John Handy: SFJAZZ 2009 Beacon Awardee

John Handy, a living jazz legend is being honored with the coveted SFJAZZ Beacon Award for Lifetime Achievement, Sunday, Nov. 1, 2009 at 7 PM at the Herbst Theatre in San Francisco. Sunday’s concert, like many of John’s rare appearances is going to be historic just for the personnel SFJAZZ has assembled for this tribute. I thought at one’s tribute the honoree is serenaded, but in this case John is working—there are four bands, the first three will perform first and the second set will be with a newer ensemble. This afternoon when I called I caught him at a good time, but then John is a talker and his memory is phenomenal, so our hour jaunt along the banks of his memory lane ended up being a stroll down his discography as John shared both old and new stories of the past 61 years of his professional career playing Indian music with the great sarodist/composer Ali Akbar Khan and others, along with his sojourn with the great bassist/composer Charles Mingus and Randy Weston, whom he called one of his favorite bosses. I open the program with a piece: Three in One recorded Visit http://www.sfjazz.org/concerts/2009/fall/artists/handy.php