Quyền Văn Minh (b. 1954) is not only a jazz saxophonist and lecturer at the prestigious Vietnam National Academy of Music, but he is also one of the most preeminent jazz musicians in Vietnam. Considered a pioneer in the country, Minh is often publicly recognized as the “godfather of Vietnamese jazz.” Playing Jazz in Socialist Vietnam: Quyền Văn Minh and Jazz ... Show More
Nov 15
Lucy Caplan, "Dreaming in Ensemble: How Black Artists Transformed American Opera" (Harvard UP, 2025)
Recently, musicologists and others have started writing about Black participation in opera. Lucy Caplan’s Dreaming in Ensemble: How Black Artists Transformed American Opera (Harvard UP, 2025) is a major new publication on this topic. Caplan examines what she calls a Black operati ... Show More
59m 59s
Aug 2024
176. The Vietnam War: The Rise of Ho Chi Minh
Vietnam, or Indochina as it was known, had been under French colonial rule since the nineteenth century. This was until the Vietnamese nationalist group, the Viet Minh, took on the French in 1946. Ho Chi Minh, son of a Confucian scholar, former chef in Boston, and lover of French ... Show More
1h 2m
Mar 2020
Bitches Brew: The Importance of Challenging Music
<p>Jazz can often be seen as a genre that challenges listeners, but one of the greatest jazz records of all time -- Miles Davis’ Bitches Brew -- was born out a need to challenge the genre, to push back on the establishment, and to break down old conventions and notions about what ... Show More
36m 11s
Apr 2017
Anna Harwell Celenza, “Jazz Italian Style: From its Origins in New Orleans to Fascist Italy and Sinatra” (Cambridge UP, 2017)
In her new book, Jazz Italian Style: From its Origins in New Orleans to Fascist Italy and Sinatra (Cambridge University Press, 2017), Anna Harwell Celenza examines the arrival of jazz in Italy after World War I and the role of Mussolini in promoting jazz throughout Italy in the 1 ... Show More
55m 56s
Apr 2023
Tunisian Classics Reimagined Through Jazz | Omar El Ouaer
<p>Omar El Ouaer plays three of his songs: Alif Ya Soltani, Aziza, and Mana3ref Win. He tells us about Tunisian music and how he discovered Jazz.</p><p>Omar el Ouaer, a Tunisian jazz musician. He started his music education at the age of 11, studying Arabic music at the conservat ... Show More
1 h
Feb 2020
1961, l’Année Bill Evans.
“Je n’aime pas les gens qui font du Jazz un théorème", disait-il... "Le Jazz est avant tout une question de feeling”. Pianiste introverti, lyrique et délicat, pianiste du sensible et de l'indicible, Bill Evans a posé son spleen sur les 88 touches de son clavier, écrivant au passa ... Show More
56m 32s