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Panel Participants:
Bill Smith, Moderator, Editor Emeritus, Coda Magazine
Andy Gilbert, Jazziz
James Hale, Writer, Ottawa Citizen, Downbeat
Bill Shoemaker, Writer, Jazz Times
Paul deBarros, Writer, Seattle TimesJohn Orysik, Media Director of the 18th Vancouver International Jazz Festival: Good afternoon everyone. Welcome to Jazz at the Roundhouse, presented by the Government of Canada. Jazz at the Roundhouse is an exciting component of the Vancouver International Jazz Festival and this afternoon the Jazz Festival is pleased to present a panel discussion with journalists from the Jazz Journalists Association. At this time, let me hand things over to our moderator, journalist/photographer and former long time editor of Coda Magazine, Bill Smith.
Bill Smith: On the far end of the table we have a surprise guest, an improviser, Andy Gilbert. He's from the Bay Area and writes for a number of American journals and magazines. We have from Ottawa, he writes for the Ottawa Citizen, Downbeat Magazine, Coda Magazine, James Hale. On my left, from Washington, DC, writes for the Washington Post, Jazz Times and lots of other magazines, Bill Shoemaker. On the far left, we have from Seattle, also writes for local newspapers, Downbeat, liner notes, etc., he even wrote a book … he's a biggie, he wrote a book, Paul deBarros.
I'm a semi-retired jazz journalist I just became a senior citizen. So now I get government money every month and I can now afford to be a jazz writer. Being a jazz writer is not something you do to have a spare Ferrari in car park, you know?
The subject this year this year, which has been supplied by, presumably, the Jazz Journalists Association, it says "Jazz is an international music, why don't more critics and festivals treat it that way?" I'd like to say that the critics, that's another subject whether we're critics or writers we'll get to later. The people who are sitting at this table actually do treat jazz as an international music and the festival that we're at is one of the greatest international festivals in the world. So I find the subject must have come from someone who lives in a place where this doesn't happen, which I suspect is New York City.
I'd like to open it up with Andy Gilbert first. Is jazz an international music? In your experience do critics treat it as such?
Andy Gilbert: Undoubtedly jazz is an international music. It has been from the earliest times. Starting from the 1920's there were jazz musicians travelling everywhere, from Shanghai to Havana, playing, spreading the gospel of swing. It was influencing other musics just as they were influencing jazz. The question why other international jazz scenes, whether Italy, Canada, Germany, Japan aren't covered better or booked better comes down to economics and communication. Even though we are living in an age of global communication, there is really no substitute for being close to, part of, and observing a scene. So being the San Francisco-Berkeley area and trying to keep up what is happening in Milan is next to impossible. I know there are great musicians there, but for most of the papers I write for, I can hardly sell a story on that. It's hard enough to get papers to cover what is going on locally, let alone what is happening someplace else.
Vancouver is a gem and a rarity in terms of which musicians from outside the area are booked. Musicians from outside New York, I mean European musicians and Canadian musicians are in a lot of ways the creative centrepiece of the festival and this is incredibly rare.
The San Francisco Jazz Festival is a wonderful Festival, one of the best in the United States, but it absolutely neglects local players and very rarely brings in musicians from Europe or Japan or other scenes. The problem is that Festivals feel that it's tough introducing players who don't have name recognition and it's an even tougher to convince the media to cover them
Bill Smith: I agree with a great deal of that, and to the difficulty of magazines having the space to cover this huge subject. I myself like the idea of local musicians being utilized to play with foreign musicians to expand everyone's experience. Perhaps we could carry on with Paul.
Paul deBarros: I would introduce two bits of information to chew on. One is that the Jazz Journalists Association just had its awards ceremony two nights ago in New York. The only musician who won and was not American was Dave Holland. And Dave Holland might as well be American [laughter], I mean he has lived in America for the last 30 years. So it is a problem. And it may not feel like it's a problem in Vancouver, where we seem to be in paradise. I go to two festivals every year for sure: this one [Vancouver] and the Monterey Jazz Festival. I like both of them, but they are like night and day, very different. And you won't find international headliners very often on the main stage of the Monterey Jazz Festival. I think that had to do with economics and a certain kind of myopia.
The economic part of it has to do with Festivals are driven by the record companies and so are magazines. The magazines that write about jazz in the United States, Jazz Times, and Downbeat, are at the mercy of record company ad budgets. It's not so much that ads pay for the record reviews but they actually establish the purview of what those magazines are about. So it's not the old saw about 'if you buy an ad in my magazine, you'll get a review' but in the larger sense that is very true. The economics of the business are controlled by the record companies, the booking agents, and the publicity agents who are involved in the music. So to break an artist no matter how big … one great contrast between Monterey and Vancouver, for example, is that all the great stuff that is going on in Scandinavia for the past three or four years -probably longer- and has finally started to break in North America has hardly had a hearing in the States. And here we are [in Vancouver] into our second or third year of learning about bands like EST or Ian Bellamy's band. It has to do with economics and it definitely is a reality. There is a strong contrast. There are some other issues involved but I want to pass it on.
Bill Smith: Well, we'll open it up as we go along. James [Hale], would you like to make a few comments?
James Hale: We find ourselves at a very interesting time. Since the late 70s and early 80s, jazz has become commercially viable in a lot of ways. It has become more of a commodity in that almost every North American city has a jazz festival. But at the same time that jazz has become more common in the regular marketplace of culture, it has also become much smaller, more narrow than at any time in the past. When you look at the line-ups of festivals, particularly in the United States, there are the same bands over and over again. And they are bands that don't push boundaries, that don't necessarily take chances, and in most instances the ones that have fairly large labels behind them.
We are tremendously spoiled in Canada by having this [Vancouver] festival with the scope that it has, or smaller festivals like the Guelph [Ontario] Festival which has a tremendous scope. But then when you look across the board at the range of music that is being presented across North America, it is extremely insular. I find that very distressing. I think to look at the other part of the question today, how journalism represents jazz, I think we do a terrible job. Maybe as Bill Smith says, with some us here as notable exceptions, the few international artists that nominated and voted for as part of our own jazz journalists awards is shameful. Closer to home here in Canada, our so-called national jazz awards are also shameful when you look at the few artists from Qu�bec who get nominated and the few artists from here in British Columbia or between here and Winnipeg who get nominated is shocking. As journalists we have a lot to answer for.
Bill Smith: [sardonically] I think that is because Toronto is the centre of the universe, excuse me perceives itself as the centre of the universe. And it's all Toronto-based, this information. It's interesting watching TV out here sometimes, isn't it, when they are telling you it's eastern standard time that the program starts and you're in Vancouver watching this on television. So a lot of this information is indeed based in that Toronto kind of idea. But what about the Ottawa festival, does it have an international forum?
James Hale: Interesting you should ask that question, because this year the Ottawa festival has a sub-section on global improvised music. I don't' think that it has done as good a job as the festival here [Vancouver] has in terms of representing international artists, but in comparison to some of the more corporate festivals especially in the United States, it does a relatively good job.
Bill Smith: Bill Shoemaker, you work for quite influential and wide-circulating periodicals, do you have a feeling about this? You reach a much broader audience than a local audience with your writing.
Bill Shoemaker: Well, first of all, I think that critics and festivals should be driven by aesthetic principles, not internationalism per se. I think where somebody comes from is secondary to what they're saying. I don't think that magazine content in the United States and certainly not in Europe is ad-driven as some would say. I don't think that it was the clout of Martin Davidson and Emanem Records that got a feature on Paul Rutherford and Lol Coxhill into Downbeat, nor was it the clout of ACTA that resulted in my including John Butcher and Chris Burn in various thematic features for Jazz Times like solo saxophone or prepared piano. Certainly there is an argument to be made for placement of cover stories and maybe lead reviews. That goes to the concept that there is something of a pack mentality in jazz magazine coverage. But I think that particularly as the managing editor positions of these magazines are going towards younger guys -Chris Porter at Jazz Times is 33 years old and Jason Koransky [Downbeat] is what - about 30? [deBarros and Hale respond: 28].
These guys are not beholden to the same interests as the "establishment." They have been given green lights by their publisher to exercise various degrees of latitude. So as long as there are guys like Paul deBarros and James [Hale] and Andy [Gilbert] out there plugging away through their different venues I think that we're in pretty good shape. If you look at European jazz magazines and the mix of European v. North American coverage, it's not all that much different than in North America.
Bill Smith: Thank you Bill. I must say that I was the editor of Coda for a quarter of a century or something like that, an enormous amount of time. In the end my idea for the coverage of Festivals was that we only wrote about Canadian festivals. There wasn't room in a magazine published six times per year to write about everything. So I decided upon the Canadian element, mostly because it wasn't being written about anywhere else. With the exception of the Montr�al festival and occasionally this [Vancouver] festival, in general the Canadian festivals were not being covered by international magazines. Plus it was for us to keep the Canadian content high, so we got Canada Council grants. I can confess to that now that I'm not the editor anymore [laughter].
But the idea was that if we didn't do it, no one would know about all these Canadian musicians. As Bill was saying, I don't think we changed the world's ideas about what Canadian musicians were or who they are. I mean, they didn't suddenly sell thousands of copies of records because we mentioned Paul Plimley's name, or Tony Wilson's name. It doesn't work like that that. It's more of a gradual situation.
I'd like to put it to the panel about this 'jazz is an international music'. Let's start with the festivals and why some festivals are international, and why some aren't. It seems to me this has a lot more to do with the presenters and what it Is they are connected with. If they are connected entirely to commercial money which is making them do something, or like this festival [Vancouver], the handful of people who put on the Vancouver festival have been the same handful in my entire history of Vancouver, which is a very long time, and they are friends and jazz fans and interested in the music. The idea of sponsorship, although it necessary from a financial point of view, is not the thing that motivates the content of this festival. It's not like people from corporations come and say 'You can't have Wolfgang Fuchs or Rutherford.' Nothing like that happens at the Vancouver festival and in some ways I feel that is why it's a successful festival. Because it is a group of people with a personality who puts it together. I'd like to go back to Andy with this notion. Is this the reason why it isn't international. Is it because they have blinkered imaginations?
Andy Gilbert: They are responding to what they see as the imperative of putting butts in seats. If we are talking about US jazz festivals, they have minimal municipal government sponsorship. They are thrilled if they have a corporate sponsor, but they are going to run most of their operations on ticket sales. It is tied in directly to being able to sell tickets to fill their theatres. That has a huge impact on who they feel they can book. Then there is the relationship with record labels. Many festivals will have a stage where Verve or Blue Note sponsors that stage. Right there you have a situation where the artists presented there have a certain profile that blocks out other musicians. It really is just a lack of faith in their audiences where they feel they have to present people who are familiar. If they are going to bring in musicians who are not already well-known, they have to do it in small amounts. Otherwise they will lose their audience.
Bill Smith: This indicates to me, in a way, that the promoters are pandering to record companies. And there are certain record companies that are not worth pandering to. Just because they have a logo up and they give you a thousands dollars and a free case of beer doesn't seem to me to be a reason to promote music at festivals. It seems to me that it is supposed to make the music go on. It's not a carnival, this is serious music. So we need the idea that people are going to learn something. They aren't just coming to experience the familiar, it seems to me. James, you might have some thoughts. The one in Ottawa is similar to here, isn't it?
James Hale: It's more of a grass-roots festival in the sense that it has been run by the same group of people for the last ten years and before that it was different group. You can have a festival in a fabulous location. It could be Monterey or Montreux, Switzerland. You can have festivals that have great venues, but what really sets festivals apart is artistic vision. You can look down the list of festivals and tell which ones have?.I'm not trying to say that people who running what I would call mediocre festivals aren't passionate about the music. But you can look down the list of festivals and tell which have very strong hands on the tiller. To go back to my example of Guelph: year after year you see growth, some vision, passion in the booking. When you get to know Ajay Heble who runs the Guelph festival, you realize where that comes from. I don't think that's any secret. The ones that are adventurous and spirited and fun, imaginative, you look at that programming and think, "Wow, I would never think of putting those things or that particular series together. When you see a festival like that, I guarantee that there is someone with vision at the helm. When that is lacking it is evident as well.
Bill Smith: So we do agree on that point of view that the vision is created by the organizers of festivals. I note that James keeps saying Guelph, so I would like to add Victoriaville [Qu�bec] as one of the great creative festivals in Canada.
James Hale: Absolutely.
Bill Smith: Paul deBarros, in Seattle there is a festival that runs on consecutive weekends or something like that with all kinds of music. This is run by a small group of people with a vision as well.
Paul deBarros: Yes, it's run by Earshot Jazz and it reflects an international outlook. It's a smallish festival compared to the ones we're talking about. I think I want to refine this idea of jazz being an international music. That's really where the rub comes from. We could talk for hours on the conflict of commerce and aesthetics and I don't think we're going to solve anything. It's there in the arts no matter where you go. Everybody deals with it differently. The Monterey Jazz Festival deals with it by dealing with record companies. And the record companies are in the business of making stars so they can sell records. Whether or not you think that is a bad or good, thing, I don't really care. It's the music that is interesting.
But I do think there is something going on in the States that is relevant to this discussion. When you say that jazz has been an international music since the 20s that may be true but innovation and leadership has not come from anywhere except African-Americans in jazz until the last 25 years. That's the rub in the United States. And that's the political-social rub, that's the reason this discussion has a resonance in the States that it doesn't have here [in Canada]. When you speak to African Americans about 'jazz is an international music now', they get a little paranoid. The last time I talked to Branford Marsalis, I had just come back from Turkey and I said 'Have you of this guy from Istanbul on Double Moon Records?' and he just went into a rant about how 'who are these people who think they can make innovations in a music that isn't part of their history and culture. How could they presume to do that?'
But he's not the only one to feel that way because there is a historical relationship between white and black in jazz and jazz history which has attempted, from the black point of view, to erase the black contribution. And fact has erased it in many cases economically and in the media. When you start saying, glibly, to an African-American musician, 'well, you know, innovation can come from anywhere, Turkey, Japan, China, Canada' they are like 'Wait a minute, pal, I have some ownership of this music.'
And that is really the question for me, Who Owns It? Because personally I don't feel anybody owns it. But it is a discussion worth having. When you start discussing internationalism in jazz you have to address not only where a player is from, but what cultural elements they are bringing into the music and what they say is innovation. I have seen a lot of real innovation from Scandinavia in the last eight years, but I'm not sure it is the leading edge of where the music will go. I'm not sure that even that the people that are involved in that would say that. So let me crack that one open.
Andy Gilbert: Bill [Smith], could I jump in on that one?
Bill Smith: I have a great deal of opinions on that one! [General Laughter]. You go ahead, Andy.
Andy Gilbert: I think what Paul is saying is very interesting and in some sense true. Ownership and where innovation is going to come from is a charged question. I think that to say it's only in the last quarter century that innovation came from outside the African- American community is to really look at jazz in a narrow sense to begin with. If you want to talk about Latin jazz, we're talking about 60 years, going back to the 40s with influences coming in from Cuba and Puerto Rico. In the Bay Area….
Paul deBarros: … But who made the innovation, Dizzy or Machito…?
Andy Gilbert: … I would say both, it was a collaboration. I don't think you can separate it. The dance orchestras that came out of it, Tito Puente, Machito …
Paul deBarros: … I don't think I would agree, but go ahead …
Andy Gilbert: … In the Bay Area we have had for thirty years an amazing Asian-American jazz scene, incredibly innovative, bringing in all kinds of new things. I mean, these are Americans working with conceptual ideas coming out of Chicago's Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians and bringing in and creating these wonderful hybrid musical forms. When we talk about ownership, that question has been opened up much earlier than you [Paul deBarros] gave it credit.
Bill Smith: Good thing those two [Gilbert and deBarros] are far apart on the table. But before the fight starts [laughter]…. I don't think of international music as being a bunch of Europeans imitating Herbie Hancock. European musical forms is the forms have been developed by Europeans out of sources that are becoming less and less connected to jazz music. People like Evan Parker, or at this [Vancouver] festival we have Paul Rutherford, Wolfgang Fuchs, and a few other people like the Dutch. They are coming out of a jazz base originally because of course we heard that music when we were young. The music that I loved was Mingus, Miles, etc. The point is that to imitate them and call that international jazz seems to me not to be anything. That's just imitating Americans. It is an American art form, that particular idea of the song and rhythm structure, the chord changes, that kind of organized way is indeed an American music, although the Parisian French are good at arguing about that. I feel the music we might call international is musical forms developed in other countries that have their own original concepts and forms that coming from their own identities. In Canada we have this, for example in a very large way in Quèbec, where out of their own folk traditions they have developed this whole new kind of idea about music that sounds almost carnival-like. Their character is quite different than American jazz. This is what I call internationalizing this music, not just imitating something that has been in place since the turn of the century.
Bill [Shoemaker] hasn't had a go yet, and I know he has a lot of opinions on this subject.
Bill Shoemaker: I'm glad that Andy [Gilbert] brought up the Asian American community because it gives me the opportunity to shamelessly plug a piece I have in the September issue of Jazz Times called "East Meets Left: Politics, Culture, and Asian-American Jazz."
In that article, my thesis is that even though African-Americans have a historical primacy in the creating of jazz, changing demographics, the spread of information, the entire globalization of the planet inescapably leads to a situation where everybody around the world claiming 'this is our music,' just the way Ornette Coleman did almost 50 years ago. Jazz has an intrinsic appropriating methodology. It seeks out materials and structures outside of its existing parameters. It brings them in and incorporates them into an ever-expanding lexicon. That is just an inevitability.
Now as to the plight of African-American jazz, that's not a problem that been caused by or exacerbated by this internationalization process. This is a problem that has been 100% domestically engendered and it goes to a whole myriad of socio-economic factors that are just too vast and complicated to discuss here. But the guy in Turkey is not the threat to Branford Marsalis by any stretch of the imagination. I think that the threat to Wynton Marsalis or Branford Marsalis or anybody else….
Bill Smith: … or any Marsalis [laughter] …
Bill Shoemaker: … the threat to them is a fickle domestic public and not somebody improvising off of a Swedish folk tune.
Bill Smith: As you can see we can get really far away from the subject very easily. There is so much to say and writers only get so many column-inches per month in magazines and their heads are full of this information. So this should really be a five-day workshop with food, insulin drips, and things like that [laughter]. So let's narrow down: we're half way though and still on Festivals.
I'd like to re-iterate the question: "Jazz is an International Music, so why don't more Critics treat it that way? We have to say that we [on the panel] do treat it that way. Bill Shoemaker and I were somewhere and immediately the accusation came that "Well in America they don't think about anything outside of America." I don't think that's entirely true with the Americans I know who are Americans, it may be true about George Bush but that's not true about the Americans I personally know. In American magazines, Andy, why don't you introduce other music to them instead of writing another thing about one of the 300 Marsalis family members? Why don't you do that in American magazines?
Andy Gilbert: I think that in many ways the battle being fought for writers covering local scenes is to get those scenes covered. Being on the west coast, the media is so New York-centric. I grew up in Los Angeles and my mission was to get the word out about Horace Tapscott, Bobby Bradford, John Carter, and Vinny Golia [applause and some shouts of "Yeah" from the audience]. Drawing attention to these other great scenes and musicians is something I'd love to do, but I feel that, like many writers, I'm a partisan of the musical scene, the musicians I've watched develop.
Those were some of the edgier players. But there were mainstream players too, like Harold Land, Teddy Edwards, these amazing musicians who couldn't get any coverage, or even minimal coverage in the national magazines or in The New York Times. And that goes back 50 years. You know, I don't think that Art Pepper was ever on the cover of Downbeat during his life, or if he was it was only much later during his come-back. So it is like 'What battles are you going to fight?' Sort of being based in the Bay Area, the first one I'll fight for are the great musicians I see weekly who I feel should get more attention. Then, its try to open up and have this different idea of who is important and who the interesting musicians are. I can see as someone in the trenches, not an editor, who is making those decisions on who is to be covered, that's where the first line of decision-making is made.
Bill Smith: I do understand that, because of course we concentrated in our Canadian cities trying to develop local scenes. The question is about international music. The papers and magazines we write in, you can't read them in Rotterdam or Helsinki. The information remains local and only invigorates a small part of this giant scene. My experience is that just as many Europeans complain they don't get a chance to come to America, there are also many Canadian and American musicians who complain that they don't get a chance to play in Europe. So I think this is common…. A Canadian point of view is much worse than the American point of view in that no one knows who Canadian musicians are. I'm not talking about Rob McConnel and the Boss Brass, I'm talking about the other ones who are in every city and are important.
James Hale: I think the situation is changing as more Canadian musicians like D.D. Jackson and Rene Rosnes and should I mention her name? …
Bill Smith: … Diana Krall, of course she's local [laughter] …
James Hale: … As more Canadians move onto the international scene -- we have to give praise to institutions like the Canada Council and the Banff Centre for the Performing Arts -- without those institutions we would have seen as much movement in Canadian jazz as we have. I don't know if the situation for local musicians is any better or worse in Canada than anywhere else. I think that if you're a local musician in St. Louis Missouri, it's probably just as difficult to get on the radar screen of major festivals or to have ways to tour outside your region than if you are from Winnipeg.
Just a couple of points on the original question and what Andy was saying. I don't think we can lose sight of the fact that improvised music continues to be very marginalized. Let's not forget that the music we are talking about accounts for 3% of international sales and within that marginalized art form the musicians who have views broader than their small scope are relatively rare. So now you are talking about a very small percentage of music that we are discussing here. The music that is broader than traditionally regionalized or domestic in scope. And I don't think that Downbeat or Jazz Times let alone Coda Magazine are the problems we are looking at here.
The problems are the non-jazz publications when they cover jazz. When most daily newspapers look at jazz you know what they are looking at: it's not international jazz, it's American jazz. When you are looking beyond to the consumer magazines, the one or two times a year that a Time Magazine or a Maclean's here in Canada will cover jazz, you know who those artists are going to be. They are not going to be the artists with a broad international scope. Those are the vehicles that are reaching the mass market and then reflects back on our music. What people are reading in the mass market publications, watching on television, and hearing on the radio is perceived as jazz. Then it starts to spiral and feed upon itself in their views of what the music is and could be.
Bill Smith: If something like the Daily Mirror in England gave 1% of its royal-bashing to jazz, billions of people would know about this music. Paul [de Barros], do you think that the writers who work in jazz magazines and don't get out into the bigger world [of daily newspapers] where regular folks can read it have a tendency to preach to the converted?
Paul deBarros: I can only speak for myself. I write about everybody for the Seattle Times. It doesn't matter if they are American. I write about this festival [Vancouver], that's what I'm doing here. I think that a lot of jazz writers who write for at The New York Times, the Los Angeles newspapers, the Chicago paper, not so much in San Francisco right now, Andy writing for San Jose. I don't think we feel constricted, I certainly don't. And I didn't mean to give the impression that Downbeat and Jazz Times don't cover international artists. They do. I've written about people who record for Eminem, and Leo. It's a matter of degree and who is regarded as the centre and who is regarded as peripheral. I think that is a cultural issue in the United States.
I've just been reading a book about Canada, "Siamese Twins." It's about the Canadian cultural mythology and it refers to American cultural mythologies. And one the of those American cultural mythologies is that if you come in under that Statue of Liberty, then we don't care where you come from: you're American. I think that the jazz industry works that way too. That's why I said that Dave Holland might as well be American, and Diana Krall might as well be American. Americans don't think of the world as international. They think of it as the United States and everybody else. So the jazz magazines reflect that cultural format. It's not that you are not going to be able to write about a Turkish musician in the Seattle Times, Downbeat, or Jazz Times, it just that the question in the public's mind is 'Are you inside of this marketing reality or are you outside of it?' Because if you are outside of it then you are only about 63% real. If you are inside of it then you are 100% real and you can start to participate. I don't think that cultural format exists here [in Vancouver], or in San Sebastian [Spain] or in Istanbul. It's a different outlook on the world.
That's my answer to the question, really. American critics and festivals don't approach the music in an international mosaic kind of way because it has a different self-image. And again, the people involved in the industry feel that jazz is an American music. All these other things may be interesting, but they are only peripherally interesting.
Bill Smith: Well, I think jazz is an American music. We haven't had anybody from the audience. There's a lady who wants to say something. Could you please come forward and speak in the mic? Last year we only had the answers on the tapes.
Audience Member: Can you tell me how you can tell if its jazz?
Some panel Members: Oh, no!
Audience Member: As simply as you can. I've heard music at this festival and others that could be called classical, or from outer space, Latin, but they call it jazz. So I would like to know what the distinction is, what creates the name jazz.
Bill Smith: Bill Shoemaker will take that question. This topic was provided to us; we wouldn't have chosen that topic ourselves.
Bill Shoemaker: I think that the rough market definition of jazz is probably workable, and that is whatever is stocked in the jazz bins at your record store [general laughter]. But if you want an aesthetic answer to that question, that's a bit trickier. That is an individual decision and is best answered with translucent remarks like "You'll know it when you hear it."
Bill Smith: Some years ago I was with a friend of ours who is not here at this particular festival- his name is Art Lange, a writer in Chicago. We sat around one night and went through a bottle of wine trying to decide 'what is jazz?' We decided that it had to be melodic and rhythmic, but your idea of melodic and rhythmic. [Laughter]. It's a huge topic that I think it's impossible to define. You can look it up in the dictionary. It says black people in American dancing in Congo Square or something like that, but of course that's very simplified and idiotic to think of it in those terms. Do we have some other questions? Oh-oh, a jazz musician!
Paul deBarros: Here comes trouble.
Tim Posgate: I heard someone use the term 'marketing reality.' My question is that I think art criticism in history has been an interesting and important art form, there's no doubt about that. I'd like to hear a couple of people talk about the state of jazz art-criticism now and maybe how it relates to what it was in the past and the phases it's gone through. Is it as important now, is it just about selling records, is it still important to the artists, the people and the world? In two minutes or so.
Bill Smith: Well, I'm not going to answer. I'm just the moderator, so I can get off the hook really easily. I did write a little note here "Are the jazz press concerned more with product than with the music? Do they pander to their editors and record companies, which is a little bit of your question. Who wants to take Tim's question?
Paul deBarros: I'll take the question. A lot our work is product-driven and tour-driven. There's no question about that, just by the nature of the publications we write for. Just to take an example, take the Seattle Times. You write about the person who is coming to town. It's hard to convince your editor about a person who is not coming to town. If they have a great album, then you can write about them. If they don't have a recording and they are not coming to town, you are pretty well not going to write about them in the newspaper.
In the major jazz magazines that is also the case although on a broader scope. I think that Coda is a lot more open to publishing art criticism that is not product- and tour-driven. As to the quality of jazz criticism, obviously this not an objective answer, but I think it's really good right now. There are a lot of really good jazz writers who are grappling with the subject at hand. Whether or not it's important or not is a question that the musicians and the audience have to decide. I certainly couldn't tell you if our work is important. But I think that the quality is quite high, a lot higher than it was twenty years ago. And I think that it is approaching the level that it was when I grew up admiring people like Nat Hentoff, Ralph Gleason, Amiri Baraka.
Bill Smith: I should point out that Coda Magazine, which I was the editor of for a very long time and I'm not the editor anymore, that although it did indeed did write within the system of art criticism, articles that went to eleven pages out of forty about obscure saxophone players from Bulgaria….
Paul deBarros: … yeah, I wrote one of those….
Bill Smith: … We never, ever, could get corporate advertising for Coda. They never, ever, bought full back-page ads in color for Diana Krall.
Bill Shoemaker: I just want to take a slightly contrary view to Paul's [deBarros] about the state of jazz criticism. I think that at this point it is a very stratified situation. There's a lot of hacks out there who don't know what they're talking about who are just fumbling about. There's a wave of a very few, in my opinion, writers who have come up in the last five to seven years and show great promise, Michel Mercer being foremost among them. Unfortunately, we have a generation of writers who are going around the bend who still think it's the 40, 50s, 60s, 70s or whatever mindset they grew up with. I kind of long for the days where you had titanic critics like Ralph J Gleason and Amiri Baraka. I just don't see any out there now.
Andy Gilbert: I agree with both of you. I think that there are a lot writers who take a shallow approach to the music. One thing that is refreshing and relates to the topic is that I think the ideological struggles that were at the centre of jazz journalism -in the 40s with the rise of be-bop, in the 60s with the rise of the avant-garde, and in the 70s with fusion, when you go back and read the old magazines, people were bashing each other trying to define "Is this jazz, is it not?" That is ultimately a boring discussion….
Unknown: … Thank You! …
Andy Gilbert: … instead what you have now is that people are less worried with definitions and more interested in: Is this interesting music? Since no one else is going to cover it, we'll bring it into the jazz magazine or present them at a jazz festival. Except for a couple of writers and musicians who are really concerned with drawing the distinctions between what is jazz and what isn't, I think that many writers are willing to say 'Well, let's look at this music and ask the questions: 'does it intersect with the jazz world, do I find it interesting, challenging, and does it move me?' Those are more interesting questions than trying to create definitions, whether artificial or not.
Bill Smith: Do we have any more questions?
Tony Reif [Songlines Records]: Isn't part of the problem in writing about jazz is the fact that it incorporates so many other kinds of music? How can you know enough about all these other kinds of music to say something interesting and valid about jazz musicians intersecting with non-jazz musicians or other musicians who are intersecting with jazz? Isn't it rather difficult to be on top of all that?
James Hale: It always has been, and I don't know if it is any more difficult now than at any time in the past. I think it is always incumbent upon critics of any art form to understand the art form as thoroughly as you can and understand it from many directions, not only as a listener but as a player-participant in the art form. Just to live and breathe the stuff is part of your job. So I don't know if it is any easier or more difficult now than it ever has been. It is the same process it has always been: listening to the music, talking to musicians, hanging out and living the stuff. Synthesizing it in your own head. That's our job: provide context, hopefully entertaining the reader, because after all it is journalism and part of the greater entertainment business, if you will.
Bill Smith: I think, Tony, it's interesting this idea. I remember seeing at least three times in large newspapers in the western world, the headline saying 'Jazz Is Dead.' These are long times apart. I think the name of the French critic was Andr� Hodier. When he first heard Charlie Parker, he said that jazz was ended, was dead. And for a lot of us, of course, Charlie Parker was the beginning of jazz or whatever. Patrick Scott, a writer with one of the Toronto papers, I can't remember which one now, he was very fond of proclaiming that jazz was dead. Thelonious Monk was the end of jazz for him, because Monk still played tunes that sounded like stride piano which was OK for him, but the people in his band weren't OK. There were all these silly narrowing down of definitions.
As was pointed out like the whole global world we have evolved into -I'm not fond of this but it has- so has the music, it seems to me. The world that I came from when I first listened to it didn't have such a large amount of information from international musics. When I was a young man, we hadn't even heard of Ravi Shankar yet. So these influences didn't come and we were basically listening to an American music. We were listening to Coleman Hawkins, Earl Hines. This was our source. As the information systems open up we are getting more information, faster and more of it all the time. So we now live with a generation of young musicians who are not just influenced by this very narrow band. Initially musicians were influenced by players in their own town. But now there is such a huge amount of information: we can now pick up our personal FM radio and listening to Brazilian music just by twisting the dial. We could never do that 25 years ago, it didn't exist. There is always this proclamation 'jazz is dead, jazz is dead.' But what it really means is that the writer has come to the end of their ability to continue to listen to newer forms. We always used to laugh about people who were stuck in Benny Goodman, stuck in Woody Herman, Stan Kenton. They were frozen there, couldn't go on to the next one.
James Hale: Frank Zappa said "Jazz isn't dead, it just smells funny." [Laughter in audience].
Bill Smith: Unfortunately the hour is up and there is another workshop immediately after this, so let's have a round of applause for all the people who came out today. And our parting words are: "Jazz is not dead" [applause].
C o m m e n t s
Marketplace blues 1 of 4 David Whiteis
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October 29, 03
"I don't think that magazine content in the United States... is ad-driven as some would say..."
Mmmmm -- really? I admit that this happened a couple of years ago, but I distincly remember pitching a story about a particular musician to A Major And Very Prestigious Jazz Magazine That Will Remain Nameless, only to be told in EXACTLY these words, "Does he have new product coming out on a major label? That's how we pay the bills, you know...."
I'm not saying that this the ONLY criterion; but I do know that in the vast majority of cases when I've gotten a story placed in this particular Major And Very Prestigious Jazz Magazine, the artist in question has, coincidentally I'm sure, had --guess what!?-- new product coming out on a major label.
Then there was the time I pitched a piece about one of Chicago's most important and revered elder statesmen --one of the founding fathers of the AACM, a pioneer in the city's free jazz movement, a mentor to countless aspiring musicians-- only to be told that the story wouldn't be interesting unless there was an "angle" over & above just the music; I wasn't quite sure what this meant, but the mag's cover story for that month, if I'm not mistaken, featured one of Wynton's ex-sidemen who had some juicy dish on the band's interpersonal politics.
Such are the dangers of becoming "mainstream" in America, I guess...
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Generally a permit is not required, but any person wanting to sell goods or services, or to solicit monetary donations door to door must apply with the San Marcos Police Department for a peddler's or solicitor's identification card. Contact the San Marcos Police Department in person at 2300 South I-35, San Marcos, Texas 78666 or contact SMPD Sgt. Mizanin by telephone at 512-754-2205. The fee for issuance of the card is $10.00 and the card is valid for 90 days. Specific rules for door to door solicitation are set out in
Be sure to check the appearance date on your citation and to make contact with the Court on or before the date indicated.
If you lost your citation, contact the Court immediately to see if they can locate your citation information and determine your scheduled appearance date.
The City has no obligation to entertain request to purchase City owned land. Nonetheless, if the City wishes to entertain a request to purchase land, it must follow procedures set out in the Texas Local Government Code governing sales of real property by municipalities. Upon receipt of your inquiry, the City will conduct an internal review to determine whether the property may be needed for future projects or whether the property is unneeded surplus property. If City staff determines that the property is suitable for disposition, it will seek authorization from the San Marcos City Council to advertise the property for sale to the highest bidder. The City Council reserves the right to accept the highest bid or reject all bids.
If you wish to report a possible violation of a zoning regulation or restriction you may contact the City's Code Enforcement Department at 512-393-8440. If you have general questions about the applicability of any zoning regulations to your property, you may contact the City's Development Services Department, Planning Division at 630 East Hopkins Street, San Marcos, Texas 78666 (Second Floor of the Municipal Building) or by telephone at 512-393-8230. Occupancy restrictions limiting the number of unrelated adults in single family and other residential zoning districts are set out in Section 22.214.171.124 of the Land Development Code. General zoning requirements and restrictions are located in the Chapter 4 of the City's Land Development Code, which is available online.
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When you have returned your library books or library materials to the Library you will receive a compliance letter which you will need to submit to the prosecutor at the City Attorney's Office located at 630 East Hopkins Street. If all requirements have been met a dismissal will be prepared and forwarded to the Municipal Court. If you have any questions regarding the compliance letter please contact the City Attorney's office by telephone at 512-393-8150.
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Specific requirements for a permit are available in Chapter 90 - Limousine and Taxicab Permits
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It is recommended you consult a private attorney, if you believe you have a private civil claim against a towing company or wrecker service.
Requirements of the City's wrecker ordinance are set out in Chapter 90, Article 4 of the San Marcos City Code

subset: commoncrawl


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Firstly thankyou to everyone who came to a show, bought a CD, all the venues, festival organisers and bookers for your unswerving support over the years. We wouldn't be here without you and are looking forward to continuing the journey with you all.
For all you long term The Flumes fans who are wondering why we would do such a thing!? Please understand we haven't done this lightly. We are deeply attached to our name but the confusion caused by The Flumes, Flume and The Fumes has become annoying to the point of unbearable. In fact it's got our goat and made a curry but as they say "A change is as good as a holiday" and we're moving on.
Thank you for bearing with us while we go through this transition and please be assured that it's a name change only and we'll still be making the music you've come to know and love since 2008. We're in it for a long time as well as a good time and are treating this as part of the natural evolution of the band.
We've been cooking up some new tunes in our Solar Powered studio and looking forward to sharing them with you in the New Year.
Until then…Much Love
Kayt & Steph


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1. Butterick 6041 Size 16 Bust 34 $8 plus shipping
Who doesn't love a smart bolero? This pattern offers two collar options, three sleeve options and your choice of pockets or not.
2. Advance 5859 Size Medium Bust 31-33 $8 plus shipping
This pattern is for the gal who loves outdoor adventures! Make this pattern up in wool, corduroy or even denim for all of your outdoor activities and camping this summer. Note: This is an unprinted pattern.
3. Simplicity 3468 Size 16 Bust 34 $10 plus shipping
This smart 1940s dress pattern is perfect for that girl who wants to look elegant even at home. The classic lines will make you look chic in both the more casual version or the one with the fabulous ruffles.
4. Simplicity 3938 Size 12 Bust 30 $10 plus shipping ****sold
Yet another really fabulous early 40s pattern! This one features a dropped waist and really cute bow details! Note: This is an unprinted pattern.
5. Simplicity 4321 Size 14 Bust 32 $10 plus shipping
Right now is the perfect time to sew up your very own playsuit! This one can be made up as a crop top with shorts or skirt OR a very cute day dress! Note: this is an unprinted pattern.
6. Simplicity 3144 Size 15 Bust 33 $10 plus shipping
This blouse and skirt pattern can be made up as chic separates or in matching fabric to give the look of a dress. The sleeveless version is perfect for summer while the 3/4 length sleeves are perfect for spring and fall.
7. Simplicity 3997 Size 12 Bust 30 $10 plus shipping
This early 40s dress features great gathered details. Make it up in rayon with short sleeves for summer or a light weight wool with long sleeves for winter. Note: this is an unprinted pattern.
8. Simplicity 3977 Size 14 Bust 32 $10 plus shipping
This pattern is the perfect blank canvas dress. Show off a great novelty print. Make it up in a solid to show of a really fun trim. The neckline is perfect for showing off a great necklace or novelty brooch.
9. Ann Adams 4814 Size 14 Bust 32 $10 plus shipping
This Anne Adams patter is a really cute dirndl style dress. It also really reminds me of Renaissance costumes. Either way you choose to style it, you'll be cute!
10. Simplicity 1936 Size 18 Bust 36 $12 plus shipping ***sold
What a cute 1930s pattern! It has really cute fluttery sleeves and is perfect for some really special buttons. Note: This is an unprinted pattern. This pattern is also missing several pieces from the shorts pattern: L shorts underlap, M shorts overlap, P front shorts belt, R back shorts belt. All of the pieces for the blouse and skirt are included. This is reflected in the price.
To purchase, please email me at girlwiththestarspangledheart[dot]gmail[dot]com. I still have several other patterns for sale. Thanks!


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I just started jogging recently. I can complete 2-3 rounds jogging(3 miles appprox.) and 2-3 rounds walking. While jogging, my stomach aches (the right side, I don't know what that part is called). And a day after I jogged I experienced pain in my calves.
How to prevent stomach pain during a jog and knee pain a day after jogging?


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What does it take to create your New American Dream?
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In nine electrifying chapters, Orman delivers a master class on personal finance for this pivotal moment in time. She addresses every aspect of the American Dream—home, family, career, retirement. She teaches us that in order to create lasting security we must learn to stand in our truth. We must recognize, embrace, and be honest about what is real for us today and allow that understanding to inform the choices we make. The New American Dream is not the things we accumulate, says Orman, but the confidence that comes from knowing that which we've worked so hard for cannot be taken away from us. In THE MONEY CLASS, Orman teaches us how to take control over our present—right here, right now—in order to build the future of our dreams.
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- Home
- Government
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Green Initiatives
Environmental Sustainability
Protecting and preserving the natural spaces in Canton is extremely important. Canton's Parks, Golf, and Public Works divisions all work together to identify and implement environmentally sustainable practices whenever possible.
Audubon International
The Fellows Creek Golf Course has been certified as a Cooperative Sanctuary by Audubon International. Throughout the Fellows Creek Golf Course, there are wetlands and bird areas that are protected to help wildlife habitats thrive.
No Mow Areas
In an effort to preserve the natural habitats of wildlife, Canton maintains several no mow areas within its parks and golf courses. If you see an area that looks overgrown with taller grass or wildflowers, it is likely that ducks, turtles, rabbits and other native creatures call these spaces home. Additionally, these spaces are ideal for bees and birds that help foster a healthy ecosystem. For no mow areas around ponds, the grasses help to stabilize the pond banks and help provide shelter for smaller bugs, frogs, and fish. Maintaining these no mow areas, help ensure that wildlife has a safe habitat in this region.
Phragmites are an invasive species that creates an enormous challenge for many parks, golf courses and wetland areas. In 2018, Canton worked with consultants to develop a Phragmite Mitigation Plan to eradicate the invasive vegetation in several community park areas. The process for mitigation will take at least two years to complete. Canton understands that a healthy watershed is contingent upon control of invasive species and thoughtful reintroduction of native plants. This project will help remove the identified phragmites invasion and add back more native vegetation to help with storm water runoff.
Pond Management
In Canton's exterior spaces and parks, pond management is a priority area. Ponds are vital to the wildlife in the parks, storm water runoff and also are used as irrigation on the golf courses and some parks. In 2017, several ponds near the Pheasant Run Golf Course and Summit on the Park Community Center underwent a stabilization project. The results have helped to ensure proper storage, drainage and erosion control.
Prescribed Burns
In an effort to maintain natural vegetation, prescribed burns are used in vegetated areas. By conducting the prescribed burns, non-native vegetation can be eliminated and provides native species the opportunity to re-establish themselves. Prescribed burns are conducted under supervision of trained professionals.
Energy Performance Contracts
In 2014, Canton first entered into Energy Performance Contracts to improve energy efficiencies within the Township's facilities and parks. Through these projects, Canton has been able to make equipment upgrades that improved heating and cooling systems, boilers, lighting retrofits, water conservation and other infrastructure components. Due to the significant results in energy savings, the Township has begun the evaluation process of future collaborative projects to replace HVAC equipment and lighting upgrades to Canton's outdoor facilities, roadways and surface lots.
Canton Township is commitment to environmental and fiscal sustainability. By controlling energy use, Canton saves over 20% annually on its utility costs.
Latest Energy Performance Projects
- Replacing 450 existing lights at the Summit on the Park with energy efficient LED lights and fixtures.
- In 2018, the Summit on the Project had a wattage savings of 135,987,076.
- Early 2019, 211 existing lights at the Department of Public Works building were replaced with energy efficient LED lights and fixtures.
- The DPW project will be completed in 2019.
- 10 Canton Township buildings have HVAC heating and cooling controls in place.
Recycling at Canton's Parks and Facilities
Canton residents visiting the community parks can expect to see cleaner public parks thanks to a significant grant made possible by Dr Pepper Snapple Group (NYSE: DPS) in collaboration with national nonprofit Keep America Beautiful. The Dr Pepper Snapple Group/Keep America Beautiful Park Recycling Bin Grant Program provided funding to Canton Township to install 30 recycling bins that were placed in several parks, including: Heritage Park; Independence Park, Canton Dog Park and Preservation Park. In 2018, the Dr Pepper Snapple Group/Keep America Beautiful Park Recycling Bin Grant Program is funding 34 grants with a total distribution of 936 new recycling bins in public parks across the country, making recycling more accessible for Americans enjoying the outdoors.
Thanks to the overwhelming response from the initial installation, the Parks division will continue to add recycling opportunities throughout the parks, trails and green spaces. We just ask that you do your part and properly dispose of recycled materials in the Blue recycling bins.
All of Canton's Township facilities have single stream recycling bins available for guests and staff. Throughout all of the administrative areas, staff recycle paper, packing materials, and other supplies whenever possible. Guests are encouraged to use recycling bins when they visit. You may see standard blue or grey bins, but also several artistic bins that have been designed by local artists. All of these receptacles are maintained by the Facility Services and Parks staff. To learn more about home recycling, please click on the "Get Involved" tab.
Did you know?
- All of Canton's recycling bins are now single stream recycling. Yes, you can put empty plastic bottles, cans, and other recyclables in the same blue bin.
- In 2017, Canton Township's Administration Building recycled 72% of its generated debris.
Ways to Go Green
Canton residents are encouraged to help improve and protect the environment. Whether your interest is incorporating native plants into your yard, creating wildflower areas for bees, appropriately recycling used materials, or participating in an event, each action makes a big difference!
Native Plants
Michigan is home to many beautiful trees, plants, shrubs, grasses and flowers. When choosing which plants to add to your yard, consider adding native species. This helps the wildlife and ecosystem in our region and helps to minimize invasive species. Local nurseries and also Canton's Master Gardeners can provide advise on what types of plants are ideal for our area. You can talk with Canton's Master Gardeners each week during the season at the Farmers Market.
Hazardous Waste Round Up
Canton Township hosts annual Hazardous Waste Round-up events to encourage individuals to turn in non-recycled items such as oil, paints, and other chemicals. Public Works staff then properly dispose of the items. Learn more at the Public Works website or by calling 734/397-1011.
River Day
Each spring, Canton Municipal Services Department, Leisure Services Department and the Friends of the Rouge host the annual River Day event. The one day event helps to remove invasive species, reintroduces natural trees and plants, encourages recycling, and helps to build native bird houses. To learn more about getting involved please call 734/394-5150.
- Annually in May
Single Stream and Simple Recycling
Residents can now participate in Single Stream and Simple Recycling right from their curb. These two services allow residents the opportunity to recycle unwanted materials rather than putting them straight into the refuse container. For more information about how to take part in these two recycling programs please visit the Public Works website.
Canton Leisure Services encourages all residents and guests to actively get involved in green initiatives and recycling. To learn more about community wide Recycling, please visit the Municipal Services website or call 734/397-1011.
Jonathan LaFever
Community Development Director
Summit On the Park
Physical Address
46000 Summit Parkway
Canton, MI 48188
Phone: 734/394-5460


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As one of the country's leading distributors of small kitchen appliances, Hamilton Beach Brands, Inc. sells over 35 million appliances every year.
Our company's most famous brands—Hamilton Beach®, Eclectrics®, Proctor Silex® and TrueAir®—are found in households across America, Canada and Mexico. Now we're expanding into new areas as well, delivering our "Good Thinking®" approach throughout the home.
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Stay up-to-date on the hottest food trends with our blog, discover a new favorite dish with recipes from our Test Kitchen, access your account, and so much more.
Interested in receiving emails, recipes and tips?


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Bart Baggett Credentials
Mayor of Los Angeles Says
"When you need a professional handwriting expert of the highest standards, hire Bart Baggett. He is honest, quick, direct… and will deliver an objective expert opinion, every time. I recommend him without hesitation."
– Richard J. Riordan,
39th Mayor of Los Angeles
Baggett helps attorney in third case for his firm.
"Thanks to Mr. Baggett's written opinion, my client's case settle in our favor for a small amount. . Mr. Baggett's reputation and letter saved my client thousands on a trial. "
Mr. Andrew Smyth, Attorney at Law
Los Angeles, Ca
Baggett helps jilted x-wife win six figure settlement from forged pre-nuptial agreement
"The fact that you were here, in the court, to prove my x-husband forged the pre-nuptial agreement was the key to my divorce case. I can't thank you enough. You've help end this horrible 2 year drama of lies and created justice for me."
– Michelle Cheeley
San Bernadino, CA
(Husband forged pre-nuptial agreement and settled during the court trial to avoid Bart's 2nd day of court testimony.)
Baggett helps client recover $6,600.
"Your testimony and support during this lawsuit by my x-girlfriend has been nothing short of amazing. The judge awarded me full amount of the $6,600 and finally I can sleep at night.
And, you went head-to-head against that x-government document examiner and made him look like a babbling idiot. The judge obviously thought you were more credible. Thank God I chose you. "
– Mike Juaraz, East Los Angeles
Helped client avoid 15 years in prison.
"Thanks you soooooo much for going above and beyond. Your testimony was the key the criminal lawsuit against me. The jury found me NOT GUILTY on all counts. They obviously believed you instead of that Police document examiner the D.A. hired.
I was so impressed you handled that District Attorney with such professionalism… he knew you were right, but couldn't make you look bad on the witness stand.
I have my life back. Thank you Mr. Baggett!"
-Amir Dawood, Attorney, San Bernadino, CA
Attorney's Recommend Bart.
"Bart Baggett is the best expert witness I've ever worked with. What's more, he successfully testified for my client via telephone in a live trial here in Alaska. He even "consulted with me" on how best to cross-examine the defense's document examiner. We won the trial and I recommend him whole heartedly."
— Jim Fry, Attorney, Anchorage, Alaska
Even when Bart isn't in the room, his reputation helps client win
"Thank you very much for your assistance in this matter. Your opinion letter may become enough to prevent a trial."
— Sandra G. Slater Phoenix, AZ
Just an FYI. We won our case in small claims court (Balboa Capital vs. San Dollar Mortgage Service, Inc) . The judge accepted your "Official Letter of Opinion" in lui of a live testimony and he believed your opinion was credible. Should Mr. Baggett want to use our case for testimonial, feel free to do so. Thanks to you and Bart for efficient service!!!"
— Margaret Granger , San Bernadino, California


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"Great Hawk™ N95 respirator is perfectly fit, breathable, comfortable and cool. I wear it everyday since the COVID-19 pandemic. It's my favorite to protect my health!" -- Professor Dr. Hengyucius
SEATTLE, WA, September 25, 2020 /24-7PressRelease/ -- Great Hawk Air Service ("GHA") is pleased to announce that it has prepared 30,000,000 N95 respirators for hospitals, medical centers, clinics, healthcare operations, senior living facilities, universities and K-12 schools. All of its N95 respirators are NIOSH-certified, CDC-recommended and FDA-authorized to be used for both medical and non-medical applications to combat the COVID-19 pandemics.
As coronavirus infection rates rise across Europe and America again, the 2nd wave of COVID-19 causes approximate 1,000,000 people to be infected everyday. To date, there have been 32,000,000 confirmed cases with 978,000 deaths worldwide.
One of the main reasons that caused such massive infections and deaths shall be MASSIVE SHORTAGE of N95 respirators in Americas, India and European countries.
"Six months later, that shortage persists, leaving health-care workers exposed, patients at risk and public health experts flummoxed… At Hopkins, nurses are asked to keep wearing their N95s until the masks are broken or visibly dirty." Washington Post stated.
Similar situations are happening at universities throughout USA as schools reopen for the fall semester. Although all the American universities have taken precautions, it seems that they are not effective enough. The reason is VERY simple. Because domestic face masks and cloth face coverings are NOT effective to prevent wearers from COVID-19 infections. Even FDA-certified surgical masks are not enough to prevent wearers from infections of such SMALL viruses.
Technically, one N95 respirator's filter effectiveness is 25 times better than any Level 3 Surgical Mask, which is the highest level of all types of surgical masks per FDA regulations. According to CDC, the N95 respirator is able to effectively provide the wearer with at least 95% filter efficiency level against airborne particles AS SMALL AS 0.3 MICRON.
Social distance, of course, is important. However, the global facts show that with the same social distance, wherever N95 respirators are not available, the infection rates are always higher there.
It is undoubtedly that NIOSH-approved N95 respirators are the first choice for hospitals, medical centers, clinics, healthcare operations, senior living facilities, universities and K-12 schools, etc. to protect all the people there against Coronavirus. Nothing is better than N95 respirators among all types of PPE so far.
Because of the above-mentioned, GHA has been working hard to prepare 30,000,000 N95 respirators for global users. All the N95 respirators are 2020 production for quick deliveries from Washington.
ORDERS are ACCEPTED on the basis of "first come, first served." But preferences will be given to American hospitals, schools and fire departments. Inquiry email: [email protected]
Based in Seattle, Washington, Great Hawk Air Service is NIOSH-certified and FDA-cleared N95 developer and supplier for global users. To date, two models of Great Hawk™ N95 respirators have NIOSH approvals. New models of Great Hawk™ N95 respirators are on the way. Its modernized PPE production lines are capable to produce millions of top quality N95 respirators and surgical masks on a daily basis. For more information, please check the following:
1) Official Website: www.N95-US.com
2) Global Page: www.Facebook.com/GHA800
3) My PPE Store: www.N95-US.com/my-ppe-store.html#
Headquartered in Washington, DC, NIOSH ("National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health") is the United States federal agency responsible for conducting research and making recommendations for the prevention of work-related injury and illness. It is part of the CDC within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
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FDA Wants to Monitor Social Media Chatter About Product Risks
Blog and social media buzz monitoring could help the agency better communicate drug risks.
The Food and Drug Administration is looking for a contractor to monitor social media chatter about the drugs and other products it regulates and how that chatter shifts as a result of FDA risk warnings, solicitation documents show.
The agency is looking for a contractor that can provide historical information about the sorts of conversations consumers are having on blogs, message boards and social media sites about the product classes FDA regulates -- such as drugs, medical devices, food and tobacco -- and then track when the sentiment or volume of those conversations shifts, according to the sources sought notice posted on Tuesday.
FDA wants to track what makes those conversations spike, rise slowly or trend downward, the notice said, and to gather information about "about social media buzz volume over time, top sources of buzz, most popular forums of online discussion, most-cited news stories, major themes of discussion, sentiment analysis, word clouds and/or message maps, and a sample of verbatim consumer comments."
A sources sought notice doesn't obligate FDA to purchase any goods or services.
FDA has been at the forefront of agencies using Web monitoring to guide their work. In September, the agency contracted with a small company of former campaigners for President Obama to track the public response to FDA's own social media outreach.
The agency is also using Web monitoring to find and shut down sellers of fake and knock off drugs and other products.
The General Services Administration has urged agencies to learn from social media to fine tune their services, noting that intelligence gathered from social media can help agencies deliver services more effectively and, ultimately, save money.
The White House issued guidance in July approving such social media mining programs to gain "situational awareness" so long as agencies level with the public about what information they're collecting and why.
(Image via Thirteen/Shutterstock.com)
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A 19-year-old Chilliwack man has been charged after the violent attack of an 85-year-old man Sunday morning in Abbotsford.
Abbotsford Police Sgt. Judy Bird said police were called to the area of 33555 South Fraser Way – west of Bourquin Crescent East – at about 10 a.m. for a report that an elderly man was being hit and robbed.
Witnesses followed the suspect as he ran away. Bird said the man ran into traffic on South Fraser Way, and was struck by a vehicle.
The culprit continued to run away, and witnesses saw him head into a townhouse complex and go over a fence and into a ravine north of Trinity Street in downtown Abbotsford.
Police arrived and found the suspect hiding in some bushes in the ravine.
Bird said the victim – who did not know the assailant – sustained serious injuries, including broken teeth and cuts to his face.
Brandon William Janveaux has been charged with assault with a weapon and assault causing bodily harm.
Bird said she did not know what weapon Janveaux is alleged to have used.
Janveaux currently has other charges before the courts, according to the provincial court database. He is set to go to trial on Jan. 16 on charges of occupying a vehicle knowing that a firearm is present, possessing a firearm without a licence, and carrying a weapon or prohibited device on Sept. 30, 2018 in Chilliwack.
He is also set to go on trial on March 20 on two counts of assault with a weapon and two counts of breaching his bail conditions on June 17 of this year in Chilliwack.
ALSO READ: String of purse snatches at Mill Lake in Abbotsford
ALSO READ: Man sentenced for break-in of senior man's home


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Project ORCA, an MIT group for students interested in autonomous underwater vehicle technology, won the $5,600 first prize in the annual AUV competition organized by the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International and the Office of Naval Research.
"The MIT team won first place in the 1998, 1999 and 2001 competitions, and we were victorious once again," said Hongshen Ma, a graduate student in media arts and sciences.
The goal of the AUV competition is to "advance the state of the art of AUVs by challenging a new generation of engineers to perform realistic missions in the remote underwater environment," according to contest organizers.
The format is similar to that of other robotics competitions, except the arena is underwater, which presents a whole new set of constraints and challenges for the designers. This year's competition took place in San Diego.
The arena is a 38-foot-deep elliptical pond in which 17 platforms with unique barcode markings are situated at various depths. A sonar "pinger" is set at the center to help the submarines navigate. Each AUV's goal is to locate and identify the platforms to produce an ordered list of barcodes and the corresponding platform depth. The teams are given 20 minutes to survey the platforms and five minutes to report the final result, Ma explained.
"The MIT team had a close call during the qualifying heat when one of the vertical thrusters failed and the vehicle sat idle for the first 18 minutes of the run," Ma said. "We did very well during the final run and narrowly edged Cornell for first place."
For more information, click here.
A version of this article appeared in MIT Tech Talk on September 11, 2002.


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Dentsu Aegis Network is headquartered in London and operates in 145 countries worldwide with more than 50,000 dedicated specialists.


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God has a history of using His people to shape every facet of society read more
Samuel Rodriguez: Lessons From 2012 Election
The outcome of the 2012 presidential election reinforces the fact that what America needs the most is not a political movement driven by expediency and agendas of man but a prophetic movement driven by the impetus of the cross.
Accordingly, the outcome of the 2012 election speaks to a fragmented Bible-believing community where ethnic followers of Christ validated the donkey while white evangelicals supported the elephant. We need a new narrative that will bring both groups together.
To that respect, I am convinced more than ever that the only agenda that can save America and unite the body is not the agenda of the donkey or the elephant but the agenda of the Lamb.
The agenda of the Lamb is one of righteousness and justice. We need a multi-ethnic kingdom culture cross-driven movement that will reconcile Billy Graham's message with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s march. In other words, we need a movement committed to protecting life and alleviating poverty, defending marriage and doing justice in the name of Jesus. It can no longer be either or, it must be both-and.
In order to protect our Judeo-Christian value system, defend the image of God in every human being (in and out of the womb), secure religious freedom, reform the culture, transform our political discourse and usher in a new awakening, we must reconcile truth with love, conviction with compassion, sanctification with service and holiness with humility.
Finally, as many pro-life biblical worldview Christians fight off the effects of post-election stress disorder, let us not forget that God is still on the throne. At the end of the day, our objective is to convey to America one simple message; Behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of mankind. Behold the Lamb! read more


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2010 Olympics: Freestyle Skiing
Ski Cross added to freestyle mix
by Mike Morrison and Christine Frantz
Related Links
Did You Know?The word "mogul" comes from the Austrian word "mugel," which means "small hill" or "mound." |
Freestyle skiing saw its first Olympic action at the 1988 Calgary Games as a demonstration sport. Its immense popularity, particularly with the Gen-X crowd, made it an official medal sport at Albertville in 1992 . It has been a staple of the Winter Olympics ever since.
New in 2010, ski cross will be contested at Cypress Mountain, along with aerials and moguls.
The aerial event is perhaps the most breathtaking freestyle discipline. Competitors begin at a spot of their choice and ski straight down the mountain toward a concave jump (which can be as high as 13 ft) that hurls them into the air.
They perform a variety of twists and somersaults in midair, and then attempt to stick the landing on their two skis. Sounds easy, right?
A panel of five judges ranks the jumps, guided by the following components: 50% form, 20% air, and 30% landing.
The 16 women and 16 men with the best scores advance to the final round. Each competitor then jumps twice, and the highest combined score wins the gold.
In the moguls competition, skiers individually race down a mountain covered with large bumps measuring up to four feet. They must make aggressive turns while still keeping their shoulders parallel to the finish line.
There are also two jumps, placed one-third and two-thirds of the way down the mountain. At each one, racers attempt to dazzle the panel of seven judges with "helicopters," "back-scratchers," and other creative jumps.
The judges use the following criteria to rank the competitors: 50% turns, 25% air, and 25% speed.
Ski cross is similar to snowboard cross, and looks to be just as popular, with its mass start followed by a mad dash down the mountain.
Each heat features four skiers skiing down a course of turns, flats, traverses, rolls, banks, and ridges. Strength and endurance are key, but the most important factor is just plain speed.
The freestyle events will be held Feb. 13–25.


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By Mary Carmichael and Stephanie Ebbert
"At some point after I was hired by them, I . . . provided that information to the University of Pennsylvania and Harvard," she said in a statement issued by her campaign. "My Native American heritage is part of who I am, I'm proud of it and I have been open about it."
Warren's statement is her first acknowledgment that she identified herself as Native American to the Ivy League schools. While she has said she identified herself as a minority in a legal directory, she has carefully avoided any suggestion during the last month that she took further actions to promote her purported heritage.
When the issue first surfaced last month, Warren said she only learned Harvard was claiming her as a minority when she read it in the Boston Herald.
No, of course not. Penn and Harvard thought she was Native because she told them so. They reported this claim to the government as if it were fact.
Warren claims she forgot that she told Harvard she was Native. Really? You forgot whether you told people you were white or Native? Did you also forget whether you told them you were male or female? Because that's about the same magnitude of error.
But let's assume she did forget. The correct answer in her previous comments would've been "I don't remember what I told Harvard." Not "I never told Harvard I was Native." If you don't remember, you say "I'm not sure" or "I don't know."
As I said before, the more she listed herself as "Cherokee" or "Native," the more she required evidence. Now we learn it was official. She helped her schools mislead the federal government on their diversity reports.
She didn't say she was white with Native ancestry, which might've been accurate. She flatly said she was Native despite having no known tribal ancestors. Indeed, despite having nothing but unreliable family rumors.
At a minimum, this listing let the schools deflect the hiring criticism they were receiving. They could say they had one "Native" professor so they didn't need to look for others. Consequently, did Native professors get less consideration for job openings? Quite possibly.
Although there's still no evidence that Warren used her imagined ancestry to get a job, it's looking more and more like she engaged in box-checking to get ahead. She can't claim she told her schools she was Native to meet other Natives--her prior flimsy excuse. The only reason you inform officials you're a minority is to benefit from it--officially.
Warren flunks crisis management
Another article notes the consequences of Warren's stonewalling and backtracking:
What Elizabeth Warren did wrong
By Chris Cillizza
But, when the Boston Herald first reported on the fact that Warren was listed as a Native American in a faculty directory, she said that she had no previous knowledge of that fact and had not authorized Harvard to list her as a minority. Warren's campaign has said she forgot some details of her past employment as a way to explain the discrepancy in her statements.
And, it's clear from the Globe story that Warren's hand was forced by the fact that the newspaper had found proof that, in their words, "the university's law school began reporting a Native American female professor in federal statistics for the 1992-93 school year, the first year Warren worked at Harvard, as a visiting professor."
While the Warren campaign will insist that she is being consistent—that she has always said that she never told Harvard or Penn about her heritage before being hired or that it benefited her in any way—the optics of this back and forth are just terrible for her.
This could—and should—have been a minor nuisance for the campaign. No one is alleging that Warren used her minority status to get her jobs and it's hard to imagine that in a campaign where the economy, jobs and debt are the overriding issues that whether Warren is Native American or not matters at all to voters.
But, Warren has turned a minor nuisance into a major storyline by not simply coming out with everything she knew—up to and including that she had formally told Harvard and Penn of her Native American heritage—about the whole episode right from the start.
"In Politics 101 you learn to get it all out and apologize on day one," said one senior Democratic consultant who marveled at how the Warren campaign dealt with this episode. "'Yep, I did it and I'm sorry.' This has been handled amateurishly."
By dragging out the story—the first Herald piece on it ran April 27!—Warren has turned it into, at the least, a distraction and, at the most, an issue to be used against her this fall.
This leads me to question her aptitude for politics. Not because of her questionable ancestry, which still isn't a decisive issue. Rather, because of her inability to manage this relatively simple controversy. If you don't understand public relations, I'm not sure you're qualified to hold public office. Politics is all about the art of the message.
For more on Elizabeth Warren, see Cherokee Website Targets Warren and Harvard Reported Warren as Native.
Below: "Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren, right, takes questions from members of the media as Mass. Gov. Deval Patrick, left, looks on during an event at Warren's campaigns headquarters, in Somerville, Mass., Wednesday, May 30, 2012, during which Patrick formally endorsed Warren in her campaign for the Senate seat." (AP Photo/Steven Senne)


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Yesterday, I accidentally left the window open while it was raining heavily. Some rain poured in for a while (maybe a half-hour or so) before I noticed. After I had wiped off the floor, some dark areas remained in the vicinity of the seams between the planks. Since then, most of these dark areas have dried up and returned to their original color, but some still remain, close to the wall (see pictures below)
These dark areas seem to dry up extremely slowly (I guess they are a sign of trapped water, and not permanent discolouration). I guess they will dry up in due time, even if it might take a very long time, but I've read that mold growth can initiate in as little as 72 hours, which makes me a bit worried.
What should I do, just leave it and wait for it to dry up? Call a professional? (I'd rather not, of course). Take measures on my own?


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Contemporary Strategy Analysis Text and Cases
Contemporary Strategy Analysis Text and Cases
- Edition: 8th
- Format: Paperback
- Copyright: 01/22/2013
- Publisher: Wiley
- Newer Edition
Note: Supplemental materials are not guaranteed with Rental or Used book purchases.
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The current and previous editions of Contemporary Strategy Analysis have seen this title become established as one of the leading strategic management textbooks in many different markets across the world. It has been adopted very widely on MBA level courses, for which it was primarily written, and also on a considerable number of undergraduate level courses. The success of this title reflects the very high esteem and regard in which Rob Grant is held across the international community of strategic management academics.
The success of earlier editions has been carried through to the current edition on which there have been two major changes: firstly, a WileyPLUS course has been developed offering a much richer collection of resources than were previously available, and secondly, a combined text and cases version of the book has been made available for the first time which has allowed us to compete more effectively against Johnson, Scholes & Whittington, the market-leading title from Pearson in the EMEA market.
This plan for the eighth edition of Contemporary Strategy Analysis has two main objectives: firstly, to further consolidate and increase our market share on MBA and Masters level courses in strategic management, and, secondly, to link in with our planned publication of Foundations of Strategy from Rob Grant and Judith Jordan which has been written and developed for the undergraduate level and also for those Masters level courses that require a briefer and more accessible coverage of the subject than is provided in Contemporary Strategy Analysis. We aim to develop a coordinated strategy for the development and publication of both titles which enables us to maximize the use of resources and online materials. This strategy also includes the development of an extensive global collection of online resources for strategic management courses that will be made available to support both titles and also other future strategy titles that will be published by other Wiley locations.
We do not propose to publish the cases only version of Grant as a separate print version and will make these cases available for sale online.


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A test is recommended immediately after:
Drinking water testing for private water systems are recommended to be tested for bacteriological contamination at least once or twice per year. High water season is the perfect time to test; the high water increases the chances of your water system becoming contaminated. If your well head or water system is flooded you should consider your well to be potentially contaminated and have your water sample tested before using the water to drink, prepare food/baby formula or wash dishes.
Possible indicators that your water may be contaminated are: a chance in color, odor or taste. Water sampling bottles and instructions are available at Teton County Environmental Health. Water samples are tested by the Teton County Water Laboratory Mondays and Tuesdays. Please submit samples before 2 p.m.


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Small fruit, crisp like apple, not a good taste.
Plant Patent #9406 (Zaiger Genetics, Modesto, CA, 1995). The present new variety of nectarine tree was originated by us in our experimental orchard located near Modesto, Calif., as a fifth generation seedling from a cross between Ruby Gold Nectarine (U.S. Plant Pat. No. 3,101) and Redwing Peach (U.S. Plant Pat. No. 621). A large group of these fifth generation seedlings were planted and maintained under careful observation by us, during which time, one such seedling, which is the present variety, having especially desirable fruit characteristics was selected for asexual reproduction and commercialization. The present new variety of nectarine tree is of large size, vigorous upright growth and is a prodcutive and regular bearer of large, firm, white flesh, freestone fruit with excellent flavor and eating quality. The fruit is further characterized by being relatively large in size throughout the tree, having good handling and shipping quality, having a high degree of attractive red skin color and in comparison to its maternal parent Ruby Gold Nectarine (U.S. Plant Pat. No. 3,101), the new variety is white flesh instead of yellow and is approximiately 35 days later in maturity.
The description of each variety of peach or nectarine fruit under each group is in different formats as this information is collected from varied sources and hence is not consistent


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Will Dylan (Steve Burton) survive? Photo Credit: CBS |
Monday, June 30
Tensions between Nikki (Melody Thomas Scott) and Christine (Lauralee Bell) increase; Kelly (Cady McClain) tells Jack (Peter Bergman) about her relationship with Stitch (Sean Carrigan).
Tuesday, July 1
Nick (Joshua Morrow) and Mariah (Camryn Grimes) reach an understanding; Leslie (Angell Conwell) tells Nikki about the revenge plot.
Wednesday, July 2
Colin (Tristan Rogers) confesses to Jill (Jess Walton); Summer (Hunter King) works to help Austin (Matthew Atkinson); Devon (Bryton James) battles feelings for Hilary (Misheal Morgan).
Thursday, July 3
Dylan (Steve Burton) takes a bad turn; Jack gets shocking news; Paul (Doug Davidson) talks to Nikki about their history.
Friday, July 4
Nick and Sharon (Sharon Case) celebrate the Fourth of July; Victoria (Amelia Heinle) confronts Stitch and Kelly.
- Soap of the Week Poll (June 23-27, 2014)
- Former 'Guiding Light' and 'One Life to Live' Star Gina Tognoni Joins 'The Young and the Restless'


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A Glendale, California-based debt collector will pay $1 million dollars to settle Federal Trade Commission charges that the defendants violated federal law. This is the first FTC action against a debt collector who used text messaging to attempt to collect debts in an unlawful manner.
The FTC, the nation's consumer protection agency, alleged that Archie Donovan and two companies he controls – National Attorney Collection Services, Inc., and National Attorney Services LLC used English- and Spanish-language text messages and phone calls in which they unlawfully failed to disclose that they were debt collectors. The FTC charged the defendants with violating both the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act and the FTC Act.
In their text messages, phone calls, and mailings, the defendants also falsely portrayed themselves as law firms – by using the names National Attorney Services, National Attorney Service, National Attorney, and Abogados Nacionales. Building on their deceptive company name, the defendants falsely threatened to sue consumers for not paying their debts or to garnish their wages.
Example of envelope allegedly used by defendants to contact consumers' family members, friends and co-workers about their debts. |
The FTC also alleged that Donovan and his companies illegally revealed debts to the consumers' family members, friends and co-workers. Among other tactics, the defendants used mailing envelopes picturing a large arm shaking money from a consumer who is strung upside down. The law does not allow debt collectors to disclose publicly someone's private debts, because doing so could endanger their jobs and reputations. Mailing envelopes can include only the name and address of the company, and cannot indicate that the consumer may owe a debt.
"No matter how debt collectors communicate with consumers – by mail, by phone, by text or some other way – they have to follow the law," said Jessica Rich, director of the FTC's Bureau of Consumer Protection. "The FTC has a zero tolerance policy for deception."
The FTC held a workshop in 2011 and issued a report in 2009 that addressed how debt collectors can use text messages to collect debts in a lawful manner while maintaining consumers' privacy.
In addition to the $1 million civil penalty, the settlement requires the defendants to stop sending text messages that do not include the disclosures required by law, and to obtain a consumer's express consent before contacting them by text message. The defendants also are barred from falsely claiming to be law firms, and from falsely threatening to sue or take any action – such as seizure of property or garnishment – that they do not actually intend to take.
For consumer information about dealing with debt collectors, see Debt Collection.
The Commission vote to authorize the staff to refer the complaint to the Department of Justice, and to approve the proposed consent decree, was 4-0. The DOJ filed the complaint and proposed consent decree on behalf of the Commission in U.S. District Court for the Central District of California on August 23, 2013. The proposed consent decree is subject to court approval.
NOTE: The Commission authorizes the filing of a complaint when it has "reason to believe" that the law has been or is being violated, and it appears to the Commission that a proceeding is in the public interest. Consent decrees have the force of law when signed by the District Court judge.
The Federal Trade Commission works for consumers to prevent fraudulent, deceptive, and unfair business practices and to provide information to help spot, stop, and avoid them. To file a complaint in English or Spanish, visit the FTC's online Complaint Assistant or call 1-877-FTC-HELP (1-877-382-4357). The FTC enters complaints into Consumer Sentinel, a secure, online database available to more than 2,000 civil and criminal law enforcement agencies in the U.S. and abroad. The FTC's website provides free information on a variety of consumer topics. Like the FTC on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, and subscribe to press releases for the latest FTC news and resources.
Contact Information
- Betsy Lordan
Office of Public Affairs
- Rebecca Unruh
Bureau of Consumer Protection


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Village residents are allowed to place one bulk item out with their weekly pick up at no charge. For more than one item, please call Waste Management for a special pick up at (800) 796-9696. Waste Management does not pick up appliances. Certain bulk items have fees associated with them.
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Please see the Garbage Route Map.
In order to accommodate various resident service needs, there are three different garbage toter sizes for residents to select from: Standard Size / 90 Gallon Garbage Toter - $24.22 per month Medium Size / 65 Gallon Garbage Toter - $21.65 per month Small Size / 35 Gallon Garbage Toter - $18.01 per month Monthly rates include fees for recycling services, leaf vacuuming service, holiday tree pick-up and special spring yard waste pick-up week.
The garbage can exchange program takes place once a year. Residents who want to take part in the program may register between January 1 and February 15, replacements take place in March. Please call the Request for Service system at (847) 223-8515 for more information.