IAJE Goes Bankrupt

Friday, April 18, 2008 - Page updated at 12:00 AM


American jazz gathering, planned for Seattle, is canceled

By Paul de Barros

Seattle Times jazz critic

The most important American jazz gathering of the year, scheduled to
take place in Seattle in January, has been canceled because its
presenter is declaring bankruptcy.

In what is being described as a "perfect storm" of bad luck, unchecked
growth, fundraising and management failures, the International
Association for Jazz Education (IAJE) � an important link to Seattle's
successful school jazz-band scene � has collapsed.

According to IAJE's legal counsel, Alan Bergman, it will go into
Chapter 7 bankruptcy and be turned over to a trustee, its assets
parceled out to creditors.

A letter from the group's president, Chuck Owen, is scheduled to go
out to members as early as today, announcing the bankruptcy � and
essentially the dissolution � of the 40-year-old organization.

"It's a dark day," said band director Clarence Acox, whose
award-winning Garfield High School jazz band has performed at IAJE's
gathering four times.

"It's one of the best jazz events in the world, for the performances
by great musicians, clinics, meetings, a place for people to network
and exchange ideas. It was the one event when all the people in jazz
could get together and have fellowship."

Roosevelt High School band director Scott Brown, whose band has played
the conference as well, agreed.

"I'm bummed," said Brown. "We had hoped to perform, but it's way more
global than that. It's exposure to so much music that's going on
around the world, to information about the business, networking,
clinicians."

IAJE meets in different cities each year, but often in New York.

It began in 1968 as a modest professional gathering of jazz-music
teachers, holding its first conference in 1973.

In 1997, the conference embraced an "industry track," absorbing
another convention previously sponsored by JazzTimes magazine, which
brought in record companies, agents, managers, radio professionals and
high-profile performers such as Herbie Hancock and Quincy Jones.

Since then, the organization has formed chapters worldwide and has
become the site for the National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Masters
Awards ceremony; commissions of new works; an academic conference;
programs to promote women in jazz; and a wide array of other programs,
including a teacher-training institute.

In a good year, the conference attracts 7,000 to 8,000 people, a
must-attend for anyone involved in jazz.

Rumors that the organization was in trouble surfaced after this year's
dramatically underattended conference in Toronto, down 40 percent.

In a March 25 letter to 8,000 members, Owen announced the suspension
of IAJE's magazine, its search for a new executive director, its
scholarship programs and its summer retreat.

The letter also explained that the organization's ambitious capital
campaign had spent more money in startup costs than it took in.

Owen asked members to donate $25 and netted about $12,000 from 250
donors, according to Bergman. Greg Yasinitzy, IAJE's Northwest
division coordinator, said he had been told IAJE liabilities exceeded
$1 million.

Bergman said he felt the organization's rapid growth had outstripped
the expertise of its founders.

"A bunch of jazz musicians formed this organization and it grew into a
multimillion-dollar operation with a huge convention and a big staff
and big journal, but it was still run by a volunteer board elected by
the membership that met twice a year."

Though the conference in Seattle has been canceled, there is already
talk of a regional conference that may take place instead.