Broyges*

Never known to avoid a grudge, we'd like to remind Gilad Atzmon (see 6 November) that the second coming of Jazz Jews on radio is tonight at 10.00pm UK time, with listen again facility if he misses it. Here's the programme we are talking about: http://www.ukjazzradio.com/MikeGerber.html.
* a wonderful Yiddish word describing the situation whereby a second cousin is still upset because he wasn't invited to a wedding 23 years ago.

Our worst review ever?

Supporters of the Jewish right has for years been banging on about "the new anti-Semitism", where any small sign of concern that Israel might, on balance, from time to time, do the odd minor thing a teeny weeny bit wrong is lumped in with thousands of years of blood libels, forced conversions and pogroms as being anti-Semitic to the core. Ever vigilant, they spend their lives scanning the Guardian, the Independent and the Hamas-supporting BBC for evidence, where such evidence of anti-Semitism can always be found. If you want to find it. Over on the other side is Gilad Atzmon. Atzmon is an Israeli born anti-Zionist, whose views once managed to attract a picket by Jews Against Zionism. Atzmon is the mirror image of the right, where any sign of Jewish politics is a fig-leaf for Zionism. Thus, attacking Mike Gerber, the author of Jazz Jews and a member of the Jewish Socialists' Group, he argues that "Jewish politics is always a form of Zionism" or, because Mike plans to play Israeli musicians on his Jazz Jews radio programme he "manage[s] to endorse Zionist culture". Atzmon goes on to describe Jazz Jews as "one of the most disturbing books in the history of jazz literature". Maybe we'll use that on the cover when we get to paperback time. The good news though is that Atzmon has said it was Gerber writing the book that caused him to invent the satirical character "Artie Fishel" with his Promised Band, so we can now safely say that Jazz Jews influenced jazz history. Here's Atzmon's article (don't forget to wade through the comments): http://dissidentvoice.org/2010/10/jews-jazz-and-socialism/

"We're off to see the wizard"

Nat Hentoff on Jazz Jews

http://jazztimes.com/articles/25939-jews-in-the-family-of-jazz

Jazz Jews - the movie

Well You Tube anyway. This is the book launch. I'm the guy in the blue shirt doing the introduction. When I put this up the counter on You Tube said the introduction had not been viewed, which is a mistake, as of course the man in the blue shirt has viewed it several times:
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=jews+jazz&search_type=&aq=f
Clare Shaw is the singer - the canary in jazz parlance. There is still one song from the launch to go up, her arrangement of Strange Fruit, written by the Jewish Abel Meerepol in 1936, and introduced to Billie Holiday in 1939 by the integrated night club owner Barney Josephson, and recorded by Milt Gabler on Commodore in the same year, which history in itself makes some points about jazz Jews and their relationship to the black community.

Messiah still late shock, but the band plays on

On 22/11 I wrote that this long awaited book was due, betting though that it would come still before the Messiah. Well, the Messiah may be late, but the book was early. Dropping into the office today just to check the post before going away for a few days I had to climb over mounds of Jazz Jews, with no time to do anything other than send the author a few copies. The dispatch note with the books was dated 4th January so they must have arrived by time travel as well as carrier.
If you are one of those waiting, that the book has arrived early will do you no good whatsoever, and copies will still be sent out in the second week of January. Sorry.

In that earlier blog I wrote that the earliest emails about this book were from sometime in 2003. Mike tells me that we actually started discussing it in 2001, which means we really can say this book was ten years in the making. It's big, it's heavy, it's hardback, it has 7,000 names in the index and it's £24.99.

We're happy to send it to anyone in the UK post free, but anyone wanting to order from overseas would be best to go via http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/ as it will be post free internationally from there.

Thanks to Darius Hinks, by the way, for this wonderful wrap round Blue Note inspired cover.

Waiting for the messiah (who will be depping on drums)

I can't exactly place when Mike Gerber and Five Leaves started discussing a book on Jews and jazz, but the earliest saved email exchange was on 13/06/2003. Perhaps we were discussing it before email, or even movable type, it feels so long ago. At times it felt like the messiah would arrive before the book did. But unless the messiah gets his or her skates on, Mike's book will be out first.

Many people have been waiting for this book. Some have grown old while waiting. But it is on its way, 656 pages in all, which is about 500 pages larger than we originally planned, with an index featuring 7,000 names from all over the world as the book also became an international survey. And quite a few quid more than we'd planned, but, you know, inflation and all that.

I guess that other such books - not that there are any like this one - would be written by an academic on sabbatical, or a writer on a good advance, published by a publisher with a big editorial team. But Mike is a freelance journalist, with all the pressures that brings, and a family, which is probably living in dire poverty now because of all the CDs he had to buy and Five Leaves is only a small publisher which sometimes bites off more than it can chew.

Thanks to those who have waited. Just wait a little bit longer. This won't be the last word on Jews and jazz, just many tens of thousands of words as a contribution to a discussion.

Meantime, here's a picture of the Makabi club orchestra from Siauliai (Shavl in Yiddish) in Lithuania in 1932, courtesy of the Siauiliai Austros Museum.