Willard Jenkins

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Willard Jenkins (born February 6, 1949 ) is an American music journalist , author , record producer , radio presenter and jazz official.

Live and act

Jenkins earned a BS in Sociology from Kent State University in Ohio in 1973 . In 1983, he led a regional jazz research program in the American Midwest that became the nation's first regional jazz program, the Arts Midwest in Minneapolis . There he created the first regional jazz database from 1984 to 1989 and wrote a number of manuals for musicians and promoters. From 1989 to 1994 he was Executive Director of the National Jazz Service Organization (NJSO) in Washington, DC In 1990 he helped set up the Lila Wallace-Reader's Digest National Jazz Network . As a fundraiser he worked a. a. for the National Endowment for the Arts and select charities and foundations.

From the 1970s on, Jenkins wrote for publications such as JazzTimes , Inside Arts, Down Beat , Schwann Spectrum, Schwann Opus, Jazz Report, Jazz Forum , The Antioch Review, Attache, Jazz Education Journal and All About Jazz , and also on his blog The Independent Ear . He has acted as the editor of numerous publications, such as the NJSO Journal and Lost Jazz Shrines, as well as the author of various liner notes for albums by Terence Blanchard , Nnenna Freelon , Talib Kibwe , Babatunde Lea , Joe Lovano and Marcus Printup as well as for the anthology Jazz: The Smithsonian Anthology (2011). Jenkins has worked as an interviewer for the Smithsonian Institution , the Rhythm & Blues Foundation, and 651Arts . With Randy Weston he wrote his autobiography African Rhythms , which was published in 2009 by Duke University Press. From 1979 to 1984 he taught jazz history at Cleveland State University ; from 2005 he taught the Jazz Imagines Africa course at Kent State University. He also worked in the music education field for the International Association for Jazz Education and the Thelonious Monk Institute.

Since the 1980s, Jenkins has also worked as a radio host and program designer in Cleveland , Minneapolis and Washington, among others. a. for National Public Radio , for which he contributed to the documentary for the 100th birthday of Louis Armstrong . In 1994, Jenkins worked for Black Entertainment Television as a jazz program consultant. Since 2007 he has been involved in the compilation of the WWOZ radio program in New Orleans. Since then he has worked as a consultant and coordinator. a. worked for the Cleveland Orchestra, the Greater Hartford Festival of Jazz , the Cleveland Education Fund, and the National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Masters Program . He participated in the production of numerous concerts and festivals, including a. for the Smithsonian Institution and the Harlem Stage / Aaron Davis Hall. As artistic director, he was responsible for the Lost Jazz Shrines and Jazz-in-Progress concert series at the Tribeca Performing Arts Center in New York, as well as the BeanTown Jazz Festival in Boston, produced by the Berklee College of Music . In 2012 and 2013 he was nominated in the category Prize for Lifetime Achievement in Jazz Journalism by the Jazz Journalists Association , of which he was co-founder and long-term vice president.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Biographical portrait at Open Jazz
  2. ↑ Open Sky Jazz
  3. ↑ http://www.allmusic.com/artist/willard-jenkins-mn0001753217
  4. ↑ Willard Jenkins at Discogs (English)
  5. ↑ JJA nominations 2013
  6. ↑ Interview (2011)
personal data
SURNAME Jenkins, Willard
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American music journalist and broadcaster
DATE OF BIRTH February 6, 1949