Jazz Giant Artie Shaw Dies at Age 94

Giant doesn't begin to describe Artie Shaw. I remember reading old interviews with Shaw in Downbeat magazine when I was a teenager. I thought him an arrogant, opinionated jerk.

Years of listening and learning from him helped me to realize that he was arrogant. He was opinionated. And, finally, he was more genius than jerk.

Hank Garland passed earlier this week. A random auto accident robbed the world of years of wonderful music from his guitar. Shaw laid down his instrument in 1954, never to play again. One could argue, that decision robbed us of a half-century of great music. I think, though, that we needed those fifty years and more to understand the gift he had already given.

He was a thorny, irascable, son-of-a-bitch and my heart hurts for his passing.

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How can I respond to this? I need my dad to discuss everything there is to discuss about this GIANT. And my DAD is long gone. I used to say these things come in threes, but it's much worse now, maybe because of the earthquake/tsunami?!? Artie Friggin' Shaw, you don't notice they're gone until they ARE.