Stan Getz responsible for current financial crisis

[Daniel A]

According to an article today in one of Sweden's leading newspapers, Dagens Nyheter, Stan Getz is partly to blame for the ongoing financial crisis of the world. The reason is that Alan Greenspan, once a saxophone player, eventually gave up music after having played alongside Stan Getz and subsequently launched a career in economics. An article in The New York Times last week, Taking Hard New Look at a Greenspan Legacy explores Greenspan's guilt in the housing bubble, and the Swedish newspaper concludes that things might have been different had Greenspan pursued his musical career.

Edited October 14, 2008 by Daniel A

[jazzbo]

According to an article today in one of Sweden's leading newspapers, Dagens Nyheter, Stan Getz is partly to blame for the ongoing financial crisis of the world. The reason is that Alan Greenspan, once a saxophone player, eventually gave up music after having played alongside Stan Getz and subsequently launched a career in economics. An article in The New York Times last week, Taking Hard New Look at a Greenspan Legacy explores Greenspan's guilt in the housing bubble, and the Swedish newspaper concludes that things might have been different had Greenspan pursued his musical career.

Hah, that's a good one. Best chuckle I've had all day!

[T.D.]

Clever, thanks.

I'm not a Greenspan fan, but I don't think Getz was the immediate cause of Greenspan giving up music.

I first saw the Getz anecdote in a review of Greenspan's autobiography. But upon reading the book, I found that the encounters in question took place when Greenspan was in high school (they practiced together when AG was around the age of 15 iirc), and he realized that he simply didn't have Getz's talent. But he still played, even professionally, for several years afterward.

[Larry Kart]

Clever, thanks.

I'm not a Greenspan fan, but I don't think Getz was the immediate cause of Greenspan giving up music.

I first saw the Getz anecdote in a review of Greenspan's autobiography. But upon reading the book, I found that the encounters in question took place when Greenspan was in high school (they practiced together when AG was around the age of 15 iirc), and he realized that he simply didn't have Getz's talent. But he still played, even professionally, for several years afterward.

The question is whether Greenspan was better than Leonard Garment:

"Two of the gentlemen in the Henry Jerome Orchestra also grappling with these [beboppish] arrangements [by the young Johnny Mandel et al.] were none other than Alan Greenspan -- future Chairman of the Federal Reserve -- on bass clarinet and saxophonist Leonard Garment, eventually to become an unfortunately overly busy counsel during the administration of Richard Nixon. Garment and Greenspan became great friends on the bandstand and it was this bond that led the former to put up the latter for the job of Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, Nixon later naming Greenspan to his nearly infinite Federal Reserve stewardship."

[Christiern]

I think Dagens Nyheter nailed it!

[Larry Kart]

Other members of the boppish Henry Jerome Orchestra of 1944-5, along with Greenspan and Garment, were Al Cohn, Tiny Kahn, and Al Haig.

[Dave James]

On the upside, it spared us the possibility of Greenspan/Giberto.

Up over and out.

[medjuck]

I heard an interview with Johnny Mandel on Fresh Air where he said Greenspan did all their tax returns for them.

[RDK]

On the upside, it spared us the possibility of Greenspan/Giberto.

[Claude]

Blame it on the Bossa Nova

[Larry Kart]

Other members of the boppish Henry Jerome Orchestra of 1944-5, along with Greenspan and Garment, were Al Cohn, Tiny Kahn, and Al Haig.

I think I read that some years later Garment hired Al Haig to play at his son's Bar Mitzvah.

[Swinging Swede]

Mosaic should release The Complete Alan Greenspan Recordings.

[AllenLowe]

Garment did hire Haig for the bar mitzvah - when I worked for the Jazz Museum in Harlem I asked him about this -

[Denis]

Daniel, great story. I was really intrigued by this.

I tried to track down this article in the Dagens Nyheter for October 14 2008.

To no avail. Could you help me find it please.

Thanks for your help

Denis