ABSTRACT
Jazz recordings are powerful objects. The legacy of recorded jazz functions as the backbone of the music’s history and shapes our understanding of the past. Jazz Australia was released on the prestigious Columbia label in 1967. The practice of jazz musicians drawing on a small pool of colleagues reveals that developing a common musical understanding between players is important, and once creative relationships form, they are relied upon by those involved. Pianist and composer Judy Bailey was born in Auckland in 1935 and moved to Sydney in 1960, where she quickly established herself as a highly creative jazz musician. Bailey’s contribution to Jazz Australia is her composition ‘Two-Part Sketch’. Bernie McGann’s commitment to playing jazz and ‘nothing else’ does set him apart from the other three bandleaders on Jazz Australia who, in addition to playing jazz, were also successful in other spheres of music making such as television, theatre, and club work.
