Having made some promises last week concerning the future of this blog, I thought it best to take a few minutes to let you know what I’ve done so far to fulfill those promises.
My first promise was that by the end of today, June 15, I would have removed all the “Index To Reviews Posted Here” messages, because the older links still point to the old site.
That has been done. (If you happen to stumble upon a copy of the “Index” that I missed, please let me know where you found it. I will take it down right away. Thanks!)
My second promise was that by the end of this month, June 30, I would have updated all the links so they point to the proper location on http://www.saturdaynightjazz.com, and I further promised that the “Index” would from then on have a permanent home on the “About” page here.
Beginning with JFASN #73, which was the last review posted to http://www.saturdaynightjazz.blogspot.com, I have worked my way back through the list to JFASN #55. I fully expect to be finished with this project ahead of time, but there are still a lot of things I need to do besides this, so I’m not going to move up the date. But the “Index” will be updated and back online by the end of the day on June 30.
My third promise was that by the end of July, I will have taken down all of the remaining reviews posted on BlogSpot and replaced them with placeholders pointing to this site.
I have not begun this project yet, other than the dozen or so reviews that I initially took down right after I moved the blog to its present location. It will be completed on time.
My final promise was that beginning September 6, I will return to publishing reviews here weekly instead of every other week. To bring this about I have done three things.
First, I have already selected the next seven albums that I intend to write about here, and I’ve set up a written schedule of when each review will be published. My intention is to continue to add to this list until I reach a point where I have an even dozen albums selected and scheduled. Then it will be a matter of adding a new one to the list every time I publish a new review.
Second, I have completely changed the way I create the reviews you see here. Until now, I have written each review completely on its own, first word to last, all on the same day it was to be published. Occasionally (ahem) this has led to reviews being published later in the evening than I really cared for.
No more.
I am now working on a sort of assembly line, beginning with writing the biography portion of each review, one after the other. This section of the reviews has always been problematical for me because it’s not always easy to decide what information needs to be included no matter what and what can be skipped over, and still do the artist justice.
That takes time, sometimes longer even than listening to and writing about the music!
Then there is the matter of little-known artists who are so obscure that there is scant information available about them, yet they are too talented to ignore. They take even more time to become informed about.
Not to make excuses, but I have to point out that, beside my volunteer commitments, I do still also have a 40 hour a week day job. Believe it or not, I do not always get home from work in the evening thinking “Oh boy! Now I get to sit at my laptop and write for four hours!” 😉
So there you have it. I firmly intend to uphold my promises and have a new review published here each and every Saturday, beginning in September.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to publish this so I can go downstairs to my turntable. My copy of the next album you are going to read about here (that would be next Saturday evening, June 21) is a 2-disk vinyl LP from the late 1970’s. I think I’m going to rearrange my brand new schedule and at least begin writing the review of it today.
Thanks for reading this.
Al Evans
Wood Village, Oregon
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If you represent a jazz artist with an album you feel would “fit in” here, whether a new release or what I call “pre-existing jazz,” please contact me at saturdaynightjazz@yahoo.com. I will provide you with an address you can submit a review copy.
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My original content, including photos other than album covers, Copyright © 2014 by Al Evans. All rights reserved.
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