Sometimes I feel uncomfortable when looking back at the earliest issues of JAZZIZ. Visually, they weren’t much to look at. Thankfully, that period during which the magazine was new and awkward lasted only a few years. Then the appearance of the magazine began to improve dramatically. Today, it’s much easier on the eyes. During the
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With champagne taste and a beer budget, I remember assigning our first JAZZIZ cover-photo session to Los Angeles-based photographer Chris Cuffaro. Thankfully, Chris was in the early stages of his photography career. Before long, he was landing gigs with A-list artists, athletes and Hollywood actors, and his photos were featured on hundreds of album covers.
When Chris Cuffaro was unavailable for a few shoots, I met with Jeff Sedlik, another Los Angeles-based photographer. Jeff’s work has graced some of our best covers, the most celebrated of which featured a photo that Jeff snapped during a day he spent with Miles Davis in Malibu. To schedule the date, I contacted Miles’ manager, Peter Shukat, who resisted but agreed to allow me to send samples of Jeff’s work to Miles. Impressed, Miles agreed to the shoot, but suddenly changed his mind when Jeff showed up at his home. After some schmoozing at the front door, Miles allowed Jeff and his crew inside, and the shoot was on. A few days later, I returned to Miles’ house to show him the results of the entire session. I decided to use his favorite shot for the cover story. My favorite shot from that session is, 30 years later, on the cover of this issue.
The photo of Dave Brubeck was taken by Sedlik in the back yard of Brubeck’s home in early 1993. The temperature that day was below freezing, so right after this photo was taken, Dave and the camera crew headed back into the house (where the cover shot to the left was taken) to thaw out.
The best George Benson photos I’ve ever seen were from this Jeff Sedlik session. George liked them too. When this issue came out, I met George for a drink in the hotel where we were both staying. He wanted to sit in the corner to avoid being recognized, but when Whitney Houston’s “The Greatest Love of All” came over the barroom speakers, he suddenly stood up and loudly started singing along.
James Minchin was another Los Angeles-based photographer who shot some beautiful JAZZIZ covers in the mid-’90s. Through James, I met his assistant Tom LeGoff, who was preparing to move to New York City. Soon I began assigning cover shoots to Tom in the Big Apple. Tom has been with us ever since, and has done more photo shoots for us than anyone. One of my favorites, from which this shot is taken, is a session he did with Eliane Elias.
This is a photo from Tom Legoff for Diana Krall’s first national magazine cover shoot. After hearing Diana at the Five Spot in New York City shortly after her debut album was released, I promised her producer, Tommy LiPuma, that I’d run her on an upcoming cover. That cover appeared on talk shows and in newspapers as the world was being introduced to this inevitable star.
I remember walking into Chick Corea’s Madhatter Studios for the first time, and seeing a floor-to-ceiling painting of his Romantic Warrior album cover. That was the first jazz album I owned. I decided to create a similarly awesome cover for a story about Chick that we’d soon be running. The cover shot we used, taken by Tom LeGoff, captured Chick with his head strikingly tilted downward.
During this time, singer Jane Monheit was the talk of the town. She had no idea what was up our sleeves when Tom LeGoff asked her to pose for some photos in a leopard-print leotard. One of those shots worked perfectly with the “Me Jane” cover story that we ran.
Geri Allen sat through several wardrobe, hair and set changes before Tom LeGoff shot this beautiful sepia-toned photo.
The subject of Tom LeGoff’s favorite session for us was a young Esperanza Spalding. Tom was crushed to learn that Esperanza hated the cover photo we used. She said it made her look “so young and innocent.” On a sunnier note, Esperanza liked the LeGoff photos of her that appeared inside the magazine.
For her cover shoot, Cécile McLorin Salvant requested that we commission New York City-based photographer Mark Fitton. We hadn’t worked with Fitton before, but we were pleased to discover that his work with Cécile resulted in a few classic shots, including this one.
