JAM: June/July 2003 Issue: Coda

Valve trombonist, composer, recording artist, bandleader, educator and KC native Bob Brookmeyer, whose acclaimed 50-year career in jazz
began in the clubs of 18th & Vine
in the 1940s.

Recognition
"The American Jazz Museum celebrates Kansas City's rich jazz heritage..." -- from the AJM's "Museum History," May 13, 2003.

At the May 13 meeting of the American Jazz Museum's Board of Directors -- of which I am honored to be a part -- Board Chairman Emanuel Cleaver directed that a Recognition Committee be formed in order to establish criteria for proper acknowledgment of those individuals, past and present, who have done so much to put (and keep) Kansas City on the map. I am happy to be a member of that committee, along with committee chair Mike White, one of KC's most respected jazz musicians (and attorneys). Dr. Wayne Goins, the Director of Jazz Studies at Kansas State University, has been nominated to join us.

Stay tuned for updates as the AJM goes about affording much-deserved (and belated) recognition to Kansas City-connected jazz artists of local, national and international repute. It is an impressive list of candidates, and one that includes...

Trumpeter and recording artist Carmell Jones (1936-1996), also a Kansas City (KS) native, who rose to international prominence in the early '60s and played on Horace Silver's Song For My Father.

Singer and recording artist Marilyn Maye, whose strong KC ties go back more than 50 years and whose many admirers over the decades have included Steve Allen, Ella Fitzgerald and Johnny Carson.

And yes, that only scratches the surface.