Jazz Effusion

When is that backward and narrow-minded jazz critic of yours, Leonard Feather, going to start reviewing jazz-fusion???

All I ever hear about are the traditional trios and quartets--as if that’s all people buy. Hear this: Traditional jazz is out! The avant-garde jazz artists today aren’t playing Cole Porter and Gershwin. They make original music that even the pop-oriented idiots might enjoy.

Don’t you see that without reviews the public (us) has no way of gauging a group or artist. You review juvenile pop bands till I get sick with the overexposure, but don’t touch fusion. Why not? There’s a lot out there.

Need names? Here goes: the Rippingtons, the Yellowjackets, Billy Cobham, Special EFX, Bill Evans, Lee Ritenour, Steps Ahead, Indra Lesmanna, Brandon Fields, Shadowfox, Alphonse Mouzon, Passport, Spyro Gyra, Branford Marsalis, David Sanborn and Generation Band, to name a few that I have.

And how do I find them? I have to try most of them cold turkey by reading the instruments used on the back!! I think in L.A.--the recording and music capital of the world--that is pretty pathetic.

Why don’t you guys do something about it, OK?

BRENT WATERBURY

Anaheim Hills