Celebrating and perpetuating the tradition of jazz in New England
	Hall of Fame History
	Gigi Gryce came up playing bop alto in Hartford and Boston, and went on to a sterling career as reedman, arranger, and teacher.

Hall of Fame History

Location

There are two main reasons why the New England Jazz Hall of Fame/Museum should be located on the East Boston waterfront:

There is a need for an anchor on the East Boston side of Boston Harbor to stimulate water transportation and use of the community’s new parks and walkways.. The historic, cultural and educational tie-ins to Boston would be as significant as the economic benefits.
Boston is the only city in the world that has the untapped resources (Logan Airport travelers and a plethora of fine jazz players), and East Boston’s undeveloped waterfront is the ingredient that would make the project work.

The skyline view from Piers Park is second to none.

TOURISM/PEDESTRIANISM
Millions of people come to Boston each year to enjoy the culture, walk the FreedomTrail, visit our colleges and museums, and to be entertained. And millions among them enter Boston via East Boston’s Logan International Airport. Massport figures show that 65,000 passengers come through Logan each day (25 million per year) and that the great majority of them now get to and from the airport by automobile. In addition, more than 15,000 people are employed at Logan. At present, no more than a few hundred a day are drawn into the East Boston business community even to just take the MBTA Blue Line downtown. The quick in-and-out-of-East-Boston habits of both travelers and workers mean that most of the financial benefits of the airport are funneled elsewhere. According to Massport, the average air traveler is spending less than $1 per day at the airport but if there were a 15-boutique mall, that figure would quadruple in one year’s time (i.e. $75 million a year).

All city planners and consultants agree that future development should emphasize pedestrian traffic as much as possible to improve the quality of life for those living in the neighborhoods as well as to help stimulate the economy. A waterfront Jazz Hall of Fame and live music venue would be accessible not only via water shuttle across Boston Harbor; there also would be a link to the Samuel Maverick Square T stop, the proposed waterfront walk and the 2.5-mile bicycle/walkway that will follow the old Conrail railbed all the way to Belle Isle Marsh and Suffolk Downs, and every effort should be made to link the Jazz Hall to hotel guests on the other side of the harbor and tourist groups and families visiting the waterfront and harbor islands. All who have ever visited Piers Park agree that East Boston’s view of the dowtown skyline is unparalleled.

Certainly the Boston Tourism Bureau could do a great deal to promote a Jazz Hall of Fame as a wonderful place to enjoy New England’s jazz traditions, but, to some extent the city already has been benefitting from a multitude of New England musical ambassadors who have been spreading the message worldwide through their playing, teaching and recruiting of new students.

LIVE MUSIC/EDUCATION
There are some very strong and varying opinions as to which musicians should first be inducted into a Jazz Hall of Fame, but the ongoing performance venue should feature those accomplished musicians who have either grown up in the region or who have chosen to call New England home.

The fact is that jazz already is part of the landscape. There are courses about the music in every college and university in town and in many of the area’s high schools, too. There are the Boston Jazz Society and a Jazz Hotline, the “Quarter Notes” and “The Herds” jazz newsletters; and Wally’s, Connolly’s, Bob The Chef’s and the 1359 club in Cambridge still feature local players almost exclusively. There also are a growing number of jazz venues in the suburbs, where most affluent high schools still offer music programs.

But, jazz has been a music of the city, and Boston has work to do to restore the music’s rightful place in its history, its culture, its image and in its public schools.

Musicians taking part in the Hall’s on-going live music venue could be tapped to help fill the tremendous void that budget cuts have left in the public schools’ music education programs. Some of the work already is being done in the colleges, libraries and schools, by teachers, broadcasters, the Boston Jazz Society, the musicians union and “Quarter Notes” magazine, but a Jazz Hall of Fame Museum would help coordinate all of their activities and act as a clearing house for all of these fine efforts.

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Last modified: February 01, 2005, 15:46 EDT