Jimmy B
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 Posté le: 10 Feb 2006 16:52 Sujet du message: Disparition du critique de jazz Phil Elwood |
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Phil Elwood | 1926-2006 (10 janvier)
Critique de jazz américain célèbre, Phil Elwood laisse derrière lui une carrière remplie de rencontres mémorables.
| http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-passings12.2jan12,0,7735749.story?coll=la-news-obituaries a écrit: |
Phil Elwood, 79; Influential Bay Area Jazz Critic, Radio Host
From Times Staff and Wire Reports
Phil Elwood, 79, a leading jazz critic in the Bay Area for nearly half a century, died Tuesday of heart failure. His wife, Audrey, died of cancer four weeks ago.
Elwood spent most of his career from 1965 to 2002 covering the region's jazz scene for the San Francisco Examiner.
He was also among the first to broadcast jazz on the FM dial on his weekly "Jazz Archive" program that aired on Berkeley's KPFA-FM radio from 1952 to 1996.
He was born and raised in Berkeley, where his father was an agricultural professor at the University of California. As a teenager, Elwood began building a large jazz record collection by haunting thrift stores.
With a master's degree in history from Stanford University, Elwood also had a second career teaching American history and American music history at the high school and college level.
"Phil knew the music as well as loved it," jazz great Jon Hendricks told the San Francisco Chronicle. "Phil loved it all, from Bunk Johnson to Louis to Bird, up through Coltrane and into the avant-garde. He was the complete critic." |
| http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/01/11/MNG5LGLEN01.DTL&type=music a écrit: |
PHIL ELWOOD: 1926-2006
Beloved Bay Area jazz and blues critic
Joel Selvin, Chronicle Senior Pop Music Critic
Wednesday, January 11, 2006
Phil Elwood covered nightlife for the Examiner starting i...
Phil Elwood, one of the best friends jazz and blues ever had, died Tuesday of heart failure, only four weeks after the death of his beloved wife, Audrey. He was 79.
As a critic for half a century, Elwood pursued a lifelong love affair with the music that began in the living room of the Berkeley home of Depression-era photographer Dorothea Lange, when he first heard a record by Louis Armstrong as a high school student.
"I wish I could go back and stand in that living room again," he said two years ago. "I'd remember exactly how it felt."
Elwood covered jazz, rock, blues and comedy, the entire panorama of nightlife, for the San Francisco Examiner beginning in 1965. He continued his career at The Chronicle after the two papers merged in 2000 and retired in 2002. He was an endless fount of jazz lore, an unflagging enthusiast of the music and a world-class raconteur blessed with an extraordinary memory.
He was also one of the first people to broadcast jazz on the FM dial. His weekly radio program, "Jazz Archive," began in 1952, when very few people even owned FM radios. His show continued on Berkeley's KPFA until 1996. "Talk about old school," said rock musician Huey Lewis, "he was a music lover. Imagine that. He actually loved the music. They don't make 'em like that anymore."
"Phil was the quintessential jazz critic,'' said jazz great Jon Hendricks, who lived in the Bay Area for many years and rubbed shoulders with Elwood at clubs and festivals around the country and the world. "Most jazz critics love the music, but Phil knew the music as well as loved it. He and Ralph Gleason hung in the clubs, hung with the cats. They were part of the scene just like the musicians. Phil loved it all, from Bunk Johnson to Louis to Bird, up through Coltrane and into the avant-garde. He was the complete critic.''
George Shearing, the great jazz pianist who knew Elwood for half a century, said: "We lost a very capable and musically savvy writer in Phil Elwood. He knew his craft and he knew his music. But beyond that, he was my friend, whose wit, loyalty and kindness knew no bounds.''
"Phil was an awfully good man," said rock musician Boz Scaggs. "It was always nice running into him at shows, mostly jazz and blues for us. I could always count on him for the historical perspective and some funny stories."
Elwood was born March 19, 1926, and raised in Berkeley, where his father was an agriculture professor at the University of California. He first saw Count Basie in 1939 from the balcony of Sweet's Ballroom in Oakland while he was still attending Berkeley High School. He used to ride his bicycle around to Oakland thrift stores and spend his paper route money buying old jazz 78s by King Oliver, Jelly Roll Morton and others. Those discs were the beginnings of a legendary jazz record collection, which he stored in a serpentine basement in his North Berkeley home.
He also had an entirely separate career teaching American history to high school and college students throughout the East Bay, rising early to go to class after meeting post-midnight Examiner deadlines covering some nightclub show or rock concert. He also taught a famous history of jazz class at Laney College in Oakland that, over the years, was attended by many aspiring musicians and critics.
"I remember him coming into his Monday night jazz history class at Laney College in the mid-'70s," said Chronicle jazz writer Jesse Hamlin, "with a funky old record player and a old briefcase stuffed with scratchy albums, most without their jackets. He'd just start riffing and reminiscing and playing records, never referring to notes, for 90 minutes at a stretch. That music was in his veins."
"Phil was always there," said jazz vibraphonist Bobby Hutcherson, "He was the person on the scene. He didn't call somebody to ask what happened; he was right there to watch and hear for himself. Everything he wrote was his own personal experience. Even if he didn't write about it, he'd be there. He liked a lot of different musicians, and he was very proud to be part of the music world and proud of the people around him, and he made you feel proud to be part of it. It didn't matter whether he gave you a good review or a bad review, what mattered was Phil was there."
Over the course of his distinguished career, Elwood covered anything that moved on stage. In his 2002 farewell column for The Chronicle, he noted the breadth of acts he covered in just his first weeks on the job. "I reviewed Stan Kenton one night and Lena Horne the next," Elwood wrote. "I heard Charlie Byrd at El Matador, and Tom Lehrer at the hungry i; also Art Blakey, Chico Hamilton, Denny Zeitlin. Kay Starr, the Mills Brothers, Cannonball Adderley, Joe Bushkin and bassist Vernon Alley, and Duke Ellington at Basin Street West. My first seven weeks (21 reviews or features in print) ended Aug. 31 with a Beatles show at the Cow Palace that afternoon and Judy Garland at the Circle Star Theater in San Carlos that night."
One of his most famous reviews came when he caught an unknown opening act at a long defunct San Francisco nightclub called the Matrix and gave the young Bruce Springsteen -- appearing with his rock group Steel Mill -- his first major review.
After his retirement from The Chronicle, Elwood continued to write a column for the Web site Jazz West. In 2002, he received the Beacon Award from the San Francisco Jazz Festival and was the subject of a tribute concert, underwritten by See's Candies.
He is survived by his sons, Peter and Josh, both of Berkeley, and Benjamin of St. Paul, Minn.; his daughter Lis of Sierra City; and six grandchildren. No services are planned.
Chronicle staff writer Jesse Hamlin contributed to this report. |
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