Skip to Content

The Arts Intel Report

Jazz Birthday Broadcasts

Streaming on WKCR

Most days, the best jazz station in the world plays jazz only 40 percent of the time. But 14 times a year, WKCR at Columbia University fêtes select jazz greats with 24-hour birthday blowouts. Now working from home, the station’s stalwart, all-volunteer staff showers late April with three of the most refreshing: on the 22nd, Charles Mingus’ soulful strife; on the 25th, Ella Fitzgerald’s vintage champagne; on the 29th, the peaceable jungle of Duke Ellington. —E.E.