Home » Jazz Articles » Out and About: The Super Fans » Meet Kenneth Cobb
Meet Kenneth Cobb
I take personal pride in knowing that my ancestors created this cherished form of music that has survived and been passed down through generations. Just the pure creativity, imagination, skill, and knowledge required to be able to both play and improvise on a piece of music amazes me.
Tell us a bit about yourself.
First, thanks for the opportunity to be recognized as a Jazz Super Fan, and to participate in this series. I feel honored and humbled. I'm a Detroit native, born and raised, the middle of seven children, and am now a retired electrical engineer living outside Baltimore, Maryland. I have an MBA in finance, an MS and BS in electrical engineering, and a BS in engineering science. My 32-year professional career included Westinghouse in Baltimore; the FAA (government contractor), in Washington, DC, Northern Virginia, and south New Jersey; and NASA Ames (government contractor) in Silicon Valley. During my career, I was also an adjunct math professor at Stockton State College and Atlantic Community College. After I retired, I was a high school substitute math teacher for a year. I continue to tutor math free of charge. My passions other than jazz are Black theatre (plays, dance, choirs), independent films, writing, and current events. In my free time, I've self-published 12 books thus far, including two jazz journals entitled, New York City Jazz Chronicles: June 2013—December 2015, and Jazz Excursions Coast-to-Coast: 2010—SF Bay Area/NYC, as well as a family reunion newsletter in newspaper format.As of late, ironically, from having to read four children's books as part of tutoring my nine-year-old-niece with her summer reading assignment, I've gotten back into reading. I recently completed My Life with Earth, Wind and Fire by Maurice White, I Alone Can Fix It: Donald J. Trump's Catastrophic Final Year by Carol Leonnig and Philip Rucker, and Black Is the New White by Paul Mooney. I'm currently reading Griot: Examining the Lives of Jazz's Great Storytellers, Vol. I by trumpet player
Jeremy Pelt
trumpetb.1976
Art Taylor
drums1929 - 1995
Charlie Parker
saxophone, alto1920 - 1955
Thelonious Monk
piano1917 - 1982
John Coltrane
saxophone1926 - 1967
Miles Davis
trumpet1926 - 1991
Jimmy Heath
saxophone, tenor1926 - 2020
Wayne Shorter
saxophone1933 - 2023
What's your earliest memory of music?
Growing up in Detroit and coming of age in 1970s, I was into Motown, R&B, and funk. Between record stores, neighborhood bands, the church choir, and local radio stations CKLW, WJLB, WJZZ, and WCHB, music could be heard everywhere. My mother played piano; she was classically trained. My father's sister, also classically trained, played piano, too. During Sunday afternoon visits, my mother and aunt would alternate at the piano playing church hymns, spirituals, Christmas carols, and other music. Without realizing it, my dad and the seven of us kids were taking in free concerts while watching the Detroit Lions or Pistons on television.How old were you when you got your first record?
I paid half my tuition to private high school and had only a Detroit Free Press paper route, so I don't recall buying any albums, though I'm certain I purchased many 45's. I believe the first album I bought was
Bob James
pianob.1939
Eugene McDaniels
vocals1935 - 2011
As a freshman at the University of Michigan that fall, I was big into jazz fusion with Bob James,
Grover Washington, Jr.
saxophone1943 - 1999
Roy Ayers
vibraphone1940 - 2025
Donald Byrd
trumpet1932 - 2013
Herbie Hancock
pianob.1940
Ramsey Lewis
piano1935 - 2022
David Sanborn
saxophone1945 - 2024
Weather Report
band / ensemble / orchestra
Return to Forever
band / ensemble / orchestra
Stanley Turrentine
saxophone, tenor1934 - 2000
Freddie Hubbard
trumpet1938 - 2008
Milt Jackson
vibraphone1923 - 1999
George Benson
guitarb.1943
Ron Carter
bassb.1937
"
data-original-title="" title="">Deodato, 
Paul Desmond
saxophone, alto1924 - 1977
Kenny Burrell
guitar, electricb.1931
Hubert Laws
woodwindsb.1939
Chet Baker
trumpet and vocals1929 - 1988
Bill Evans
piano1929 - 1980
Idris Muhammad
drums1939 - 2014
Hank Crawford
saxophone, alto1934 - 2009
Johnny "Hammond" Smith
organ, Hammond B31933 - 1997
What was the first concert you ever attended?
The first I recall was an
Earth, Wind & Fire
band / ensemble / orchestraDeniece Williams
vocalsb.1951
Was there one album or experience that was your doorway to jazz?
Yes! In the late '70s, after growing my jazz fusion collection very well, but not yet having heard the "real stuff," I was introduced first to
Lee Morgan
trumpet1938 - 1972
Clifford Brown
trumpetb.1930
Max Roach
drums1925 - 2007
Dizzy Gillespie
trumpet1917 - 1993
Horace Silver
piano1928 - 2014
John Coltrane
saxophone1926 - 1967
Dexter Gordon
saxophone, tenor1923 - 1990
I have what I call my Big Seven:
Louis Armstrong
trumpet and vocals1901 - 1971
Duke Ellington
piano1899 - 1974
Thelonious Monk
piano1917 - 1982
We hear you're a bit of a record collector.
My quest for more of this swinging, burning, ballad, and bluesy music, and the artists playing it, continued into the 1980s as I tirelessly searched the bins of several new and used record stores in Ann Arbor, Detroit, Baltimore, DC, Philadelphia, south Jersey, and New York City. Man, I was definitely on a mission!As a result, I have about 3,400 record albums and approximately 5,200 CDs! I also have to mention that thanks to CD reissues in the early 1990s, I was able to get hold of many outstanding Blue Note, Capitol/Pacific, Emarcy/Verve/Mercury, Prestige/Riverside, Savoy, Impulse, and Columbia recordings from the 1950s/60s. Japanese import CDs and Mosaic box sets also helped out tremendously. Nowadays, thanks to the independent labels and to self-produced CDs, great jazz music is still accessible.
Since albums started phasing out in the early 1990s (I was one of the last holdouts), I hesitantly switched over to CDs. I still long for that hissing (clean analog) sound when the needle is placed on the record...
In fact, if I may digress, for music connoisseurs of a certain age (not hoity-toity audiophiles), it was all about building up one's sound system step-by-step so that when you purchased a new jazz album, you'd rush home to your "listening room" (aka "man cave"), carefully remove the album from the album cover and sleeve, place it on the turntable (NOT the "record player"), manually move the needle over and slowly lower it, turn up the volume, listen for the clarity of the sound, then proceed to start reading the liner notes and memorizing other album details (e.g., personnel, recording dates, studio, recording engineer, label, etc.) for later reference or argument. The better the stylus, the cleaner the sound! And you could always judge a person by the way they handled an album. If they touched the grooves, you'd cringe and your pulse would shoot up!
What does such a committed vinyl listener do for music when they're away from home?
For frequent long car trips, I used to burn my own 80-minute jazz CDs containing favorite tunes. To date I have a collection of 461 "best of" CDs, what the younger generation would call mix tapes.And since CDs started phasing out in the early 2010s, I hesitantly switched over to exclusively downloading music via iTunes or artists' websites, and now I have lots of jazz on my iPhone for long drives, flying, or just running errands. I've never utilized software or services that allowed one to download music free of charge without paying the artists. I always thought and felt it was simply outright stealing, period!
How long have you been going out to hear live music?
In the mid-1980s, I began attending jazz shows after work, mostly all by myself, at two DC venues, both in Georgetown: Charley's (owned by Charley Byrd) and Blues Alley. The two notable performances I recall were by
Oscar Peterson
piano1925 - 2007
Sarah Vaughan
vocals1924 - 1990
During out-of-town family visits and annual reunions, I discovered the Jazz Kitchen in Indianapolis (where I saw the
Pat Martino
guitar1944 - 2021
Dan Faehnle
guitar
Chicago Soul Jazz Collective
band / ensemble / orchestraWhen I relocated from the East Coast to the West Coast in August 2001 due to a job change, I was introduced to additional Bay Area jazz clubs (Savannah Jazz, the Purple Onion, Anna's Jazz Island) and festivals (the Stanford Jazz Workshop, San Jose Jazz Festival, Healdsburg Jazz Festival, Oakland Jazz Festival, and San Francisco Jazz Festival). I also discovered the Los Angeles jazz clubs: Catalina Bar & Grill, the Jazz Bakery, and Charlie O's, frequently trekking five-and-a-half hours on I-5 South on weekends. Over the next four years, my free time was consumed with (mostly) West Coast jazz clubs, festivals, plays, independent films, and record stores.
When did you finally get to the New York clubs?
Ironically, during the many years I lived in Baltimore, as well as five years in south Jersey, I never ventured to New York City for jazz. Amazing, and what missed opportunities, when I think about those fertile years (1981-2000) and the many jazz artists I missed seeing. Well, that's life—I was quite busy with my career, graduate studies, teaching, local jazz shows, record stores, movies, playing sports, hanging out with the fellas, and chasing women!Then, in late 2006, dealing with the loss of both parents in 2005, I decided to plan a week-long visit to the Mecca of the jazz world: New York City!
I had a wonderful, unforgettable week of great jazz shows at night, sightseeing, and matinee plays during the day, reasonable accommodations, and pretty good food. I captured my experience in an essay entitled, "NYC Jazz Pilgrimage Summary/Highlights."
What's the most trouble you've gone to to get to a jazz performance?
In 2007, while living on the West Coast, I undertook the effort to compress a week's worth of jazz concerts into a weekend. Being an engineer at heart, I figured it out! I'd take Fridays off from work, fly to New York early in the evening, take in four shows with staggered start times for three nights (12 total), see movies or sightsee during the day, then fly back first thing Monday morning and, with the three-hour time difference, arrive back into the Bay Area by noon, in time for work. No problem!I started out slowly with eight such weekend trips in 2007, emailing out my itinerary in advance to jazz buddies and a few jazz artists, then increased every year to a high of 24 trips in 2010 (220 total shows). That year, I was essentially an East Coast "jazz cat" half the time, and a West Coast "surfer dude" or "rocket scientist" the other half of the time. I slowly trailed off each year with only three weekend trips in 2013 for a total of 82 trips over a span of seven years.
In the process, many jazz artists and other frequent jazz patrons who saw me in practically EVERY jazz club in New York City thought that I actually lived there! Throughout, with me being naturally conversational, I found most jazz artists, both young and old, to be very approachable and personable. To this day, I make it a point to speak to visiting jazz artists when they come to Baltimore or Washington, or when I see them in the airport. It's funny that the young upstarts I first saw in 2006 are now doing their thing big time in 2021.
Then, when I returned to the East Coast in June 2013, I went to New York City for jazz practically every Saturday for the next two-and-a-half years, this time via car (a three-hour drive from Baltimore), seeing four shows each time, then driving back home afterwards, usually leaving Smalls at 1:30 AM. This came to an abrupt end due to the "Blizzard of 2016" that January. I saw a total of 496 jazz shows in 123 trips and documented each Saturday's itinerary and band members, along with my brief "Reflections" on each evening.
That's dedication! What is it about live music that makes it so meaningful to you?
The first thing that comes to mind when I'm sitting in a jazz club anticipating the start of a set is: Wow, I feel so lucky and blessed to be in a financial position to be here listening to LIVE music, to have the opportunity to witness such a beautiful art form full of rhythm, melody, and harmony. On the way in, I may have had a chance to poke my head into the back room, or at the bar, to wish the cats, "Hey, have a great set!" I take personal pride in knowing that my ancestors created this cherished form of music that has survived and been passed down through generations. Just the pure creativity, imagination, skill, and knowledge required to be able to both play and improvise on a piece of music amazes me. For the next 70 minutes, I'm about to hear artists come together to play a set of tunes, including originals, standards, blues, ballads, burners, mid-tempo, etc., all the while displaying excellent musicianship, camaraderie, and give-and-take with the audience.I also think of how, only in jazz, could you sit twenty different pianists in front of the same Steinway—let's say Monk, Duke,
Art Tatum
piano1909 - 1956
Bud Powell
piano1924 - 1966
Wynton Kelly
piano1931 - 1971
Bill Evans
piano1929 - 1980
Tommy Flanagan
piano1930 - 2001
Phineas Newborn, Jr.
piano1931 - 1989
Erroll Garner
piano1921 - 1977
Hank Jones
piano1918 - 2010
Gene Harris
piano1933 - 2000
Cedar Walton
piano1934 - 2013
Herbie Hancock
pianob.1940
Chick Corea
piano1941 - 2021
Barry Harris
piano1929 - 2021
Ahmad Jamal
piano1930 - 2023
Monty Alexander
pianob.1944
Cyrus Chestnut
pianob.1963
Benny Green
pianob.1963
Joey Alexander
pianob.2003
Is there one concert that got away that you still regret having missed?
Even though I'd seen
Roy Hargrove
trumpet1969 - 2018
Curtis Lundy
bassb.1955
Carmen Lundy
vocalsb.1954
If you could go back in time and hear one of the jazz legends perform live, who would it be?
Thelonious Monk. If I had a second selection, it would be John Coltrane.What makes a great jazz club?
The piano sound, acoustic bass microphone volume (make sure I can hear it), lively (NOT talkative!) crowd, courteous wait staff, friendly greeters, ambiance, buzz, etc. Since I have so many favorite New York City jazz clubs, I can't choose one favorite. I've enjoyed them all over the years: Smoke Jazz & Supper Club, Dizzy's, the Village Vanguard, Smalls Jazz Club,
Mezz Mezzrow
clarinet1899 - 1972
My favorite jazz clubs outside New York include: Yoshi's Oakland, SFJAZZ Center (San Francisco), Blues Alley (Washington, DC), Keystone Korner Baltimore (Baltimore), Caton Castle (Baltimore), An Die Musik (Baltimore), " data-original-title="" title="">Kuumbwa Jazz Honors Band (Santa Cruz), and Bach Dancing & Dynamite Society (Half Moon Bay).
Which club(s) are you most regularly to be found at?
Depending on who's performing: Smoke, Dizzy's, Village Vanguard, Smalls, Mezzrow, Birdland, Blue Note, Jazz Gallery, and Django's. Since I try to maximize my out-of-town visits, I see my favorite artists wherever they appear.Is there a club that's no longer around that you miss the most?
The Kitano and the Jazz Standard, both of which closed during the COVID-19 pandemic. I'm really going to miss Gino Moratti, who booked performances at the Kitano. He passed in January.Do you have a favorite jazz anecdote?
Several, but this one in particular stands out. While living in the Bay Area, I attended the annual two-week Healdsburg Jazz Festival, located in wine country approximately 70 miles north of San Francisco. In June 2007, its closing Sunday afternoon outdoor concert featured the
George Cables
pianob.1944
Cecil McBee
bassb.1935
Billy Hart
drumsb.1940
Billy Harper
saxophoneb.1943
Eddie Henderson
trumpetb.1940
Craig Handy
saxophoneb.1962
David Weiss
trumpetb.1964
Lonnie Liston Smith
keyboardsb.1940
How do you discover new artists?
Independent jazz label websites: a special shout out to Jazz Depot, Cellar Live, Posi-Tone, Sunnyside, Mack Avenue, Smoke Sessions, WJ3, Whaling Sound, Origin/OA2, Capri, and Steeplechase independent labels, just to name a few, whose websites I constantly check for new releases.Jazz magazines, websites, and radio stations: All About Jazz (new releases), Downbeat magazine (new releases), Jazziz website (reviews), Jazzweek website (Jazz Chart/Jazz Add Dates), Hot House magazine, jam sessions, and WEAA (Baltimore), WPFW (Washington, DC) and KCSM (San Francisco Bay Area) radio stations.
Vinyl, CDs, MP3s, streaming?
Mostly streaming via iTunes nowadays, and sometime CDs purchased directly from the artists after concerts. This way, the artist receives the monies directly. I've had a few instances when artists, because I'm always inquiring about their next release and am a huge jazz fan, just give me free copies of their new CDs. I always offer to pay, but they refuse.If you were a professional musician, which instrument would you play and why?
Probably piano or guitar. I've always liked the piano (took short-lived lessons as a young teen) and I now have my late mother's grand piano, purchased by my father for her back in 1994. I've also liked the guitar (
Wes Montgomery
guitar1923 - 1968
Grant Green
guitar1935 - 1979
Kenny Burrell
guitar, electricb.1931
Joe Pass
guitar1929 - 1994
George Benson
guitarb.1943
What's your desert island disc?
Very difficult choice... I'd have to go with John Coltrane's Giant Steps.What do you think keeps jazz alive and thriving?
These up-and-coming young lions who display raw talent. The fact that many universities and colleges now feature experienced jazz performers on their jazz program faculties makes a huge difference. It also has given established jazz artists more deserved opportunities in the world of academia. And thank God for independent jazz labels!Finish this sentence: Life without music would be...
...very sad indeed. In general, the performance arts (music, dance, theatre) add so much to the quality of life, and the world is much better with the international language of jazz. I know my life certainly is!Is there anything else we should know about you?
Spike Wilner
pianoYou can see Kenneth's writings here.
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Out and About: The Super Fans
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Wes Montgomery
Grant Green
Joe Pass
Spike Wilner
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