Commentary: Musicians' emergency fund faces challenges

        In Greek mythology, Atlas was the man condemned to carry the  
world on his back. To many aging jazz musicians, and some younger in 
age who find themselves in a bind, Wendy Oxenhorn is the female 
Atlas who tirelessly holds up their worlds. 
        Wendy Atlas Oxenhorn is executive director of the New York  
City-based Jazz Foundation of America and oversees its Jazz 
Musicians Emergency Fund. The foundation created the fund in 1991 to 
help individual musicians with medical or other problems related to 
indigence. 
        Oxenhorn, who is also a blues harmonica player, took the JFA  
job three years ago in a move that has extended and challenged her 
varied career in nonprofit social services work. 
        "We reached 300 musicians this year, which is amazing. The  
phone doesn't quit," she said. "When I first started, it was 35 a 
year." 
        Sixty of those 300 musicians were helped year this with  
problems involving homelessness and potential eviction, she said. 
"We've recruited some new doctors who give free medical care. Dr. 
Frank Forte and the Englewood (N.J.) Hospital and Medical Center are 
still doing amazing things," Oxenhorn said. "One doctor who we are 
honoring this year did three hip replacements -- and those are 
estimated at $30,000, between the hospital and his fee. It is quite 
incredible -- all free. 
        "We just found a doctor who helped with someone who had a  
bad infection requiring medication that was $200 a day. He got it 
for free. It has just been really great." 
        This year, a concert sponsored by a local insurance company  
raised enough money to hire a part-time social worker and provide 
enough cash for the foundation to survive through this week's major 
annual fundraiser. That grand event on Thursday night at the 
historic Apollo Theater is called "A Great Night in Harlem." 
        It will include performances by saxophonist Jimmy Heath's  
All-Star Big Band, Branford Marsalis, Jon Faddis, Abbey Lincoln, 
Frank Wess, Charles Davis and Stanley Jordan. There will be a 
tribute to late singer Nina Simone by Cassandra Wilson, Cyndi Lauper 
and Simone's daughter, Lisa, who has starred in the Broadway 
productions of  "Rent" and Elton John's staging of "Aida" and sang 
in the acid-jazz band Liquid Soul. Scheduled celebrity hosts include 
Bill Cosby, Chevy Chase, Whoopi Goldberg and Quincy Jones. 
        Oxenhorn said she hopes to announce on Thursday a financial  
services company's two-year commitment to build the first in a 
series of residences for musicians in need -- complete with modest 
rehearsal/performance space. 
        In general, the emergency fund helps musicians who are at  
least 50 and have been in the business at least 10 years. While the 
vast majority of cases involve metropolitan New York musicians, 
Oxenhorn gets calls for aid -- and helps -- musicians across the 
U.S. The needs vary from case to case and are handled 
confidentially, unless the musician decides to disclose the 
information. 
        At last year's Apollo Theater concert, trumpet great Freddie  
Hubbard told the audience that the foundation made mortgage payments 
for several months on his California home when he was unable to work 
while recovering from a heart ailment. 
        "When you don't have insurance, or only partial insurance,  
and one big medical thing happens, you're done. There go your 
savings -- if you have any to begin with," Oxenhorn said. "Most 
musicians don't have savings anyway. The guys at his level would, 
but it can be wiped out in a moment." 
        Oxenhorn said it takes roughly $350,000 to run the fund for  
a year, in addition to the donated services it is able to arrange. 
        "I'm just trying to build it to enough visibility that  
somebody will give us a corporate or personal endowment from which 
we can operate on its annual interest earnings," she said. 
        The cases in which the Jazz Musicians Emergency Fund gets  
involved in are varied, have mixed results and sometimes hit close 
to home for Oxenhorn. 
        An 86-year-old drummer named Doc Pittman performed decades  
ago with Louis Armstrong. "He was the first man to let me up on a 
bandstand several years ago when I started playing the harmonica," 
Oxenhorn said. "I had no idea that years later, I'd be helping him 
in his later years." 
        When Pittman was hospitalized and died after a fall, "I had  
to go through his effects for three days because he had no 
relatives. No one," she said. "I buried him with his drumsticks. 
        One whom she assisted this year is singer-songwriter Jimmy  
Norman, who co-wrote the classic R&B song "Time is On My Side" for 
Irma Thomas. It became a much bigger hit for the Rolling Stones in 
1967. 
        "He had sold his rights to the song for next to nothing -- I  
think it was under $200," Oxenhorn said. "He has emphysema and a 
heart condition. We helped clean up his apartment. We found a 
cassette of him and Bob Marley writing tunes that had never before 
been heard. He used to write with Bob Marley and helped him get 
established in this country. They ended up selling the cassette at 
Christie's (auction house). Our help also prompted him to also find 
some other tunes he'd written some years ago that he's forgotten 
about, and he's coming out with a CD. He's a magnificent singer." 
        For every emergency that Oxenhorn resolves, another soon  
surfaces and requires renewed energy. 
        "This is no handout," Oxenhorn tells each musician. "This is  
just what you should have gotten a long time ago from selling your 
CDs."