Did Your Favorite Musician Win at the JJA Jazz Awards? 2011 Winners List!

Congratulations to all of the winners and nominees at yesterday's Jazz Journalists Association Jazz Awards ceremony held in New York City!!

The Jazz Journalists Association  initiated its awards honoring excellence in jazz music, recordings, presentation and journalism in 1997.

At the 15th annual JJA Jazz Awards gala on June 11, 2011, a star-studded coterie of musicians, journalists and music-world movers and shakers asserted once again the unique status of these honors as jazz's only independent, international, culture-and-community-wide celebration. 

• LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT IN JAZZ - Jimmy Heath
• MUSICIAN OF THE YEAR - Sonny Rollins
• COMPOSER OF THE YEAR - Jason Moran
• UP AND COMING ARTIST OF THE YEAR - Ambrose Akinmusire 
• RECORDING OF THE YEAR - Bird Songs Joe Lovano Us Five (Blue Note)
• HISTORICAL RECORDING, BOXED SET OR SINGLE CD REISSUE OF THE YEAR - The Complete 1932-1940 Brunswick, Columbia, and Master Recordings of Duke Ellington and His Famous Orchestra - Duke Ellington (Mosaic)
• RECORD LABEL OF THE YEAR - Blue Note
• FEMALE SINGER OF THE YEAR - Dee Dee Bridgewater
• MALE SINGER OF THE YEAR - Kurt Elling
• LARGE ENSEMBLE OF THE YEAR - Mingus Big Band
• SMALL ENSEMBLE OF THE YEAR - Joe Lovano Us Five
• ARRANGER OF THE YEAR - Bill Holman
• TRUMPETER OF THE YEAR - Ambrose Akinmusire
• TROMBONIST OF THE YEAR - Wycliffe Gordon
• TENOR SAXOPHONIST OF THE YEAR - Sonny Rollins
• ALTO SAXOPHONIST OF THE YEAR - Rudresh Mahanthappa
• BARITONE SAXOPHONIST OF THE YEAR - James Carter
• SOPRANO SAXOPHONIST OF THE YEAR - Jane Ira Bloom
• CLARINETIST OF THE YEAR - Anat Cohen
• FLUTIST OF THE YEAR - Nicole Mitchell
• GUITARIST OF THE YEAR - Russell Malone
• PIANIST OF THE YEAR - Fred Hersch
• BASSIST OF THE YEAR - Christian McBride
• DRUMMER OF THE YEAR - Matt Wilson
• PERCUSSIONIST OF THE YEAR - Bobby Sanabria
• ORGANIST/KEYBOARDIST OF THE YEAR - Dr. Lonnie Smith
• MALLET INSTRUMENTALIST OF THE YEAR - Stefon Harris
• VIOLINIST OF THE YEAR - Billy Bang
• PLAYER OF THE YEAR INSTRUMENTS RARE IN JAZZ - Toots Thielemans, harmonica
• PERIODICAL/WEBSITE OF THE YEAR - JazzTimes
• BLOG OF THE YEAR - A Blog Supreme, by Patrick Jarenwattananon
• BEST BOOK ABOUT JAZZ - I Walked With Giants: The Autobiography of Jimmy Heath, by Jimmy Heath and Joseph McLaren (Temple University Press)
• BEST LINER NOTES OF THE YEAR - Steven Lasker – The Complete 1932-1940 Brunswick, Columbia, and Master Recordings of Duke Ellington and His Famous Orchestra (Mosaic)
• THE HELEN DANCE-ROBERT PALMER AWARD FOR REVIEW AND FEATURE WRITING - Nate Chinen
• THE WILLIS CONOVER–MARIAN MCPARTLAND AWARD FOR BROADCASTING - Phil Schaap
• THE LONA FOOTE- BOB PARENT AWARD FOR PHOTOGRAPHY - Jimmy Katz
• LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT IN JAZZ JOURNALISM - Bill Milkowski
• SHORT FORM VIDEO OF THE YEAR - Sonny Rollins: Getting It Back Together - Bret Primack, producer/director
• PHOTO OF THE YEAR - Sonny Rollins by John Abbott
• JAZZ HEROES - Omrao Brown, Peggy Cafritz, John Gilbreath, Dr. Maiterya Padukone, Don Z. Miller, Ed Reed, Mike Reed, Roger Spencer and Lori Mechem, Elynor Walcott and sons Paul, Frank and Lloyd Poindexter