Jazz caught on film

As you know by now, we like pictures and we like old stuff. So it was only a matter of time before the work of Gjon Mili caught our eye. Mili was a photographer for Life magazine, a job he kept from 1939 until his death in 1984. During his career, he took pictures of Pablo Picasso, Adolf Eichmann, the cast of West Side Story, Gene Kelly and more. When he wasn't on location Mili was in his New York studio - a "smoky sweaty barn of a studio", as Life wrote on October 11, 1943. Why smoky and sweaty? Because at night Mili regularly hosted jam sessions with the greatest musicians of the time: Duke Ellington, Billie Holiday, Dizzy Gillespie, Count Basie,... And naturally his camera was never far.

The energy shining through these pictures is breathtaking. However, you can't help thinking that not hearing the music is a shame. Luckily for us, at the same period, Mili directed Jammin' the Blues, a short film featuring Lester Young, Red Callender, Harry Edison, Marlowe Morris, Sid Catlett, Barney Kessel, Jo Jones, John Simmons, Illinois Jacquet, Marie Bryant, Archie Savage and Garland Finney, playing what, according to the introduction, "could be called a midnight symphony". The film was nominated for an Academy Award in 1945 in the category of Best Short Subject, One-reel.