"If strong intellectual opponents asked me about jazz music, these would be some of my answers." According to Jazz Education Hall of Fame inductee Tom Smith, jazz music's intellectual properties are the sole reason it's unpopular. According to him, the great falsehood about jazz is that its direction is natural, while arguing that all music is susceptible to control, linked to societal concerns we all face. This Third Edition is written in an opinionated tone that is self-deprecating, poignant, auto-biographical, and ...
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"If strong intellectual opponents asked me about jazz music, these would be some of my answers." According to Jazz Education Hall of Fame inductee Tom Smith, jazz music's intellectual properties are the sole reason it's unpopular. According to him, the great falsehood about jazz is that its direction is natural, while arguing that all music is susceptible to control, linked to societal concerns we all face. This Third Edition is written in an opinionated tone that is self-deprecating, poignant, auto-biographical, and occasionally funny. Smith eviscerates traditional cathedrals of jazz, from sociologists, to overreaching critics, righteous aficionados, dishonest historians, myopic educators, the wayward musicians he calls 'sheeple, ' and his favored nemesis, Jazz at Lincoln Center, whose contributions (in his estimation) have hurt more than helped. Drawing from a career spanning over four decades as a world-class trombonist, bandleader, researcher/ educator, and builder of jazz programs in several countries, Smith offers insights from places few have traveled, nor would ever want to go. 'Stealth Jazz: Behind the Curtain' is likely to draw equal praise and repudiation, which according to Miles Davis, is exactly where one wishes to be. * * *Tom Smith is a Downbeat Jazz Education Hall of Fame inductee, an IAJE Ambassador recipient, a six-time Senior Fulbright Professor (Romania), and a Fulbright Specialist (South Africa, Serbia). In 2003, he was awarded the Romanian Radio Prize, co-founded Romania's first music camp/ school for jazz, and performed on three of that country's officially designated One Hundred Essential Recordings. In 2010, Tom relocated to China, where he developed a music strategy for teaching English to Mandarin speakers, and in 2011 was hired as Professor of Jazz/American Music Studies at Ningbo University, the first American music professor in Mainland China. He then subsequently wrote that country's curriculum for jazz/popular music education, and in 2013, was awarded the Camellia Prize for significant cultural/entrepreneurial contributions. Tom has founded over fifty jazz ensembles on four continents, and is an active performer worldwide, having played trombone, conducted/recorded for scores of iconic musicians. A Brubeck Grant recipient, Tom's publications have been featured on National Public Radio (US), Discovery Channel, and Rutgers Roundtable. He has also contributed to American National Biography, Teaching Music Through Performance in Jazz, Bakers Dictionary, and Oxford Encyclopedia of European Jazz.
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