Performances + Events
We recently visited NEC’s Record Room with Jazz Studies Department Co-chair Anna Webber, who pulled albums by Wayne Shorter, Anthony Braxton, and Lee Konitz from the shelves and explained the influence those recordings have had on her musical life.
Also worth an explanation is the history of the collection, which includes more than 10,000 vinyl albums by artists Contemporary Musical Arts Department Co-chair Hankus Netsky described as “the major musicians of the 20th century.”
It’s “a brilliant musician’s record collection,” Netsky said, referring to pianist and composer Ran Blake, founding chair of the CMA Department, which for many years was the Third Stream Department, named for the term Gunther Schuller, the Conservatory’s president at the time, had coined years earlier.
Blake founded NEC’s Third Stream Department in 1972 and early on would search the Conservatory’s record collection for albums to play for his classes, Netsky said. The library though, didn’t have what Blake was looking for. Blake’s personal collection, on the other hand, was a wealth of music from around the world, and he brought those albums to NEC.
“It’s kind of like this independent, cool record library that the school has,” Netsky said, citing recordings of gospel, blues, jazz, classical, world, and folk music. “What he had was a collection curated by a musician who wanted to know everything that was going on in music,” Netsky said, pointing out that Schuller was similarly wired.
The collection includes recordings from “all traditions,” Netsky said.
“We teach by listening to recordings,” Netsky said, referencing the CMA Department, “If you’re teaching from oral tradition, you need a great collection of LPs.”
Explore the playlist above, which includes visits to the Record Room with Webber, Netsky, and Jazz Studies Co-chair Ken Schaphorst.
