Kansas City, Missouri, June 13, 2008: Jazz Master Alaadeen has been awarded a grant from the Fund for Folk Culture to write The Rest of the Story, a jazz methods manual based on his approach to teaching.
This project is made possible by a grant from the Fund for Folk Culture’s Artist Support Program, underwritten by the Ford Foundation with additional support from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. Based in Austin, Tend conservation of folk and traditional arts and culture throughout the United States.
Alaadeen states: “I grew up in Kansas City, Mixas, the Fund for Folk Culture is a nonprofit organization dedicated to the dynamic practice assouri in the 18th and Vine area, the neighborhood which was the center of a vital African-American community and the place where the distinctive sound of Kansas City Jazz emerged. I learned Jazz immersed in this community, from the oral tradition, directly from that first generation of jazz masters. Over the years I’ve seen jazz moving away from the African-American community, and the traditional way I learned it into the jazz studies programs found in universities. In many jazz studies programs in formal institutions, music theorists write down on paper what a particular jazz master was playing and teach that to the student. When I was coming up if you took a solo and sounded like anyone else, you would be booted off the stage.”
TheRest of the Story is being written from the perspective of a traditional musician, from a performer’s viewpoint rather than that of a theorist. The manual will also include stories about Alaadeen’s life experiences as well as photos. It is hoped to reach and inspire musicians across a broad spectrum to reach deeper inside the music to find their own expression.
