Jamie Howison's Blog

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I missed seeing Chasing Trane: the John Coltrane Documentary when it played in the theatre during the 2017 Winnipeg Jazz Festival, so I was pleasantly surprised when I recently discovered it was available on Netflix.  While there is really nothing new here for the serious fan, it is great fun to watch a wide array of people – unabashed fans all – remember, pay tribute, and sometimes positively gush over the work of a true jazz great. That list of fans includes jazz legends such as Benny Gols...

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A note from Jamie Howison: Here’s the text of a sermon preached at Winnipeg’s Fort Garry Mennonite Fellowship on Sunday April 23, 2017. The congregation set the whole morning as a jazz liturgy, with all of the music led by a very fine quartet led by saxophonist Scott Kroeker. Also playing were Steve Hamilton on bass, Bryan Harder on piano, and Rob Siwik on drums. *Please note that the audio of the sermon will be available soon.

I’m sure that many of you would not say that you’re particularly...

From left to right, Bill Charlap, Willie Pickens, Renee Rosnes and Bethany Pickens

One of my favourite moments as Christmas approaches is to see that NPR has posted the audiofrom the year’s Jazz Piano Christmas concert. It is an annual eventheld at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, DC, and it just never fails to satisfy. This year’s concert took place on December 10, and featured twin piano sets by Willie Pickens and his daughter Bethany, and by husband and wif...

A sermon preached by Jamie Howison on June 26, 2016 at saint benedict’s table in Winnipeg. The text for the sermon wasGalatians 5:1, 13-25.

I spent two evenings this past week, listening to some great live jazz music. On Tuesday evening Rob Burton and I went to see Kamasi Washington, the rising star in the world of jazz. With an incredibly good and inventive band, Washington is filling theatres across the continent, and getting the kind of enthusiastic reception generally reserved for rock st...

Once again, NPR has provided a rich and filling banquet of piano music for the season. This year’s version of A Jazz Piano Christmas features two of my favourites – Kenny Barron and Fred Hersch – along with two newer faces I’m now coming to appreciate. Of those newer faces, one is particularly new… 12 year old Joey Alexander, whose debut albumMy Favorite Things hasrecently been nominated for two Grammy Awards. By comparison, that makes 33 year oldCarmen Staaf a veteran!

For me the standouts...

Richard Brody’s piece in The New Yorker offers some keen insight on the newly released three-disc set, A Love Supreme: The Complete Masters, and on the legacy of Coltrane as a whole. Take the time to read this piece… and if, like me, you already own the two-discedition of A Love Supreme issued by Impulse! in 2002, feel some relief in knowing that you probably won’t need to shell out for this new edition!

Lately I’ve been exploring the blues, which is not an entirely unexpected move for a jazz person to make. After all, blues music is one of the real taproots of jazz, which continues to shape and inform the jazz genrein so many ways.

Specifically my explorations have to do with the ways in which the blues tradition might help us to hear the biblical psalms in new and fresh ways. Though there are clear distinctions between the two, I am increasingly convinced that there are real ways in which t...

In a article posted onAL.com, Mark Almond recalls the 1963 bombing Birmingham’s 16th Street Baptist Church; the event that inspired Coltrane’s extraordinary jazz lament, “Alabama.” I highly recommend you read articleand then make time to watch this rare live version of the Coltrane piece.

On of my favouritetraditions of this season is to set aside time to listen to the most recent edition of NPR’s Jazz Piano Christmas. This year’s concert was held at Washington’s Kennedy Center on Wednesday December 17, and featured a great line-up:jazz-legend Harold Mabern, newcomer Kris Davis, andseasoned veterans Lynne Arriale and Cyrus Chestnut.

I’d highly recommend taking an hour out from one of these busy days to pour yourself something to sip on and then settle back to enjoy some fine, f...

In a recent post on the NPR website, Arun Rath launched into his piece celebrating the 50th anniversary of Coltrane’s A Love Supreme by observing that “For people across musical boundaries and cultures — for Carlos Santana, Bono, Joni Mitchell, Steve Reich, Bootsy Collins, Gil Scott-Heron — hearing A Love Supreme was a revelation.” “A Love Supreme,Rath continued,“is Coltrane’s ultimate spiritual testament: The “love supreme” he describes is God’s love.When I first heard it, I didn’t get it.”

A...