Night Lights made its debut on WFIU four years ago almost to the day–or night, as it were–with a program called Let Freedom Ring that aired on the eve of the July 4th holiday. I had been working at WFIU for exactly two years, subbing for weekday afternoon jazz host Joe Bourne and producing WFIU jazz specials such as Bix Beiderbecke: Never the Same Way Twice and Jump for Joy: Duke Ellington’s Celebratory Musical. When the syndicated “Worldwide Jazz” show that we carried on Saturday evenings suddenly ceased production, I proposed Night Lights as a replacement to our station manager, Christina Kuzmych.

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Jazz vocalist Rene Marie turned a relatively pedestrian event–this past Tuesday’s “State of the City” address from Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper–into a media tempest over patriotism when she sang the melody of “The Star-Spangled Banner” but imported lyrics from James Weldon Johnson’s Lift Every Voice and Sing, long referred to as “the black national anthem.”

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The Jazz Icons website has posted discographical information about the previously-announced third set in their ongoing series of jazz-performance DVD releases. Due out in September…

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Jazz pianist Ronnie Mathews has passed away at the age of 72 after a battle with pancreatic cancer. Matthews had been the subject of an all-star benefit and tribute just last week at Sweet Rhythm in New York City. If you’ve spent any time listening to 1960s, 70s and 80s hardbop, there’s a good chance that you’ve heard Ronnie Matthews on the keyboards at some point–Dexter Gordon’s live 1976 opus Homecoming, for example, or…

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Multi-instrumentalist, jazz/classical/world maestro, and Beat Generation icon David Amram will be appearing at Farm Bloomington for a jazz-poetry performance this Friday evening, June 27 at 8 p.m. EST in Bloomington, Indiana. Amram, whose music has been featured in Night Lights programs such as Jazz and Jack Kerouac…

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Jazz writer and musician Allen Lowe has put together a terrific series of 9-CD sets documenting jazz from 1895 to 1950 called That Devilin’ Tune, which includes his book of the same name. I’ve posted about these sets before, particularly Volume 4, which covers the 1945-1950 period…

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Mosaic Records has posted information, including discographies, about new sets featuring Dave Liebman’s Pendelum group and some Helen Merrill jazz-vocal sides on their upcoming releases page, along with more details about the forthcoming early-1950s Oscar Peterson collection.

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