IAJE in NYC

The International Association for Jazz Education is meeting in New York this week. To help celebrate, the New York Times has a nice article about the liveliness of jazz education in American high schools and colleges. “I don’t have empirical data,” IAJE executive director Bill McFarlin tells the Times, “but I would have to guess that the jazz education industry has quadrupled in the last 20 years.” 

The annual IAJE conference, like the Country Radio Seminar, is a relatively undiscovered opportunity to hear lots of great music. Both events are trade shows intended for people in an industry. You have to join the organization, of course, and you have to be able to take a few days off from work, and you have to be willing to stay in a nice hotel. It’s not Woodstock. But there’s good music around every corner.

The boom in jazz education does not help those of us who are done with school and are trying to keep the flame burning on our own. Fortunately, we have WorkshopLive.

[TJH]