Arts
2021 A.B. Spellman NEA Jazz Masters Fellow for Jazz Advocacy Phil Schaap is an original—a legendary radio host since 1970 at WKCR, an award-winning audio engineer with a facility for remastering jazz classics, a renowned teacher of jazz, a virtuoso of jazz history in general and Charlie Parker in particular, and, as you will hear in this podcast, one of the great storytellers. Schaap has won six Grammy Awards for his liner notes, audio engineering, and production. He’s taught jazz at Columbia University, Princeton University, and Rutgers University, and currently teaches in the graduate school at Juilliard. In addition, he became curator at Jazz at Lincoln Center where he created Swing University--an educational program where he teaches classes that cultivate listening and a deeper appreciation for jazz. From the mid-1970s until 1992, he booked musicians for Jazz at the West End a Manhattan club with nightly shows seven days a week. Phil Schaap literally grew up surrounded by jazz and in the company of extraordinary musicians who were close family friends—and he has funny, lovely, and appreciative stories about all of them. This podcast is a great way to kick off Jazz Appreciation Month—it’s harder to find anyone who appreciates the music more than 2021 NEA Jazz Master Phil Schaap.