DJ Ryan Swift

Very interesting look at the modern state of the historic 18th & Vine Jazz District in Kansas City, Missouri, the launching place for such jazz greats as Bennie Moten, Count Basie, Andy Kirk, Joe Turner, and my personal favorite swinging jazz sound.

Take a walk in the Historic 18th & Vine Jazz District in Kansas City, Missouri, and you’ll see some of the storefronts of that bygone time. Shops, cafes, clubs, all evoking those days of prosperity and depravity that contributed to one of America’s great renaissances.

Now look not even that closely and you’ll see that many of those storefronts are flat: they’re paintings, imaginary doors and awnings and windows. Behind them, boards prop up walls in weedy lots. These aren’t storefronts at all: they’re the backdrops for the 1996 Robert Altman film, Kansas City.

Read the entire piece and see photos at The Atlantic Cities blog!