One musical genre I love is funk. It really can get you out of the worse moods, connecting to your nervous system and shaking your booty and shoulders no matter how bad you felt. One musician I have enormous respect for is Maceo Parker, 98% funk-2% jazz by his own definition. Saw him twice on stage, and man, it's an inspiring (and sweaty!) experience. Hmuh! (Funky grunt.)

I just listened to one of Maceo's records (Maceo - Soundtrack). Then next think I drag and drop into Winamp is Bill Evan's Big Fun (a sax player, not the pianist), not knowing what to expect. Well, there's more jazz and less funk in that cocktail, but it's quite good too. Here's another great 2003 jazz record, not bad for a genre that like Rock has been proclaimed dead for decades. (Any good alternative rock records this year?)

And as I'm looking to all these children jazz had with funk, hip hop and electronic music, I'm realizing how much all these owe to Miles Davis, whether jazz traditionalists like it or not ("traditional jazz", now that's an oxymoron) . If you were to remove Miles Davis and James Brown before they had a chance to play with, train and influence so many people, how different would be the musical landscape today! Alternative music history would be a fascinating discipline to explore.