Bell Awards

[bunt]

sorry - i reckon half bunt beat you to it.... you can help us if you like though... we're sick of it!

[aj]

Before everyone jumps into Carlo Pagnotta (as per some of the postings above), I'd like to challenge a couple of claims that seem to be reported as fact :

* when did he say (& to whom) that Wangaratta was 'shit' ? It would be a complete backflip from what he has said to me & to several others.

* when did he say (& to whom) that Phil Slater 'couldn't play' ? That would be a stupid thing to say, & I frankly don't believe that Carlo would have said it. If he said he didn't like his music, his tone or his ideas, that's one thing -- everyone's entitled to his taste & opinion -- but to say that PS can't play ? I mean, come on.

Surely we can deal in facts rather than 'I heard someone spoke to someone who overheard someone saying that they spoke to someone who heard that he told someone'..................

[VHB]

I think some of the above could be whispers Chinoise, however... where there is smoke there is usually fire. So I wonder if anyone reading Robin Usher's article in Friday's Age, on Pagnotta and Dadon's new direction for Umbira Jazz in Melbourne would agree with myself (and a few others I spoke to at Half Bent tonight)?

I think the article painted them both as mean spirited, disrespectful to everyone who has contrbuited to the MIJFs in the past, and Chairman Dadon as suffering from cultural cringe, which I find particularly odd as this is his adopted country.

Perhaps due to the edit of the piece or lifting quotes out of context, but for me the gist of the article felt negative and unnecessarily mean.

[Uncle Bob]

Duplicity in the arts scene AJ? nah mate your right never in a billion years

[aj]

I have actually encountered my share of it, don't you worry about that !!

But I just think some of the earlier posts were part of another unfortunately-common phenomenon, rumor + exaggeration being related as fact.

[Aus jazz lover]

When Carlo asked Ronny Fearella to take Ish Ish to Umbria, Huge Ball couldn't make the trip so Ronny asked Phil. When Eric Myers told Carlo he didnt wish Phil to go as he thought he couldn't play. Ronny of course insisted and Phil did the trip.
Thats what I heard from a guy that met the mother of a drummer that once sat in with the guy that plays snooker with Phils brother, I recon thats a reliable source!

[VVHB]

Yes, all very well but did I shag him in the 80s?

[AJ Fan]

Is it true AJ has jumped ship?

[aj]

Just working on the Wangaratta Festival these days.

[AJ fan]

So AJ why don't you enlighten us somewhat to the machinations of the processes at work here... seems to me nobody asks musicians who THEY think should run the festival... funny that they spruik the same musicians for $100 for tickets to the Bell Awards fundraiser.
And really... what does Albare know about running a jazz festival? Word is that he is going to be picking the acts and then Carlo just basically signs off on them... I give this goddamn shamozzle 3 years then Melbourne will be without a festival again.

[not jw]

well she didn;t make the Bell finals but at least got nominated for a Grammy

2004 Grammy Nominee, for best solo instrumental jazz cd: LIVE AT YOSHI'S Volume One ... Jessica Williams,piano; Ray Drummond, bass;
Victor Lewis, drums

so maybe next year?

[thin king]

If everyone likes what you´re doing, you´re doing something wrong.
Further, I think the Half Bent festival, run by musicians, is a fantastic event that effectively is a festival where musicians did ask themselves who would they like to have run such an event. I mean, if muso´s want to be asked, why don´t they just ask the person/people who they want to have run it? It seems that some musicians have a ´little man´syndrome. From my position, I think they wield far more influence than they think they do. Hats off to Albert for taking up the position someone asked him to do. (btw, the MIJF has a board, it´s not just one person making decisions.)