About two years ago, I was approached by the editors of the Journal for Music-In-Education (Larry Scripp & Patrick Keppel) to write a short response to a story they were publishing by & about jazz pianist Michael Cain (perhaps best known for his work with Jack DeJohnette’s Special Edition band). Cain’s article addresses some of the social and cultural stereotypes he has encountered as a jazz musician, as well as the journey into the mindset of the high-visibility performing musician; a process he terms ‘Initiation.’

Scripp and Keppel were interested in my response to Michael Cain’s writing, primarily because I studied privately with him while at NEC, and because Scripp (a WAITIKI supporter) deemed my work with that group as a sort of ‘Initiation’ of my own. To make a long story short, when I began to write my response (which was originally intended to be just a few paragraphs), I discovered how complex and nuanced the story behind WAITIKI truly is &emdash; and thus found my way into writing a full-length article. (Consequently, I further ended up becoming Associate Editor of the JMIE, and contributed several more writings to it before publication in July).

The JMIE has since been published and circulated throughout the world. It is now in the hands of hundreds (soon to be thousands … and more) of music educators, professional teaching artists, arts education policy makers, action researchers, performers, and artist-teacher-scholars. Additionally, this particular edition will be used as a textbook at the university level in several states. I am excited to know that many people, who had not formerly had an affiliation with exotica, will be introduced to some of the lesser-discussed cultural nuances of the genre, and the artistic choices that musicians are faced with when working with an artform whose whole is the sum of many different cultural parts.

JMIE website:

journal.music-in-education.org

MICHAEL CAIN ARTICLE

http://journal.music-in-education.org/pdfs/JMIE2007_Cain_article.pdf PDF – 10 pages [268 KB]

RANDY WONG’S ARTICLE:

http://journal.music-in-education.org/pdfs/JMIE2007_WongExotica_article.pdf PDF – 8 pages [532 KB]