Jazz composition can be dirty work, especially when you use exotic time signatures.
Jazz piano legend Dave Brubeck is shown below with his family at their home in Connecticut in this advertisement that originally ran in the November, 1969 issue of Better Homes and Gardens magazine.
(click on image to ENLARGE text in new window)
Little did I know when I began blogging that it would turn out to be so educational, darn the luck.
Doing just a little bit of research, I was fascinated to learn a bit more about "statuesque"
Iola Brubeck, Dave's wife of 65 years.
Having worked and studied in radio, as a writer, and free-lance actress, Iola became her husband's personal manager, publicist, and occasional lyricist after the birth of the first of their 6 children (four of whom became professional musicians).
In the photo, ►
together in 1954 at their innovative modern-design home in the hills of Oakland, California's Montclair district.
Beginning in the late 1950's the couple collaborated on a jazz stage musical,
'The Real Ambassadors'.
The show's story was a fantasy built around race relations and foreign diplomacy.
A soundtrack LP was recorded in
1961 with a cast that included Louis Armstrong, Lambert, Hendricks & Ross, and
Carmen McRae, and the show premiered at the Monterey Jazz Festival in 1962.
The Monterey Jazz Festival in 2006 included the debut of Dave and Iola's jazz opera, the
John Steinbeck-based
'Cannery Row Suite'.
In the photo, ►
together in September of 2007 on their 65th wedding anniversary on the terrace of Clint Eastwood's Mission Ranch hotel in Carmel, California.
In 2000, they founded The Brubeck Institute at their former alma mater, University of The Pacific in Stockton, California. What began as an educational archive has evolved to also provide scholarships in jazz performance.
Hats off to Iola Brubeck - - Her achievements have even exceeded that purchase of a dryer at Sears...
See also:
- 'A Conversation with Iola Brubeck' at PBS.org
- Dave Brubeck at All Music.Com and at Dave Brubeck.Com
