Covering the Scene Has Filled Her Heart, Not Her Coffers

Seven years ago this month, Myrna Daniels made a decision that changed her life: She expanded the newsletter she had been writing on jazz in Los Angeles into the L.A. Jazz Scene--now a respected monthly journal that offers interviews, club and album reviews, news and schedules of events at local venues.

“It was a pretty dramatic choice,” Daniels says. “I had no background in journalism or publishing or music.”

Daniels had to borrow money to get started and gave up a room in her Burbank home for office space. She began to spend more time in clubs to write reviews. On her free nights, she found herself handling the myriad tasks involved in getting the paper ready for its print date, which is the last Friday of the month. All this, and the paper was a “great drain financially” for the first two years, she says.

But Daniels, who works for the nonprofit Head Start program in the San Fernando Valley, says that she’s glad she’s hung in with her tabloid-sized venture. The paper, which seven years ago had a press run of 10,000 copies, now publishes about 38,000 copies each month and has grown from the initial 16 pages to the current 28. And while she still carries some debt from the paper’s outset, the L.A. Jazz Scene has enough ads to pay for itself--”though there’s no salary for me,” she says.

Daniels apparently isn’t in this for the money, however.

“It’s still satisfying to go into a club and hear what the musician is going to give me,” she says. “There’s still an element of surprise. Jazz is challenging music. It works at you, and you have to constantly work to get somewhere with it. To understand any one musician, period or style, you have to really work, and that’s challenging.”

She finds interviewing to be another rewarding experience. She’s written about such artists as Hiroshima’s Dan Kuramoto, saxman Rickey Woodard, trumpeter Wallace Roney and singer Al Jarreau.

“The interviews have helped me understand the musicians, what they get out of the music, how they become creative people,” she says. “The creative process, that’s what interests me, and in a roundabout way, I have come to understand my creative process by exploring it in others.”

And while her paper may not have led to a jazz renaissance in Los Angeles, Daniels believes that it has helped.

“The more we do, the stronger jazz here gets,” she says. “Jazz won’t ever die, but it won’t grow, either, if we don’t do something. The paper is our little way of making a contribution to the culture of Los Angeles.”

* The L.A. Jazz Scene can be found in nightclubs and records stores throughout Los Angeles. It’s free, but mail subscriptions at $20 a year are available. Write to L.A. Jazz Scene, 12439 Magnolia Blvd., No. 254, North Hollywood 91607.

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Jazz on Cable: Black Entertainment Television has taken a major step toward its planned 24-hour jazz network with “Jazz Central,” a two-hour telecast that will air daily at 8:30 p.m. The show, hosted by BET’s Angela Stribling, premieres Monday and will consist of performance footage and interviews.

Monday’s show includes a performance by the GRP All-Star Big Band and an interview with Bruce Lundvall, president of Blue Note-Manhattan Records. On Tuesday, Chick Corea and Carl Anderson are spotlighted, and David Benoit and Ramsey Lewis are scheduled for Wednesday. Future shows will feature Grover Washington Jr., the Brecker Brothers, Benny Green and Stanley Turrentine.

BET spokesman Craig Muckle says the 24-hour jazz network, originally scheduled to be launched this month, will start next year, though no date has been set.

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Swing Time: Orchestras led by Steve Allen, Frank Capp and Med Flory highlight “Big Band Bash,” produced by Robert Widener and Patricia Winston and held Thursdays at the El Rey Theatre in the Mid-Wilshire area. The series, which opened Thursday night with Ray Anthony’s band, continues this Thursday with Allen. Capp, with gutsy blues singer Barbara Morrison, plays Oct. 6, and Flory, Supersax and the L.A. Voices perform Oct. 13. Shows are at 8 and10 p.m.; tickets, $15 and $20. Information: (213) 936-3790.

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Back to the Lighthouse: Ex-bassist and bandleader Howard Rumsey returns Tuesday to his old haunt, the Lighthouse in Hermosa Beach, talking about the bands he led there for more than two decades, in a benefit for Arts Hermosa, which supports arts causes in the beach city. The event also features drummer Bobby White’s band. Information: (310) 374-3813.

More Lighthouse: The legendary Lighthouse, where jazz used to be spotlighted seven nights a week, has gone mostly to a blues and rock policy, says Jim Harvey, assistant manager. “But we’re game for more jazz,” he says. “We’re expanding our bookings, featuring jazz a couple of Tuesdays in October. As more people come around for it, we’ll have more.”

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Critic’s Choices: Frank Strazzeri and Bill Perkins investigate both originals and jazz classics tonight at Legends of Hollywood in Studio City, and pianist Gerald Wiggins will offer a relaxed view of improvising at the room on Saturday.