Jazz in the New Millennium:
Live and Well
Revised Edition 2024
By Rick Mitchell
Dharma Moon Press in partnership with Da Camera of Houston $29.95 Print + shipping
October 21, 2024
Press Release
Dharma Moon Press is pleased to announce the publication of Jazz in the New Millennium: Live and Well, Revised Edition, by Rick Mitchell. The 8 ½ by 11 book contains interviews with 84 prominent jazz musicians active in the 21st Century, including such living masters as Charles Lloyd and Pat Metheny, prime time players Jason Moran and Christian McBride and rising stars Esperanza Spalding and Cecile McLorin Salvant.
As Mitchell says in the introduction, “I am shaping the narrative with the questions I ask, and my analysis of the music is never too far from the surface. But as an interviewer, my primary objective is to let the musicians speak for themselves.”
The first edition was published in 2014 by Dharma Moon Press and DaCamera of Houston. At a hefty 275 pages, Jazz in the New Millennium: Live and Well, Revised Edition includes 40 new chapters, and dozens of new photos.. The book is easy to read and full of useful information for those who want to educate themselves about jazz and/or stay current with the latest trends and new artists. The book offers the most comprehensive overview of what is happening in jazz today that exists in print.
Rick Mitchell is a radio programmer, journalist and teacher living in Portland, Oregon. He has been writing about all forms of music for national and regional newspapers and magazines for 50 years. From 1989 to 1999, he was the jazz and popular music critic for The Houston Chronicle. His previous books include Garth Brooks: One of a Kind, Workin’ on a Full House (Simon and Schuster, 1993) and Whiskey River (Take My Mind): The True Story of Texas Honky Tonk (University of Texas Press, 2007). Since 2015, he has produced a weekly one-hour radio program, also called Jazz in the New Millennium, syndicated nationally by the African American Public Radio Consortium.
In Jazz in the New Millennium: Live and Well, Revised Edition, Mitchell argues that the greatest music of the first 25 years of the 21st Century holds its own with any previous era of jazz, as the most talented musicians from around the world continue to find their way to this music and bring their unique cultural perspectives to the tradition of Duke, Monk and Trane. “Will young listeners 50 years from now discover the recordings of Cecile McLorin Salvant and Joshua Redman and approach them with the same reverence we now have for Billie Holiday and Lester Young?” he asks. “I don’t know,” he answers, “but I am here to make the case that they should…”
Jazz in the New Millennium Revised Edition is available for purchase at select independent music and book stores and by mail order at www.rickmitchell.us. To request a review copy, please email [email protected]. The author is available for interviews.
Praise for the First Edition
“From Randy Weston, Roy Haynes and Wayne Shorter to Jason Moran, Robert Glasper and Esperanza Spalding, Jazz in the New Millennium profiles nearly 60 leading jazz artists who are keeping the tradition alive and well in the 21st Century. Sincere thanks to Rick Mitchell and Da Camera of Houston for this invaluable addition to the jazz scholarly canon.”
Dr. Robert Morgan Director of Jazz Studies Emeritus High School for the Performing and Visual Arts
Rick Mitchell In the News
Houston Chronicle, Houston 8/8/2014
Writer Profiles 21st-Century Jazz Greats in New Book
Willamette Week, Portland, OR, 7/30/2014
Hotseat: Rick Mitchell, A Former Portland Musician and Writer on the State of Jazz Right Now
Houston Press, Houston, 7/29/2014
Houston Author Rick Mitchell on Modern Jazz: “There’s too Much Good Music Out There”
Houston Chronicle, Houston, 8/1/2014
Jazz in the New Millennium: Live and Well, An Excerpt from Rick Mitchell’s New Book
To read an excerpt from the Introduction, click here.