving positive responses, something one cannot take for granted.
The real challenge for me then is how to allocate time and energy to the afterlife of this culmination of one to three years of work while also looking ahead to new projects. Sometimes this is easy – my book events can also represent the first of future concerts that have some relationship to a book. My book about Herbie Hancock’s Mwandishi band was preceded and followed by concerts of its repertoire, and then, three years following the release came an album recording session that included two original members of the band. My new book about Pat Metheny arose out of performances of his music and the release of the book marks the resumption of these concerts.
Writing books and composing for recordings requires patience and an ability to ride the spurts and lulls of activity. At the end of the day, these efforts net concrete representations of creative work that readers and listeners may return to for years to come. One never knows the trajectory of a publication because there is so much competition for people’s attention, and our attention spans are brief. There is no predicting what will catch or remain in the public eye.
I’ve been fortunate to have multiple opportunities over many years to release creative work, talk about and perform it. I look forward to this continuing well into the future. It all requires enormous patience and endurance. My wish for you is that you can also find the inner reserve to fulfill your own creative projects, each of which entail extended periods of sustained effort.
“Pat Metheny, Stories beyond Words” – Reflection 14 – bassist Steve Rodby
•June 25, 2024 • Leave a CommentOne of the pleasures of working on each of my book projects has been conducting interviews. Of course, the most significant interviewee for Pat Metheny, Stories beyond Words has been Pat Metheny himself. Conversations with three other key figures also played a substantive role in the development of the book. One of these, bassist and producer Steve Rodby, is the focus of today’s blog posting. Commentary about the two other interviews will appear in future posts. Even after the release of the book, I will conduct additional, new interviews and these will over time will appear on this blog to supplement the book. This has been a practice of mine for each of my previous books.
With the music itself being front and center, Steve Rodby’s discussion of his experiences as bassist with the Pat Metheny Group music offers substantial insight into how the music was translated from composition into sonic realization. At times, Rodby notes, the bass lines were composed by Metheny, in which case “I just tried to bring them to life, with small but (to my sensibility) important improvisations along the way.” At other times, a bass line reflected “elements of personal expression for me, and other players might have approached it quite differently.” But almost always, there were improvisational elements within Rodby’s lines.
Steve Rodby was a particularly valuable musical partner for Pat Metheny because he brought a wide range of skills, experiences, and sensibilities to the table. Rodby describes himself as: “probably three musicians in one, the jazz musician, the pop studio player, and the orchestral bassist…” His musical craft grew in depth and breadth during his time as a college student at Northwestern University, situated in the Chicago area. One formative experience was:
“often being part of the ‘house rhythm section’ at the seminal Jazz Showcase in Chicago. At the same time, I started doing a lot of recording sessions, many on electric bass, many playing straight up pop music of the time. I was wearing a lot of different stylistic hats, older jazz and newer jazz and pop music, all of which reflected my broad tastes in music.”
During his three decades with the Pat Metheny Group, Rodby brought an improvisatory spirit to Metheny’s compositions:
“I was improvising the whole time, responding to every unique moment in the soloing and drumming and drama of the moment. And that was my intention: to combine the solidity (very much in a pop sense) of what the bass can do to organize music, how it’s heard and felt, with the flexibility and intuition that accompanying these brilliant improvisors would call for … serving the composition rather than pushing individual personality to the foreground.”
Rodby observes that every Metheny composition presented its own distinct character, that required an idiosyncratic response from the rhythm section. This could reflect a spectrum of musical qualities, including pop music, that was performed by musicians with Rodby’s type of sensibility. Thus:
“To me it was still jazz music [and I was was] playing a crucial supportive role for incredible improvised solos and interactive drumming and accompaniment and unpredictability – always in and of the moment, always needing to be made fresh, every time.”
In Pat Metheny, Stories beyond Words, I build upon Rodby’s ideas in my narration of how he navigated Metheny’s “Red Sky” (from We Live Here). You’ll also find in the book, far more extensive material from my discussion with the Steve Rodby, and others. Its worthy noting that Rodby’s work with Metheny has continued well beyond his days as the Pat Metheny Group bassist, bringing his substantive studio engineering knowledge and skills to bear on many subsequent Metheny projects.
The book will be released by University of Chicago Press on August 5, 2024.
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