The jazz program has been especially rich at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts this season. As befits a national institution, the center aims to honor jazz masters while also supporting younger musicians and new music. A case in point is the flurry of visitors during the last month. February 9th, for example, saw bassist/composer Dave Holland bring his new sextet to the Terrace Theater. This ensemble is a mixture of old and new for Holland, with Robin Eubanks a holdover

The Fish Middleton Jazz Scholarship Fund (FMJS) is a non-profit organization that was created in memory of Elmore "Fish" Middleton to continue his vision of the perpetuation of jazz and supporting emerging jazz artists. Its major event is the annual East Coast Jazz Festival that I have reported on in previous years (www.jazzreview.com/articledetails.cfm?ID=4059). This year's event has had to be postponed, however, due to construction at the Doubletree (soon to be Hilton) hotel in Rockvill

As another example of how large scale jazz events can work, The Duke Ellington Jazz Festival enjoyed its second year October 4 - 8 with an even more ambitious program than last year, sponsoring activities that seemed to encompass the whole of the District of Columbia. The more than fifty performances were held in major venues such as the Kennedy Center, the Library of Congress, the National Gallery of Art, the Inter-American Development Bank, the National Museum of Women in the Arts, the Duke El

The name Hariprasad Charasia may not be well known to jazz lovers but he is virtually a household name in India and in Indian classical music circles world wide. He is best known as the premier performer on the bansuri, or bamboo flute, but he has also written the scores of several very popular Bollywood movies. He has also collaborated with jazz musicians in a number of Indo-jazz fusion projects, most notably with guitarist John McLaughlin. He has also worked with San Francisco Bay Area

The jazz program at the University of Maryland continued as it began this season with quality, as the Maria Schneider Jazz Orchestra followed the McCoy Tyner Septet into the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center. The difficulty in describing any performance by this award-winning ensemble comes from finding superlatives that haven't already been used. Perhaps the best compliment to pay Ms. Schneider's work and her ensemble is that it shows how far jazz has come and what its potential is becoming.