Wendy Oxenhorn on the Jazz Foundation of America

BIRTH OF THE JAZZ FOUNDATION OF AMERICA [:90] RUFFIN: NOW A JAZZ MOMENT Dizzy under THE JAZZ FOUNDATION OF AMERICA GIVES MEDICAL, FINANCIAL, AND LEGAL ASSISTANCE TO BLUES AND JAZZ MUSICIANS. LIKE MANY GREAT IDEAS, IT WAS BORN OUT OF NECESSITY. EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, WENDY OXENHORN. OXENHORN: All these wonderful people started the Jazz Foundation. It had been the Jazz Museum, in New York, run by Ann Ruckert. And I think the Rockefellers had given them space and something happened to the space, and they couldn't be there anymore. And they sat around the table and they were like: “We can't let this go. Let’s do something. We have to keep the music alive.” Then, a couple of years later, Dizzy Gillespie got cancer. He was at Englewood Hospital. They were helping him. They said, "Dizzy, what can we do?" He said, 'You can treat all the uninsured musicians.'" RUFFIN: THE JAZZ FOUNDATION HAS DONE THAT AND MORE. OXENHORN: This is helping people who would never ask for help. This is helping people who work six and seven nights a week until three in the morning for next to nothing for the love of the art, and just to pay their rent. [beat] It's been over a thousand musicians now that were uninsured that have had their lives changed.
THIS JAZZ MOMENT WITH NEA JAZZ MASTER WENDY OXENHORN WAS PRODUCED BY THE NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR THE ARTS.
Excerpt of “Stay On It” composed by Tadd Dameron and Dizzy Gillespie from the album, Dizzy Gillespie and His Orchestra, used courtesy of Antigo Records and by permission of Warner Chappell Music Inc. [ASCAP]