“The pauses suggest an ego—or, better, an assurance
that you, the listener, will wait. It is the assurance of a horn player—Miles
Davis on ‘All Blues’—who comes in at his own sweet bidding, knowing that the
waiting is as much a part of the music, the desired atmosphere, as the phrase
that comes next. And that is what [WNYC-FM deejay Jonathan] Schwartz is
selling—not one record after another so much as the creation of an atmosphere
in which the Great American Songbook is, in his view, properly tendered and absorbed.
He casts the spell of steady rain at night, languorous autumn afternoons. Now
it is 1964. The Stones have issued their début record. But that is elsewhere.
Norman Simmons is at the piano. Carmen McRae sings ‘I’m Going to Laugh You
Right Out of My Life.’”— David Remnick, “The Talk of the Town-- In the Studio: Glad To Be Unhappy,” The New Yorker, November 4, 2013
In addition to David Remnick’s fine “Talk of the
Town” profile of Schwartz (pictured), by all means check out the 75-year-old
deejay’s 112 favorite CDs associated with the Great American Songbook, from The
New Yorker’s Web site. Better yet, read Schwartz’s evocative 2004 memoir, All in Good Time.
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