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By Larry Blumenfeld
From JAZZIZ
Earlier this year, while writing about
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's passion for jazz,
I rode in a town car with him through
Harlem. He pointed out the sites of leg-
endary, now-defunct nightspots, such as
Minton's Playhouse and Smalls' Paradise,
markers of Harlem's significance to jazz cul-
ture. As we rode through the neighborhood,
he recalled a 1964 summer program for high
school students, a beacon of promise for
area youngsters, in which he'd participated.
These days, Harlem is experiencing a
resurgence. Minton's has reopened. And
on East 126th Street, the Jazz Museum
in Harlem continues to bloom. In its
still-nascent state, the museum amplifies
Abdul-Jabbar's points: It highlights Harlem's
storied past as a creative epicenter; and it
focuses on empowering educational op-
portunities for local students.
On many Thursday nights, musicians
and fans fill the museum's second-floor
office suite to catch "Harlem Speaks," an
ongoing series of conversations with, and
performances by, notable local musicians
and cultural figures. One recent Thursday
found cornetist and singer Olu Dara sharing
his experiences and music. On atypical
Tuesday night, saxophonist Tia Fuller
instructs the Harmony in Harlem Youth
Ensemble. And throughout the past year,
students at Thurgood Marshall Academy
earned credits in a program that offered
firsthand exchanges with musicians includ-
ing trumpeter Joe Wilder.
But these activities merely hint at
the museum's ambitious plans, which
have gained momentum ever since Loren
Schoenberg signed on as executive director
in 2002. Schoenberg, a seasoned musician
and bandleader who worked for many years
in Benny Goodman's orchestra, is also a dis-
tinguished historian, educator, and author.
"There's a golf museum, a bowling museum,"
Schoenberg said when I visited his office,
"but there's no jazz museum in this country.
That's a bit shocking to many people."
The idea for the museum sprang up in
the summer of 1995, during a conversation
between Leonard Garment, a lawyer and
politician who started his career as a jazz
saxophonist; David Levy, president of the
Corcoran Gallery in Washington, D.C.; and
Art D'Lugoff, impresario of Greenwich
Village's famed Village Gate jazz club. With
the help of a grant from the Upper Manhattan
Empowerment Zone and Abraham Sofaer,
a former federal judge and jazz fan (now
chairman of the museum's board), the
project moved slowly along. A $1 million
Congressional appropriation in 2000 kick-
started the planning process, and enabled
the enlistment of designer Ralph Appelbaum,
whose celebrated work includes the Holocaust
museum and the Clinton Library.
Appelbaum's innovative design may
end up part of the planned redevelopment
of Harlem's Victoria Theater, just down
i25th Street from the Apollo Theater.
Schoenberg and his board are also re-
searching other area venues, including
some brownstones. The museum will have
an archival component, to include Willis
Conover's Voice of America collection, for
which Garment is executor. But it won't
be a place where you'll recount history
through artifacts. "It will be built on his-
tory," Schoenberg explained, "but it will
focus on tomorrow. Live music will be an
important fixture of the institution, as will
interactive exhibits that offer the feeling
of jazz creation."
 Bassist Christian McBride, who joined
the museum last year as co-director,
stressed over the phone that this will not
be a museum in the crusty sense, focused
solely on a "Golden Age." "Subconsciously,"
he said, "people have a tendency to think,
'Okay, I gather that jazz is already dead or
that most of the guys playing today won't
be as great as those who went before.' Well,
Louis Armstrong and Miles Davis were giants, but I think Roy Hargrove is important
too. Our museum will reflect that atti-
tude." McBride envisions a museum rooted
in Harlem's 20th-century jazz tradition but
wired to the best of 21st-century technol-
ogy. He spoke excitedly of one proposed
exhibit that would bring alive the big-band
experience by placing visitors inside a
virtual band.
Schoenberg intends the museum to be
inclusive, in a way that transcends political
correctness - in concept. "Let's look at the
museum as a crossword puzzle, with jazz
as the central clue that extends across the
puzzle."
And McBride wants to reach out to
cultural figures from all walks of music and
American life - art, theater, even sports. So,
once the new venue is secured and exhibits
in place, don't be surprised to find not just
musicians like Hargrove, but also jazz folks
like Kareem.
Larry Blumenfeld is editor-at-large of
JAZZIZ. For more on The Jazz Museum of
Harlem check www.jazzmuseuminharlem.org.
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Harlem Speaks