2025.11.24 Henry Threadgill on Ahmad Jamal - 1 of 3

2025.11.24 Henry Threadgill on Ahmad Jamal - 1 of 3

Author: Small Media Large December 21, 2025 Duration: 1:02:02
Listen to Henry Threadgill's music.  What a phantasmagoria of splendors and esoterica must animate his mind!  Don't you just want to go to that place?  Maybe for a night out on the town?  Or a picnic in The Secret Garden?  Aren't you curious about where his inspiration comes from?  You could read his autobiography, Easily Slip Into Another World: A Life in Music (in fact, we recommend you do), but why don't you spend some time with Henry, listening to music that he loves?     This Monday (11/24), for Mitch Goldman's Deep Focus, Henry Threadgill has chosen the music of Ahmad Jamal.  Can Mitch find live, unreleased recordings of Ahmad Jamal in the WKCR archives that even his greatest fans have never heard?  He hasn't failed us yet, but this one's a tall order.     Find out Monday from 6p to 9p NYC time on WKCR 89.9FM, WKCR-HD, or wkcr.org.   Or join us when it goes up on the Deep Focus podcast on your favorite podcasting app or at https://mitchgoldman.podbean.com/.  Subscribe right now to get notifications when new episodes are posted.  Just like WKCR, it's ad-free, all free, totally non-commercial.  We won't even ask for your contact info.  Learn more about Deep Focus at https://mitchgoldman.com/about-deep-focus/ or join us onInstagram @deep_focus_podcast.  Photo credit: Henry Threadgill - photo by Alan Nahigian. Courtesy of Pi Recordings. #WKCR #DeepFocus #AhmadJamal #HenryThreadgill #JazzRadio #JazzPodcast #JazzInterview #MitchGoldman   Deep Focus is a production of Small Media Large. 

Mitch Goldman, from Small Media Large, sits down with a different working musician each week for Deep Focus. The premise is beautifully simple yet endlessly revealing: together, they dive into rare archival recordings-bootlegs, demo tapes, lost studio sessions-of an artist the guest deeply admires. This isn't a standard interview format. Instead, you're listening in on a shared, intimate listening session between two knowledgeable fans. The conversation flows from technical dissection of a guitar tone to personal stories about how a particular live bootleg soundtracked a pivotal life moment. You'll hear the crackle of a vintage tape as Mitch and his guest pause, rewind, and marvel at a forgotten vocal take or an experimental arrangement that never made the official album. This podcast lives in the spaces between the famous tracks, uncovering the raw, unpolished moments that often reveal an artist's true process and passion. It’s for anyone who believes the magic isn't just in the finished product, but in the journey of how it got there. Each episode of Deep Focus feels like being invited into a private club where the sole entry fee is a genuine love for music's hidden corners.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 100

Deep Focus
Podcast Episodes
2026.01.19 Mazz Swift on Butch Morris - 3 of 3 [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:01:39
Improvisation is considered a high art form for an instrumentalist, but what about for a composer? Is it even possible to create a piece of music for an ensemble, and to hear it performed in real time? How would you go a…
2026.01.19 Mazz Swift on Butch Morris - 2 of 3 [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:07:33
Improvisation is considered a high art form for an instrumentalist, but what about for a composer? Is it even possible to create a piece of music for an ensemble, and to hear it performed in real time? How would you go a…
2026.01.19 Mazz Swift on Butch Morris - 2 of 3 [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:07:33
Improvisation is considered a high art form for an instrumentalist, but what about for a composer? Is it even possible to create a piece of music for an ensemble, and to hear it performed in real time? How would you go a…
2026.01.19 Mazz Swift on Butch Morris - 1 of 3 [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:05:48
Improvisation is considered a high art form for an instrumentalist, but what about for a composer? Is it even possible to create a piece of music for an ensemble, and to hear it performed in real time? How would you go a…
2026.01.05 Jay Rodriguez on Jim Pepper - 3 of 3 [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:04:04
Meet me at Edge City. Isn't that place where worlds collide the only one where new ideas are ever generated? Saxophonist Jim Pepper knew all about these cultural collisions. His band Free Spirits was arguably the first t…
2026.01.05 Jay Rodriguez on Jim Pepper - 2 of 3 [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:08:18
Meet me at Edge City. Isn't that place where worlds collide the only one where new ideas are ever generated? Saxophonist Jim Pepper knew all about these cultural collisions. His band Free Spirits was arguably the first t…
2026.01.05 Jay Rodriguez on Jim Pepper - 1 of 3 [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:05:38
Meet me at Edge City. Isn't that place where worlds collide the only one where new ideas are ever generated? Saxophonist Jim Pepper knew all about these cultural collisions. His band Free Spirits was arguably the first t…
2025.12.22 Will Calhoun on Jack DeJohnette - 3 of 3 [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 57:22
Plate tectonics, this idea that the very surface of the earth is not an unyielding solid, but a set of independent segments in a constant state of flow, was not always accepted as truth. It was only developed in 1967, bu…
2025.12.22 Will Calhoun on Jack DeJohnette - 2 of 3 [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:09:46
Plate tectonics, this idea that the very surface of the earth is not an unyielding solid, but a set of independent segments in a constant state of flow, was not always accepted as truth. It was only developed in 1967, bu…
2025.12.22 Will Calhoun on Jack DeJohnette - 1 of 3 [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:01:41
Plate tectonics, this idea that the very surface of the earth is not an unyielding solid, but a set of independent segments in a constant state of flow, was not always accepted as truth. It was only developed in 1967, bu…