Australian Jazz Museum

Last updated
Australian Jazz Museum
AJM logo border 300x200.tif
Australian Jazz Museum
Former name
Victorian Jazz Archive
Established1996
Location15 Mountain Highway, Wantirna 3152, Victoria, Australia
TypeJazz music museum and archive
Website www.ajm.org.au

The Australian Jazz Museum (AJM) is a jazz museum located in Wantirna, Victoria, Australia.

Contents

History

Originally founded as the Victorian Jazz Archive (VJA) in 1996, [1] with the inaugural meeting held at the then Whitehorse Hotel, Melbourne on 18 August 1996, [2] the archive was founded to address the growing concern among the jazz community that the rich Australian jazz heritage was at risk of being lost. [3] In 2014 the archive changed its name to The Australian Jazz Museum to better reflect their role, [4] after several other Australian state jazz archives closed. [5]

Collections

The museum holds an extensive collection of discs, audio cassettes, posters, books, photographs, instruments and ephemera including works by such Australian Jazz luminaries as Graeme Bell, Bob Barnard, Ade Monsbourgh, Smacka Fitzgibbon and Frank Traynor together with magazines, periodicals and newspaper articles on Australian jazz musicians and many international performers. They also hold the Australian Jazz Convention's collection. [6] [7]

The building includes a research library and is open to the public on Tuesdays and also by appointment for tours of the facilities.

Publications

The museum publishes AJazz, a quarterly magazine for members. [8] The magazine began in 1998 as VJazz, [9] before changing its name to AJazz in 2016. [10]

They also release a series of CDs titled Rare Collectible Jazz, that collect restored Australian jazz recordings. [11] The series began in 2002, [11] and has included CDs collecting Modern Jazz such as The Australian Jazz Quartet, The Three Out, and Bryce Rohde Quintet, [12] as well as early Dixieland jazz. [5] The CDs are made available for sale through the museum store. [13]

Awards

In 2002, John Kennedy was awarded an MIRA Award for Meritorious Volunteer Achievement due to his work with the AJM. [14]

In 2005, the AJM (under its former title VJA) received the Knox City Council's Knox Pride Award for Outstanding Archive of Everything Jazz. [7]

In 2007 the AJM received the Victorian Community History Awards (Best Exhibit / Display) for its Jazz Spans the Decades – A History of Jazz in Victoria exhibit. [15] That same year, AJM member John Kennedy won an award from the Australian Sound Recording Association for "outstanding achievement and leadership in the Jazz Archiving community". [7]

In 2009, the AJM received a Community Heritage Award and Grant from National Library of Australia. [7]

In 2010, the AJM won a Special Commendation in Knox City Council's Environment Awards. [7]

In 2012, the AJM received a Victorian Museum Award in the category for volunteer-run museums. [16]

In 2013, the AJM received a Sir Rupert Hamer Award for their Jazz Digitisation Project. [17]

See also

References

  1. "History Lesson". Dingo Australian Jazz Journal. 15 April 2021. Retrieved 19 February 2025.
  2. Kennedy, John; Marginson, Ray (August 2016). "20 Years On - The making of a Museum" (PDF). A Jazz (71): 3–8.
  3. Patterson, Ian (16 January 2009). "The Oldest Jazz Event in the World: Hot Times in Australia". All About Jazz. Retrieved 6 January 2012.
  4. Sutton, Ray (October 2014). "Ramblings from the General Manager" (PDF). A JAzz (64): 3.
  5. 1 2 Smith, Zachary Snowdon (6 September 2018). "The museum saving Australia's disappearing jazz records". AustralianJazz.net. Retrieved 19 February 2025.
  6. "AJC Archives". Australian Jazz Convention. Archived from the original on 12 August 2011. Retrieved 6 January 2012.
  7. 1 2 3 4 5 Baker, Sarah, ed. (1 May 2015). "The Australian Jazz Museum". Preserving Popular Music Heritage. Routledge. pp. 200–203. ISBN   978-1-315-76988-2.
  8. Barnard, Loretta (3 December 2018). "The Australian Jazz Museum: playing its own tune | Australia Explained". Australia Explained. Retrieved 19 February 2025.
  9. Victorian Jazz Archive; Australian Jazz Museum (1998), V jaz : newsletter of the Victorian Jazz Archive Inc., Victorian Jazz Archive, ISSN   2203-4811
  10. Australian Jazz Museum, (issuing body.) (2016), Ajazz : proactively collecting, archiving and disseminating Australian jazz, Australian Jazz Museum, retrieved 20 February 2025
  11. 1 2 Simpson-Bull, Ken (February 2023). "RARE COLLECTABLE JAZZ - How AJM CDs are Produced" (PDF). A Jazz (96): 11. ISSN   2203-4811.
  12. "The Cool School of the 1950s. The beginning of modern jazz in Australia | Loud Mouth - The Music Trust Ezine". 3 March 2016. Retrieved 19 February 2025.
  13. Easdown, Rod (2 May 2019). "Restoring Australian jazz of the 1930s". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 19 February 2025.
  14. "Museums Australia (Victoria) | Awards Winners 1994 - 2010". web.archive.org. 10 March 2019. Retrieved 19 February 2025.
  15. "Victorian Community History Awards - Royal Historical Society of Victoria". web.archive.org. 26 March 2022. Retrieved 19 February 2025.
  16. "Museums Australia (Victoria) | Awards Winners 2012". web.archive.org. 10 March 2019. Retrieved 19 February 2025.
  17. "Victorian Jazz Archive's Digitisation Project | PROV". prov.vic.gov.au. Retrieved 19 February 2025.
  18. Davies, Matthew. "AUSTRALIAN JAZZ ARCHIVE". The National Film and Sound Archive of Australia.

37°51′30″S145°12′30″E / 37.8583°S 145.2082°E / -37.8583; 145.2082