Jazz At Lincoln Center Announces 2005 Class of Inductees Into Nesuhi Ertegun Jazz Hall of Fame

Jazz At Lincoln Center Announces 2005 Class of Inductees Into Nesuhi Ertegun Jazz Hall of Fame

International Voting Panel Selects 12 Jazz Legends to be Honored on September 8

NEW YORK, Aug. 8 /PRNewswire/ -- Today, Jazz at Lincoln Center released the names of the jazz masters being inducted into the Nesuhi Ertegun Jazz Hall of Fame in 2005: Count Basie, Roy Eldridge, Ella Fitzgerald, Benny Goodman, Earl Hines, Johnny Hodges, Jo Jones, Charles Mingus, King Oliver, Max Roach, Sonny Rollins and Fats Waller. Inductees, family members of inductees, friends and fellow artists will be on hand to receive honors at the second annual private induction ceremony on September 8th at Frederick P. Rose Hall, home of Jazz at Lincoln Center. Performers and participants will be announced prior to the event.

A 58-person international voting panel, which includes musicians, scholars and educators from 17 countries, was charged with nominating and selecting these definitive jazz artists. Each year, criteria for nomination into the hall include excellence and the significance of the artists' contributions to the development and perpetuation of jazz. The Nesuhi Ertegun Jazz Hall of Fame was named by Jazz at Lincoln Center Board member Ahmet Ertegun and his wife, Mica, in honor of his late brother and Atlantic Records partner, Nesuhi Ertegun.

Currently, the hall's installation features its 2004 inaugural class of inductees: Louis Armstrong, Sidney Bechet, Bix Beiderbecke, John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington, John Birks "Dizzy" Gillespie, Coleman Hawkins, Billie Holiday, Thelonious Monk, Jelly Roll Morton, Art Tatum, and Lester Young. The multi-media exhibit including the 2005 inductees, will be unveiled at the September 8th ceremony and open to the public beginning September 9th. The hall is free and open to the public between the hours of 10am-4pm, Tuesday through Sunday. The space is also open to ticket- holders in the evening.

"These great jazz musicians set new standards for instrumental and vocal performance in the 20th century. Their work stands as a testament to the creative power of jazz and their impact on musicians and audiences across time is etched into the prominent history of jazz," said Jazz at Lincoln Center Artistic Director, Wynton Marsalis.

"Jazz at Lincoln Center enters its second season at Fredrick P. Rose Hall and proudly celebrates the newest inductees into the Nesuhi Ertegun Jazz Hall of Fame," said Ahmet Ertegun. "It is an honor to recognize another group of outstanding jazz artists who have contributed their lives to making jazz as timeless as it is today. This center has provided a space where people of all ages can come to learn about the art of jazz and these legendary artists who thrived in it."

"Our 2005-6 season, 'Jazz from Coast to Coast,' is one of celebration of all things jazz -- from the pioneer jazz musicians who created the music, to the times and places that shaped it, and to those who continue to perform and enrich it today," said Derek E. Gordon, President and CEO of Jazz at Lincoln Center. "We usher in the season with this very important Nesuhi Ertegun Jazz Hall of Fame induction ceremony, recognizing the artists that embody all that is rich in the tradition of jazz."

The Nesuhi Ertegun Jazz Hall of Fame was designed by the Rockwell Group and opened to the public in 2004 during the grand opening of Jazz at Lincoln Center's new home, Frederick P. Rose Hall. The space is a multi-media installation featuring an 18-foot video wall, interactive kiosks, touch- activated plaques and the great sound and spirit of jazz. The Hall of Fame's physical design celebrates jazz by emphasizing flexibility and improvisation, and utilizes materials, such as cork, wood and brass, found in jazz instruments.

The 2005 Nesuhi Ertegun Jazz Hall of Fame induction ceremony is generously sponsored by Bloomberg and Movado.

Nesuhi Ertegun (1917 -1989)

Nesuhi Ertegun's passionate advocacy of jazz music and nurturing of jazz musicians made an indelible contribution to the awareness and appreciation of jazz throughout the world. The son of the former Turkish Ambassador to the United States, Nesuhi Ertegun was born in Istanbul and subsequently raised in Switzerland, Paris, London, and Washington, D.C. A passionate jazz and blues record collector, in 1944 Ertegun moved to Los Angeles, where he ran the Jazzman Record Shop and the Jazzman and Crescent labels. Among his first signings was legendary New Orleans trombonist Kid Ory. Ertegun became the editor of Record Changer magazine, made records for the Contemporary label, and taught jazz studies at UCLA -- the first accredited course of its kind in the country. Today, the U.S. Library of Congress is home to the Nesuhi Ertegun Collection of Jelly Roll Morton Recordings.

In 1954, Nesuhi joined his brother Ahmet at Atlantic Records. Moving to New York, he developed an album department and was responsible for building the label's exceptional jazz roster -- producing John Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Ray Charles, Charles Mingus, the Modern Jazz Quartet, Herbie Mann, and many others. In 1971, Nesuhi's international expertise led to his establishment of WEA International (now known as Warner Music International). A committed and effective foe of record piracy worldwide, he also served as President of International Federation of Phonogram and Videogram Producers (I.F.P.I.). Among his many other interests, Nesuhi, along with his brother, founded the New York Cosmos soccer team. He was also a world-renowned collector of surrealist art.

2005 Inductees

William "Count" Basie (1904-1984)

At the piano, Count Basie could conjure a groove from a single note. As an orchestra-leader, he could make fourteen men breathe -- and play -- as one. In his hands, nothing seemed to be too fast or too slow to swing with style, and when his band came roaring out of Kansas City, Missouri in the midst of the Great Depression it showed the whole country how to stomp away the blues.

Roy Eldridge (1911-1989)

Roy Eldridge was the quintessential brass player -- powerful, fearless, and tirelessly competitive. A gladiator with a horn, he combined the emotional intensity of Louis Armstrong with a peerless command of the upper register to humble trumpeters of every age in every city. "All my life, I've loved to battle," Eldridge said. "And, if they wouldn't invite me up onto the bandstand, I'd get my trumpet out from the side of the stand and blow at them from there."

Ella Fitzgerald (1917-1996)

Sweet, clear and unmistakable, Ella Fitzgerald's voice was her instrument. She was a master interpreter of the great American songbook. Ira Gershwin said he'd never known how good his songs were till he heard her sing them. But she could also take off on daring flights of scatting fancy that challenged the most inventive horn-players to keep up with her. Her rhythmic sense was so sure that Lester Young named her "Lady Time." The rest of the world knew her as the "First Lady of Song."

(Benjamin David) Benny Goodman (1909-1986)

A rare combination of popular star and musical virtuoso, Benny Goodman was seen as the King of Swing by millions of people around the world. His playing and popularity helped make the clarinet a major solo instrument in jazz. He was the first well-known jazz musician to win success performing the classical repertory. And his insistence on finding and playing with the finest musicians of his time led him to integrate his bandstand long before Jackie Robinson broke the color line in baseball.

Earl Kenneth "Fatha" Hines (1903-1983)

Earl "Fatha" Hines was celebrated as the father of modern jazz piano. By the age of twenty-four, he had already shown that by loosening up the rhythm played by his left hand and boldly spinning out complex, hornlike melodies with his right, his instrument could be freed forever from its role as a mere time-keeper in the band. For nearly six decades, he never fell from fashion among musicians. "Earl can go on for ninety years," Count Basie said, "and never be out of date."

Johnny Hodges (born Cornelius Hodge, 1906-1970)

Silken, soulful, seductive, the alto saxophone of Johnny Hodges provided the signature sound of the Duke Ellington orchestra for nearly forty years. A master of both ballads and the blues, he was calm and unassuming onstage, but when he began to play, Ellington recalled, he reached "into his own soul" touched "everybody else's soul" -- and garnered from his listeners more oohs and ahs and "Yes, Daddys" than anyone else in the band.

Jo(nathan) "Papa Jo" Jones (1911-1985)

Jo Jones helped transform the art of jazz drumming. A one-time tap-dancer, he brought a great dancer's wit and subtlety, elegance and understatement to his playing. He moved the basic pulse from the bass drum to the hi-hat cymbal. The result was light, relaxed, fluid and shimmering -- the perfect underpinning for the Count Basie orchestra. Generations of admiring drummers revered him as "Papa Jo." He called them all his "kiddies."

Charles Mingus (1922-1979)

Master bassist Charles Mingus was a composer and bandleader whose kaleidoscopic work displayed every emotion from humor to horror, fury to tenderness. It also embraced the full vocabulary of jazz -- from the raw sounds of early New Orleans and the rich Gospel tradition to the supreme sophistication of Charlie Parker and Duke Ellington. But always it was expressive of his own multi-faceted personality. "I'm going to keep ... finding out the kind of man I am through my music," he said. "That's the one place I can be free."

Joe "King" Oliver (1885-1938)

Cornetist Joe "King" Oliver is best remembered now as the man who brought Louis Armstrong north to Chicago in 1922. But he was a jazz pioneer in his own right. His Creole Jazz Band represented the pinnacle of the traditional New Orleans style. His recorded solos were memorized by a generation of brass players. And he was an early master of mutes, capable of evoking almost every kind of vocal sound through his horn. Louis Armstrong remembered him as "the top cornet in New Orleans, the first big musician in my life and still... the best I ever met."

Max(well) Roach (born 1924)

Percussionist and composer Max Roach helped redefine the rhythms of jazz. He brought new polyrhythmic textures and a richer palette of tonal colors to the world of bebop, co-led a classic quintet with the short-lived trumpeter Clifford Brown, helped propel the soundtrack of the Civil Rights movement, and throughout his career continued to search for new artistic worlds to conquer. "My music tries to say how I really feel," he said, "and I hope it mirrors in some way how black people feel in the United States."

(Theodore Walter) Sonny Rollins (born 1930)

"I'll know when I find the ultimate sound," Saxophone colossus Sonny Rollins said, "because I'll be completely fulfilled by it." An adventurer and musical athlete in the tenor tradition of Coleman Hawkins, he has sought that sound relentlessly for more than fifty years, transforming even the simplest tunes into masterpieces of wit and warmth and unassailable logic.

Thomas Wright "Fats" Waller (1904-1943)

Fats Waller's talent outstripped even his girth. He was the most celebrated of all stride pianists, the first jazz musician to record on the organ, the composer of hundreds of songs and a master singer and showman who could find high comedy in the most mundane pop tunes. "Some little people have music in them, "Waller's piano mentor James P. Johnson once explained, "but Fats was all music, and you know how big he was."

Jazz at Lincoln Center is a not-for-profit arts organization dedicated to jazz. With the world-renowned Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, the Afro-Latin Jazz Orchestra and a comprehensive array of guest artists, Jazz at Lincoln Center advances a unique vision for the continued development of the art of jazz by producing a year-round schedule of performance, education, and broadcast events for audiences of all ages. These productions include concerts, national and international tours, residencies, weekly national radio and television programs, recordings, publications, an annual high school jazz band competition and festival, a band director academy, a jazz appreciation curriculum for children, advanced training through the Juilliard Institute for Jazz Studies, music publishing, children's concerts, lectures, adult education courses and student and educator workshops. Under the leadership of Artistic Director Wynton Marsalis, Chairman of the Board Lisa Schiff, President & CEO Derek E. Gordon, Executive Director Katherine E. Brown and Jazz at Lincoln Center board and staff, Jazz at Lincoln Center will produce hundreds of events during its 2005-06 season. In October 2004, Jazz at Lincoln Center opened Frederick P. Rose Hall -- the first-ever performance, education, and broadcast facility devoted to jazz.

For more information, please visit http://www.jalc.org/ .

High resolution, downloadable photos of inductees and the Neshui Ertegun Jazz Hall of Fame are available at: http://www.jalc.org/04_05/2005_Galleries/ertegun05

For 2004 Inductees and More Information visit http://www.jalc.org/ejhf_web/

Source: Jazz at Lincoln Center

CONTACT: Mary Fiance Fuss, Director, Public Relations, +1-212-258-9829,
or mfuss@jalc.org; or Zooey Tidal, Assistant Director, Public Relations,
+1-212-258-9821, or ztidal@jalc.org; or Andrew Shearer, Rubenstein
Communications, +1-212-843-8061, or ashearer@jalc.org

Web site: http://www.jalc.org/

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