Back in the 1980s, Jimmy Woode was living in Switzerland, and on a whim I asked him to come down to Ascona to talk about Ellington in the symposium I used to run there. We ended up playing together, and talking together (a lot). After that we kept in touch, and he was always a great help with anything to do with my playing. Today’s Jazz Library is a good example of one of those conversations – we demolished a bottle of Harvey’s Bristol Cream as we sat up late into the night talking about the old days…
