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Confirmation: Weekly News and Notes

May 22, 2024 William Brownlee

Original image by Plastic Sax.

*Reporting on a junket to Kansas City partly subsidized by Visit KC, a correspondent for The Times of London mentions Green Lady Lounge and the American Jazz Museum in a Taylor Swift-themed feature.

*Larry Tye promoted his book The Jazzmen: How Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong and Count Basie Transformed America on KCUR.

*From a press release: It has been a very long wait, but, with the combined efforts of three celebrated jazz musicians – and with the approval of the step-daughter of the great Charlie Parker – we proudly announce the release of "Pree's Wings", a composition and recording that not only adds to the Parker legacy, but fills a significant historical and musical void that has lasted nearly 70 years! As is well-known, Parker composed two brilliant jazz compositions for his children, “Kim,” for step-daughter Kim and “Baird Laird” for his natural son with Chan Richardson. However, Bird never composed a song for daughter “Pree” who, seriously ill from birth, tragically died as a toddler… After lengthy conversations with Parker’s still-surviving jazz vocalist step-daughter, Kim – and receiving her approval, three internationally known jazz artists, trumpeter/writer, Nick Mondello, saxophonist/arranger/composer, Gio Washington-Wright, and vocalist/lyricist, Giacomo Gates - each a lifelong acolyte of Parker’s legacy - combined forces to compose both an instrumental and vocal original composition dedicated to Kim Parker and named after the child who never had a Parker-composed song dedicated to her – “Pree’s Wings.”

*From a press release: Kansas City Jazz A.L.I.V.E. is pleased to announce it has been approved by the National Endowment for the Arts for a Grants for Arts Projects award of $10,000. This grant will support Spotlight: Charlie Parker, an annual Kansas City-wide celebration of the life and music of Kansas City’s native son, Charlie “Bird” Parker, held in August.

Tags Kansas City, jazz, Green Lady Lounge, American Jazz Museum, Count Basie, Charlie Parker
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