Following are just a few of the many, many articles and reviews Franz received throughout his life. We hope you enjoy reading more about him:
Indianapolis/Chicago Examiner.com - November 13, 2009
Neil Tesser
Looking for someplace to go Saturday night? What about Dowagiac? Dowagiac, Michigan is about two hours’ drive from downtown Chicago. That’s 115 miles or so by road – maybe 75 miles as the crow flies (but the crow gets to fly over Lake Michigan, and you don’t).......Full Story
South Bend Tribune - November 8, 2009
Howard Dukes
It had been a while since Michelle Jewell had seen Tom Bartlett, the trombonist for The Original Salty Dogs. But when Jewell ran into him at the Elkhart Jazz Festival, she wanted to make one request. But first, Jewell had to reintroduce herself.,.......Full Story
Chicago Tribune - October 6, 2009
Howard Reich
The great reedist-vocalist died last year, at 95, but anyone who heard him never will forget him. Fans from Chicago and beyond will converge on Dowagiac, Mich., next month to remember Jackson,.......Full Story
Chicago Jazz Magazine - September 30, 2009
A long-standing Chicago jazz staple, the world-renowned Salty Dogs will bring their old-school, traditional jazz sound to Michiana with a concert at The Wood Fire Italian Trattoria in Dowagiac, Michigan on Saturday, November 14, 2009 at 7:00pm.......Full Story
Dowagiac Daily News - September 30, 2009
John Eby
A longstanding Chicago jazz staple, the world-renowned Salty Dogs will bring their old-school, traditional jazz sound to Michiana with a concert at Wood Fire Italian Trattoria in Dowagiac on Saturday, Nov. 14, at 7 p.m. A favorite of jazz audiences throughout the country and around the world, the Salty Dogs have performed at some of the biggest jazz festivals......Full Story
South Bend Tribune - November 6, 2008
Howard Dukes
Trumpeter Marcus Belgrave didn’t get a chance to attend Franz Jackson’s 95th birthday bash in November of 2007.
“I had another engagement in Detroit on that day,” he says about missing what turned out to be one of Jackson’s last public appearance before his death on May 6. Instead, the Detroit-based trumpeter will bring his Marcus Belgrave Jazz Experience to the Wood Fire Trattoria on Saturday night for a benefit in Jackson’s honor.......Full Story
Dowagiac Daily News - October 13, 2008
John Eby
Marcus Belgrave, Ray Charles' longtime trumpeter, had an engagement last November which prevented him from taking part in Franz Jackson's 95th birthday gala at Dowagiac Middle School Performing Arts Center. Belgrave made a video greeting for Jackson, "but he never did see it," Belgrave recalled by phone Friday from Detroit. "He passed that morning" last May. The tribute instead played at Mr. Jackson's memorial service......Full Story
Chicago Jazz Magazine - July/August, 2008
Lisa Roti
Those of us even remotely related to the Chicago jazz scene over the past ten to seventy years are likely to have crossed paths with reeds man, Franz Jackson. Whether we were aware of it at the time or not, he was the closest link to jazz history we would ever approach outside of a book or recording. And if you were paying attention, every casual encounter was a lesson.....Full Story
Point of Departure - August, 2008
Art Lange
The first liner notes I ever wrote were for a Franz Jackson album. That’s how I intended to start this column, after hearing that Franz had passed away in May of this year, age 95, because, for as long as I can remember, I believed that statement to be true. It seems like ancient history now, but I can picture myself sitting at my desk in the old down beat office on Adams Street, downtown Chicago, when the phone rang and Franz.....Full Story
The Independent (London) - May 24, 2008
Steve Voce
The last survivor of the golden age of jazz when King Oliver and Louis Armstrong walked tall in the Chicago of the Roaring Twenties, the saxophonist Franz Jackson played with bands led by Fats Waller, Earl Hines, Roy Eldridge and Fletcher Henderson, among others. Those bands were part of the spine of jazz in the first half of the last century....Full Story
Jazz Institute of Chicago - May 12, 2008
Daniel Melnick
Franz Jackson, legendary Chicago tenor player who lived to see and play his 95th birthday party, passed away last week....Full Story
Chicago Tribune - May 8, 2008
Howard Reich, Tribune Critic
Franz Jackson 1912 ~ 2008 Legendary Chicago saxophonist Franz Jackson dies at age 95, Worked with such jazz greats as Louis Armstrong and Jelly Roll Morton......Full Story
Chicago Public Radio - May 8, 2008
CityRoom
Produced By Gianofer Fields
Franz Jackson, one of the few remaining tenor saxophone players of the Pre-Swing era jazz passed away this week at the age of 95. Franz Jackson began his life long love affair with the saxophone at the age of twelve....Full Story
Dowagiac Daily News - May 8, 2008
Obituary
Franz Robert Jackson / Nov. 1, 1912-May 6, 2008
Franz's life began on Nov. 1, 1912, in Rock Island, Ill., the son of Frank and Effie (Rice) Jackson....Full Story
ArtsJournal Weblog - May 8, 2008
Howard Mandel
Talk about a legendary career: Chicago saxophonist and clarintest Franz Jackson, who died at age 95 on May 6, spanned American vernacular music from the Roaring '20s to the postmodern present. He began as a 16-year-old professional with stride and boogie woogie pianist Albert Ammons....Full Story
Chicago Reader - May 7, 2008
Peter Margasak
Chicago has just lost perhaps its greatest living link to its earliest jazz history with the death of reedist Franz Jackson....Full Story
The Christian Century - February 3, 2008
Pastor Christian Coon, Christ United Methodist Church, Deerfield, IL
KURT VONNEGUT, the renowned writer and self-avowed humanist, once said that his epitaph should read, "The only proof he ever needed of the existence of God was music." I wonder if Vonnegut had been listening to Franz Jackson....Full Story
Dowagiac Daily News - November 5, 2007
John Eby
"Happy Birthday" doesn't usually shoot electricity through an audience. But then it isn't usually played - at least not in Dowagiac - with a New Orleans jazz flair....Full Story
South Bend Tribune - October 28, 2007
Howard Dukes
Franz Jackson still loves to play, and jazz musicians such as Larry Dwyer say Jackson still plays very well....Full Story
Dowagiac Daily News - October 23, 2007
John Eby
"That's one of the reasons for this gala, is for people who don't know a lot about him to hear him and for him to get back all the joy he's given out to other people,".......Full Story
Niles Daily Star - October 17, 2007
John Eby
Other than it will start with a video slide show encapsulating his amazing career and end with a jam session, it's hard to know what to expect in between at the gala concert planned for Sunday, Nov. 4,....Full Story
Dowagiac Daily News - October 1, 2007
John Eby
A gala celebration concert is planned for Sunday, Nov. 4, in Dowagiac to commemorate the 95th birthday of Chicago jazz legend, tenor-saxophonist Franz Jackson....Full Story
Chicago Tribune - September 21, 2007
Howard Reich
He was once a star, a Chicago pianist who practically epitomized the musical genre he helped perfect.
But his name, Albert Ammons, and the music he championed, boogie-woogie, practically have vanished from public awareness in the United States. Earlier jazz giants such as Louis Armstrong and Jelly Roll Morton still hold a significant place in American musical memory. Yet Ammons' keyboard virtuosity -- which richly deserves to be remembered -- survives mostly in history books, and in the admiration of a small cadre of connoisseurs....Full Story
South Bend Tribune - November 4, 2005
Lou Mumford
The sweet sounds still flow from Franz Jackson's tenor saxophone, just like they did when he performed during Prohibition. That's right, Prohibition. Jackson, at 93, is one of the last musicians to have learned old-style Chicago jazz and to have performed during the big-band era....Full Story
University Wire - April 4, 2005
Jeff Danna
In the jazz world, age ain't nothin' but a number. On March 19, several of Chicago's oldest and most influential tenor sax players proved that by blowing up a storm with the Chicago Jazz Ensemble in the Great Chicago Tenor Saxes at the Art Institute's Rubloff Auditorium, 230 S. Columbus Drive....Full Story
Chicago Jazz Ensemble Announces Sixth American Heritage Jazz Series First with Artistic Director Jon Faddis - January 16, 2005
The Chicago Jazz Ensemble (CJE) announced today that it will kick off its Sixth American Heritage Jazz Series Sunday, February 13, 2005, at the Field Museum with an innovative jazz inspired blues concert featuring legendary blues guitarist Lonnie Brooks. This year's celebration "The Roots of Chicago Jazz" features four programs representing the evolution of jazz in Chicago....Full Story
Chicago Sun Time - September 2, 2003
Kevin Whitehead
"Struttin' With Some Barbecue," Franz Jackson sang, but no fires burned in Grant Park on Sunday. "It Might As Well Be Spring," Karrin Allyson chimed in. Spring in the tropics. The open-air Chicago Jazz Festival is usually lucky, weather- wise, but on the last day of the 25th edition luck ran out....Full Story
The Jerusalem Post - November 11, 2002
Barry Davis
Next Friday's appearance of 89-year-old Chicago-based reedman Franz Jackson at the Tel Aviv Museum will be something of a landmark occasion for our own small jazz community....Full Story
The Daily Herald - November 8, 2002
Steve Zalusky
Urban renewal and civic neglect have swept away virtually all visible traces of Chicago's glorious jazz past. Gone are the Vendome and Regal Theatres. The same for the Lincoln Gardens and the Dreamland Cafe. Some stubborn remnants survive, such as the hardware store on 35th Street that once called itself the Sunset Cafe, where Louis Armstrong reigned as king of the trumpet in the 1920s. One flesh-and-blood monument, however, remains: the seemingly indestructible force of nature that is reedman, composer and arranger Franz Jackson....Full Story
Chicago Daily Herald - November 8, 2002
Steve Zalusky
Urban renewal and civic neglect have swept away virtually all visible traces of Chicago's glorious jazz past. Gone are the Vendome and Regal Theatres. The same for the Lincoln Gardens and the Dreamland Cafe. Some stubborn remnants survive, such as the hardware store on 35th Street that once called itself the Sunset Cafe, where Louis Armstrong reigned as king of the trumpet in the 1920s. One flesh-and-blood monument, however, remains: the seemingly indestructible force of nature that is reedman, composer and arranger Franz Jackson....Full Story
Chicago Daily Herald - November 1, 2002
Barbara Vitello
Celebrated Chicago reedman Franz Jackson celebrates his 90th birthday today at Andy's Jazz Club, 11 E. Hubbard St., Chicago, followed by a show Saturday at Pops Highwood, 214 Green Bay Road, Highwood....Full Story
The Jerusalem Post - September 20, 2002
Barry Davis
These days the epithet "legend" is attached to almost any artist who has been around for a few years and has achieved a high degree of media exposure. But, veteran jazzman Franz Jackson is, truly, a living legend....Full Story
Chicago Sun Times - January 21, 1994
Dave Hoekstra
The late jazz singer Edith Wilson developed much of her bawdy phrasing and buoyant soul from years of portraying Aunt Jemima, first on radio and later in advertisements and appearances at pancake breakfasts.
St. Pioneer Press - January 21, 1990
Bob Protzman
Cornetist Charlie Devore of the Hall Brothers New Orleans Jazz Band said it well Friday night at the Emporium of Jazz in Mendota after hearing guest saxophonist Franz Jackson play four numbers. "It's like sitting next to Coleman Hawkins and Ben Webster and Franz Jackson all rolled into one," he exclaimed....Full Story
Chicago Sun Times - December 19, 1989
Dave Hoekstra
Traditional-jazz clarinet and saxophone player Franz Jackson named his first band the Original Jass All Stars because jass is a derivative of the French verb jaser (to speed up). Further on down the line, he played with effervescent bandleader Fats Waller, trumpet player Roy "Little Jazz" Eldridge and Fletcher Henderson. Jackson, 77, has outlived all of them....Full Story
New York Times - June 29, 1981
John Wilson
''GOIN' TO CHICAGO,'' a survey of Chicago jazz since the 1920's that was presented at Carnegie Hall on Saturday evening as part of the Kool Jazz Festival, touched most essential bases - the traditional jazz played by young Chicagoans in the 20's, the blues, the hard-driving swing groups of the 1930's and 40's, the post-bop combos of the 1950's and 60's and the avant-garde musicians of the 70's...Full Story
